Michael Bond is a writer of children's books. He was born in Newbury, Berkshire, England in 1926. During World War II, Bond served in the Royal Air Force and the Middlesex Regiment of the British army during World War II. After the war, he joined the BBC Radio and later worked for BBC-TV as a cameraman from 1947 to 1966. At Christmas 1956, Bond gave his wife a teddy bear that she named Paddington after the London train station near their home. In 1958, A Bear Called Paddington was published. It featured the illustrations of Peggy Fortnum. By 1981, there were 26 Paddington books. Bond also wrote television and film scripts, including a TV series on BBC 1 that first aired in 1976. In the… 1990s, the animation company Hanna/Barbera made an American TV series about the bear. Bond set up a company to merchandise his creation that produced figurines, stationary, banks, and stuffed animals. Paddington also recorded a song titled Cross My Paws and Hope to Die in 1983. Bond chronicled his life with Paddington in his autobiography, Bear and Forebears.