Which A. A. Milne poetry collection contains the first published appearance of the bear who became Winnie-the-Pooh?

A. A. Milne’s poetry collection containing the first published appearance of the bear who became Winnie-the-Pooh is When We Were Very Young.

The character first appeared in Milne’s poem “Teddy Bear,” initially published in Punch magazine in February 1924. In that early appearance, the bear was called Mr. Edward Bear rather than Winnie-the-Pooh.

When We Were Very Young was published in London by Methuen on 6 November 1924. It was illustrated by E. H. Shepard, whose drawings helped establish the visual world later associated with Pooh. “Teddy Bear” is the collection’s 38th poem.

The name Winnie-the-Pooh arrived later. The character first appeared under that name in a Christmas story published by London’s Evening News on 24 December 1925. Milne’s first collection of Pooh stories, Winnie-the-Pooh, followed in 1926, so the poetry collection is an important part of the character’s prehistory rather than the first Pooh storybook.