Yakov T. Bear

If you're a Facebook friend of mine, then you've already met Yakov T. Bear. What you don't know is the story of how he came to be.

Yakov's I.D. picture

25 years ago, a colleague of mine had her students bring in old stuffed animals or dolls to be handed to travelers. They carried a log book with them so that people could write their names and locations as they had contact with the toys. From time to time something would happen, like a postcard  or a video showing up at the school. Some of the toys were featured on news programs in areas where the toys had gone. In some ways it was a very exciting project, though most of the toys were never heard from again.

With Capt. Chad before the
first flight

Fast forward to this fall. I'm teaching geography. Holy crap! I've never even had a class in geography! As I start figuring out what I'm doing, I start looking for ways to make the class relevant somehow. Why would someone ever need to know latitude and longitude? Well, maybe if they were tracking something on a map. What if we followed something that was traveling, like a boat or a hurricane? Or maybe a teddy bear!

Co-pilot Yakov

I bought a bear and got him a little pilot's outfit and a backpack. I knew that I would be handing the bear first to a pilot, since that was the only way to get him off the island. I also knew that my former colleague's toys traveled farther when they were entrusted to people who worked for the airlines. I was still thinking in terms of what else my colleague had done, until I realized that technology had changed everything in the interim.

In Manakotak

It no longer made sense for the bear to carry a log book. People could just check in on a Facebook page. They didn't need to leave a signature; they could leave a picture. Or a selfie! With the bear! As I thought through each step, like wearing an I.D. badge that would have the instructions, I realized he needed to have business cards so that people could hand him off and still have the email address and URL.

In Dillingham

As for his name, I wanted to name him in part after our school, Yakov E. Netsvetov School, but I wanted to use the Anglicized version of Yakov, which is Jacob. To get his gmail account, I tried every combination of Jacob T. Bear with and without underscores, periods, and dashes. None of them was available. I finally tried Yakov.T.Bear, and that was available.  Voilà!

In Chignik Bay

Once Yakov was ready, I introduced him to my students. Even the high school boys, who would never hug a teddy bear!, were interested in seeing how far he could travel.

Within the next couple of days, Yakov will be on the move again, first to Anchorage and then … who knows!