Module 3: Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World's Most Famous Bear

Module 3: Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear

Book Summary:

This is the story of a mother who tells her young son, Cole, the story of a man and a bear. The story begins one hundred years earlier with a veterinarian named Harry Colebourn. He is called up to care for the animals in the war and has to leave his beloved Winnipeg behind. On his way to report for duty he encounters a man with a baby bear. After much thought he decides to purchase the bear and take it along with him. The colonel is not pleased to see this bear when they arrive, but is immediately taken with the bear. Harry chooses to name the bear Winnipeg, Winnie for short. The bear proves to be a very useful companion and trains with the other soldiers. When the time arrives for the men to go fight, Harry makes the difficult decision not to take Winnie along with them to France. He instead chooses to take him to the London Zoo to live. Here a new story begins. A story of love and friendship and family. One that will forever forge the lives of young Cole, Harry, and Winnie, the world’s most famous bear.

APA Reference of Book:

Mattick, L. (2015). Finding Winnie: The true story of the world’s most famous bear. New York: Little, Brown and Company.

Impressions:

This was an amazing story with such beautiful illustrations. As I read the story I was immediately drawn into the young mother’s story to her son and with the turn of every page was pulled deeper into the amazing story. I had several friends read this book and we all gasped at the same surprising point. There was an unexpected revelation and then it got even better. It is important to go into this story with no more than that much information. Don’t read any spoilers about this book. Everyone should read this story and go into without any additional information. This book is at the top of my favorites list. It is a surprising story with so much to make it endearing. This story will stand the test of time and is sure to be a classic. Everyone who has read it so far wants to own this priceless story. I do not want to give too much away because it’s important to allow the story to unfold on its own. It is a truly spectacular story that you will want to read over and over.

Professional Review:

A mother tells a true bedtime story about the bear that inspired Winnie-the-Pooh’s name.

Mom tells little Cole about Harry, a veterinarian in Winnipeg “about a hundred years before you were born.” En route to his World War I muster, Harry buys a bear cub from a trapper and names her Winnipeg “so we’ll never be far from home.” Winnie travels overseas with the Canadian soldiers to training in England, but when they ship out to France for actual combat, Harry leaves her at the London Zoo. “That’s the end of Harry and Winnie’s story,” but another section begins, about a boy named Christopher Robin Milne who plays with Winnie at the London Zoo. Christopher Robin names his stuffed bear Winnie-the-Pooh after her, and his father—A.A. Milne, of course—takes the name and runs with it. Mattick’s prose has a storyteller’s rhythm and features the occasional flourish (repeating “his heart made up his mind”); Blackall’s watercolor-and-ink illustrations have a peaceful stillness that’s welcome in a book that, though not about combat, concerns the trappings of war. A photo album includes snapshots of Winnie with her soldiers and with Christopher Robin. The piece has something of a split personality, and the Winnie-the-Pooh angle comes so late it seems almost an afterthought.                                        

Beautiful but bifurcated, with the two stories in one making it a challenge to determine the audience. (photo album) (Picture book. 5-8)

Kirkus  Reviews (2015, June 23). [Review of Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear by Lindsay Mattick]. Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved from https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/lindsay-mattick/finding-winnie/

Library Uses:

Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World’s Most Famous Bear could be used to introduce students to the history behind a beloved character. Students could also find the story helpful when preparing to write a narrative in English. This is a good example of the telling of a past event. I also believe that the surprise that comes in the story, for those who don’t who this story is about, can help show students how to create interest in their own writing.