North Dakota Tourism — Direct Mail — Teddy

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The star of the show — a woven-twine teddy bear.

A closer look at the embroidery on Teddy's little custom scarf.

Teddy and his companion book.

The Bespectacled, the Bear and the Badlands

A Little North Dakota Book

This Teddy Bear is one of two things named after President Theodore Roosevelt.

This is the other.

The year was 1883 when the thin, bespectacled young dude from New York stepped off the train at Medora in what is now known as Theodore Roosevelt National Park. He looked out over this stunning, rugged land and liked what he saw.

Theodore Roosevelt was twenty-five years old, and although lifelong asthma made his health precarious, he had come west on a hunting trip in hopes that the clean, unsullied air of Dakota Territory's vast open country would do him some good.

Years later, still bespectacled but robust and vigorous, he said, "I never would have been President if it had not been for my experiences in North Dakota."

Those experiences included running as many as 5,000 head of cattle on two ranches, leading the rough life of a cowboy, hunting in the wild, even tracking a group of thieves for twenty-four miles and marching them to jail.

Roosevelt invested in the Maltese Cross Ranch and Elkhorn Ranch, and spent the better part of five years here. He fell in love with the magnificence of the Badlands; his desire to preserve such areas of unspoiled beauty made him a dedicated conservationist. After becoming President in 1901, he established the National Forest Service, the National Park Service, five national parks, fifty-one wildlife refuges and eighteen national monuments.

It was in his memory that the North Dakota Bad Lands were established in 1947 as what is now called Theodore Roosevelt National Park — more than 70,000 acres honoring the nation's 26th head of state, our "Concervationist President."

The only way to really experience the glory of Teddy's park is to visit in person. You'll discover why North Dakota visitors are awestruck by our limitless vistas and encounters with history.

In Theodore Roosevelt National Park, you'll see many wonderful sights. The land as it was eons ago. Horizons without end. Rugged structures of ageless stone. And the wild creatures who make it their home.