Follow the Hundred Acre Wood to This Winnie-the-Pooh Quiz

Forty miles south of busy London, the city of Sussex is home to the forest that inspired Milne’s Hundred Acre Wood. Ashdown Forest, also known as the Five Hundred Acre Wood, was a favorite vacation spot for Milne and his family. Milne’s illustrator, E.H. Shepard, even visited the forest to accurately capture the landscape and geography for the “Winnie-the-Pooh” books.

Gopher first appeared in the 1966 Disney animated short film “Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree,” in which he tells Owl, “I’m not in the book, you know.” Disney had originally intended Gopher to replace Piglet but decided against it. Gopher is mostly remembered for the whistling sound he makes when pronouncing the letter “s.”

In “The House at Pooh Corner,” Pooh invents Poohsticks when he drops a fir cone off a bridge and sees it appear on the other side, carried by the river. In the game, Pooh and his friends drop sticks into the river, and whichever one comes out first on the other side wins. The game is still popular among Poohsticks fans, who come together in Oxfordshire in England to compete in the World Poohsticks Championship each summer.

Before Milne’s “Winnie-the-Pooh” series debuted in 1926, the beloved bear’s name was Edward Bear, and Pooh was the name of a swan. But after Milne saw a black bear named Winnie at the London Zoo, he decided to change Edward’s name. In the first book of the series, Milne officially introduced the memorable bear with his now world-famous name.

In the book “The House at Pooh Corner,” Pooh and Piglet decide on one cold and snowy day to build their friend Eeyore a house. Eeyore had built his own house, but Pooh and Piglet, thinking the house was just a pile of sticks, tore it down and rebuilt it in a warmer part of the woods. Eeyore, however, insisted the new house was the one he built, and the wind just blew it to another corner of the forest.

In the 1968 featurette “Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day,” Tigger tells Pooh about the mischievous, honey-loving creatures called heffalumps and woozles. That night, Pooh’s dreams are haunted by the creatures coming to steal his beloved honey. Heffalumps look like elephants, while woozles look like weasels. In the dream, they shapeshift into jack-in-the-boxes and bees to taunt and scare Pooh.

Disney debuted its animated “Winnie the Pooh” franchise in 1966 with the short film “Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree.” The theme song introduced the characters that live in the Hundred Acre Wood and featured a memorable chorus that describes Pooh as a “chubby little cubby all stuffed with fluff." The franchise was a huge hit that expanded to include several shorts, feature films, and TV series.

The beloved character Winnie-the-Pooh is famously known for his love of honey — or “hunny,” as Pooh spells it. Driven by a “rumbly in his tumbly,” Pooh is always on the hunt for the sweet treat, sometimes climbing trees to get it straight from the beehive. (Real bears do eat some honey in their attempt to get bees’ pupae and eggs, but that wouldn’t be nearly as endearing for a children’s story).

Milne drew inspiration for his “Winnie-the-Pooh” stories from his son, Christopher Robin, and Christopher’s stuffed animals, which were named Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, Eeyore, and Kanga. The first book came out after Christopher turned four.

Before writing stories about Pooh and his friends in 1926, Alan Alexander Milne, or A.A. Milne, was a humorist and playwright. He contributed to the historical British satire magazine “Punch” and wrote many successful comedy plays. However, Milne is best known for his four-book “Winnie-the-Pooh” series: “Winnie-the-Pooh,” “The House at Pooh Corner,” “When We Were Very Young,” and “Now We Are Six."