The creator of Paddington Bear, a marmalade-loving refugee from Peru who entertained generations of children with his exploits in London, died on Tuesday aged 91.
Michael Bond, who named his bear after the London railway station where Paddington arrived, died following a short illness, his publisher HarperCollins said.
Wearing a tag on his coat that read “Please look after this bear”, Paddington came from “deepest, darkest Peru” in Bond’s 1958 story “A Bear called Paddington”.
Bond said the inspiration for the character came when he spotted a teddy bear in his flat, and wondered what would happen if a real bear landed at Paddington Station.
The original Paddington Bear which starred in dozens of BBC television programmes sits on a stack of marmelade sandwiches in London on April 29, 1997. REUTERS/Dennis Owen
