Winnie The Pooh Is Nearly 100 Years Old.

From childhood to grandparenthood, how E. H. Shepard's illustrations continue to charm generations.

Mark Raynes Roberts

I imagine many of you growing up were introduced to the classic Winnie-the-Pooh children’s books by British author A.A. Milne, (1888 - 1956) first published in 1926. I was. As my mother read and turned the pages, what captured my imagination were the beautiful illustrations by E. H. Shepard, OBE, MC (1879 - 1976) whose pencil drawn imagery has become synonymous with the characters nearly 100 years later.

I remember flipping through the dog-eared pages of the books we had at home, (they had been my sister’s books originally) to view the linear drawings of the comforting warm characters Shepard had imagined.

Not that I want to devote much attention to Walt Disney, but he even adhered to Shepard’s original renderings, recognizing the beauty of the drawings that were familiar to children, a wise decision in building their Winnie-the-Pooh movie popularity between 1977 and 2018.

Interestingly, there is a Canadian connection to the honey-loving character too, as it was based on a real-life bear who lived in the London Zoo, thanks to a Canadian soldier and veterinarian named Harry Colebourn. Originally from Winnipeg, Harry had bought the small baby cub, (which he named “Winnie” after his home town) prior to taking a train to Quebec, and heading off for World War I. Young Winnie quickly became his troop’s mascot. When Harry’s orders came to go to the front, he was told in no uncertain terms that he could not bring Winnie along. Consequently, he loaned ‘Winnie” to the London Zoo in Regents Park.

Canadian soldier Harry Colebourn with his pet bear “Winnie” the inspiration for A.A. Milne’s children’s books.

It turned out “Winnie” became a roaring success with the visitors, and especially A.A. Milne and his young son, Christopher Robin, who were regular visitors to the zoo, quickly naming his own toy teddy bear “Winnie the Pooh” by combining the name of his friend’s pet swan called “Pooh.” Milne was inspired to write the stories of Winnie-the-Pooh’s adventures for his son’s enjoyment, and would later bequeath the original manuscripts to the Wren Library, at Trinity College his alma mater at Cambridge University.

It always delights me to learn instances of when art comes from real life experiences.

Author A.A. Milne, (left) an original drawing of Pooh Bear, Piglet and Christopher Robin playing “Pooh Sticks,” and illustrator E. H. Shepard seen in his Lodsworth studio, in Sussex.

A. A. Milne was born in Kilburn, north London, and was taught at Henry House School, where H.G. Wells was one of his teachers. He also attended Westminster School before studying Mathematics at Trinity College, Cambridge. He served in both World Wars (as a Lieutenant in WW1 and as a Captain in WW2.) After World War I, he wrote three novels and eighteen plays.

In 1913, he married Dorothy Selincourt, and their son Christopher Robin was born in 1920, moving to “Cotchford Farm” in the village of Hartfield, in East Sussex. The location of the famed “Pooh Bridge.”

The collaboration of Milne and Shepard began in 1924 when a mutual friend, E.V. Lucas, suggested to E.H. Shepard that he might illustrate Milne’s verse book “When We Were Very Young.” Although Milne and Shepard knew of the other’s work, they had never met. After their first meeting in 1924, Milne sent Shepard a note of thanks: ‘If you are always as jolly and as crack right as this, I shall consider myself very lucky in my collaboration.’ Milne continued to have an interest in the illustration process, having the illustrations returned to him with each batch of verses and occasionally replying with suggestions for new ones, and by the time Milne was writing his storybook Winnie-the-Pooh, Shepard was accepted as the man to illustrate it. 

The Lodsworth residence and studio of the late E.H. Shepard who created “Winnie the Pooh” just around the corner from Sarah’s parents country home with a view of the South Downs.

Sarah and I have walked past this house (seen above) numerous times, and also St Peter’s Church cemetery where E. H. Shepard and his second wife Nora Carroll, are both buried.

Born in St John’s Wood, London, to wealthy parents, he attended St Paul’s Boys School, where he showed great promise as an artist winning a Landseer scholarship in 1899, and British Institute Prize the following year. In 1904, he married Florence Eleanor Chaplin, (who sadly died in 1927, at the age of 44) having become very successful in producing book illustrations for editions of Tom Brown’s Schooldays, David Copperfield and various other books. He is also famous for being the illustrator of the Wind In The Willows, written by Kenneth Grahame in 1908, and first illustrated by Shepard in 1931.

He was also a prolific painter and showed at the Royal Academy of Arts and the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool. During the First World War as an acting Captain, he received a Military Cross for his courage and coolness under fire. In 1916, he was tasked with working for the Intelligence Department, and amazingly continued to contribute his illustrations for Punch Magazine. After the war, he began to work as a lead cartoonist for the publication until Milne approached him to illustrate his books.

Shepard’s original 1926 illustrated map of the Hundred Acre Wood, which features in the opening pages of “Winnie-the-Pooh, sold at Sotheby’s in London for $600,000 in 2018, setting a new record for book illustrations.

Realizing Shepard’s contribution to Winnie-the-Pooh’s success, Milne insisted Shepard receive a share of his own royalties. I can’t imagine that happening in today’s competitive publishing world, but it was a different time and a gentler one.

Shepard wrote two autobiographies Drawn From Memory (1957) and Drawn From Life, (1961) and in 1972, bequeathed his papers and illustrations to the University of Surrey, which form the E. H. Shepard archive.

St. Peter’s Church graveyard where E. H. Shepard is laid to rest. Sarah and I at a footbridge that Sarah’s mother, Joan, designated a “Pooh Bridge” after her grandchildren arrived on the scene. We would throw a stick in the small river on one side, make a wish, and if the stick came through to the other side, the wish would come true - or so we told the children!

As I mentioned earlier, Sarah and I have visited her parents home many times in Lodsworth, where Shepard also lived between 1955 and his death in 1976. It seems inconceivable to think that the famous map illustration of Hundred Acre Wood, created in 1926, wasn’t inspired by the Sussex scenery close to his home. Although Milne’s “Pooh Bridge” is located in Hartfield, East Sussex, it could just as easily be here in Lodsworth.

Whenever we visit, Sarah and I will always walk down to Shepard’s “Pooh Bridge” just like Christopher Robin, Piglet and Pooh, to play Pooh Sticks, and then hike over the Downs to refresh ourselves at the Halfway Bridge Inn for a pint of Sussex’s finest ale, and hopefully a roast beef dinner. Thank goodness some things in life never change, and are every bit as charming today as they were 100 years ago.

Sarah and I, having enjoyed our lunch in the 250-year-old Halfway Bridge Inn, located between Petworth and Midhurst, in the heart of the South Downs National Park.