Volume 1, No. 14. August 10, 2001
Bear care
By one measure, the worst place to be a teddy bear would seem to be Colorado
Springs, Colorado. Every year some 600 stuffed animal dolls are treated for
ailments ranging from minor cuts and bruises to having the stuffing loved out
of them. Yet, by the same measure, teddy bears get the best care in this city,
thanks to an annual Teddy Bears Day promotion at Cheyenne Mountain Zoo which
has become the attraction's third best drawing event of the year behind Christmas
lights and Halloween haunts.
"In February and March we start getting phone calls asking us when we're doing
Teddy Bear Days," said Sean Anglum, the zoo's public relations and special events
manager. Local people apparently want to make sure they don't inadvertently
schedule a vacation that would cause them to miss the event held on a weekend
in the middle of July, he said.
For the two-day promotion, children 11 years old and under who bring a stuffed
animal are admitted to the zoo for $1, a $4 savings off the regular gate price.
They are referred to the Special Pavilion area where volunteer health care officials
set up a clinic to conduct checkups on the stuffed critters. Inevitably, every
bear leaves the clinic with at least a bandage or splint. "The kids come up
with the greatest stories," Anglum said. "'Oh, it keeps falling off the bed
and breaks it legs.' Every kid seems to want to have a Band-Aid on his bear."
The volunteers also have sewing kits, extra doll eyes and stuffing material
to make real repairs on the plush toys.
The promotion began 10 years ago as a partnership with a local hospital who
wanted to ease young children's fears of visiting emergency rooms. Two years
ago when the hospital pulled out of the promotion, other sponsors jumped in,
including the Colorado Springs Dental Hygienists Society; Farmers Insurance,
who distributed child ID kits; the Pikes Peak Library District, who this year
signed up more than 100 children for library cards in the two days; and the
local minor league hockey team, which, notes Anglum, is "big on gauze and bandages."
A local ambulance service also participated in this year's Teddy Bear Days.
Three emergency medical technicians performed CPR on bears and applied defibrillation
paddles to "revive" some, while nearby a bedraggled teddy lay on a gurney wearing
an oxygen mask. That bear, the medical technicians told children, didn't wear
his seat belt.
At the end of the day, after the families with their cared-for bears in arm
strolled about the zoo, the children were invited back to the pavilion for a
teddy bear parade accompanied by the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo's and sponsors' mascots.
The parade ends up at the real bears' enclosures where keepers give a talk on
the teddies' living kin. This, though, is not the event's primary message. "Going
to see the real bears is really an afterthought," Anglum said. "The primary
mission is to get kids comfortable with medical personnel." The event also has
helped Cheyenne Mountain Zoo build strong relationships with other community
entities. Plus, the $1 admission ticket for bear-carrying kids packs the zoo.
"We see some of the bigger families coming out on Teddy Bear Days," Anglum said.