The man’s son, David Sanders, claimed in a 2014 interview that Shepard used his father’s name because the real Winnie bear had ties to Winnipeg. “Who did [Ernest Shepard] know from Winnipeg?

A real-life bear started it all - the storybook character was inspired by a stuffed bear owned by A. A. Milne's son, Christopher Robin. Unlike in the books, the original bear ‘Winnie’, was a girl.