In the beginning...

In the beginning there was a bear. It was drawn by Lori DeLeonardis-Aman while vacationing in the Adirondack Mountains of New York State. Lori, an elementary art teacher, she loves kids and she loves to draw. So with the encouragement of her husband, she created a bear character and named him Zachary.

She wanted to make a storybook character and write a book. But people liked the friendly bear so much, they asked to have pictures made for their children's rooms with the child's name on it. Soon Lori was in the personalized gift market. Lori's husband Bill started a company to sell her art and gifts. He took two parts of Lori's name (Lori DeLeonardis-Aman) to come up with Loram Productions. Bill incorporated the business and together they took the show on the road. The first sales were made at local art shows in the Rochester, New York area.

The first designs were mainly storybook style settings. Some of the first designs were: Evening Prayer, Goodnight Zachary, Bubblebath, to name a few. These designs were placed in mats which were 11" by 14" on the outside edges. To mass produce these images Lori first made a black and white line drawing of the scene. This line drawing was printed on watercolor paper and all of the original series were watercolored by hand. Name personalization was added and then matted and framed. These were the original Zachary Bear® Pictures, in the beginning.