You can sometimes find purebred papered dogs through rescues. Some times they even have their owner history. When I was going through the sleddog/husky/malmute rescues looking for a dog, I found tons of dogs with history and papers.

Also, Teddy is papered from a good breeder, and he's still cost be a bunch of money for dental problems. You never know!

But, I don't see anything wrong with going to a breeder. You want to get a dog that you want. I would look around at the rescues and nearby pounds first though.