Reindeer Flip Flopping

It's never made sense to me that Rudolph (the biggest the castout in Christmas history), when given special treatment by Santa, was embraced and adored by the other reindeer. If I know reindeer bullies, and I think that I do, they are more likely to further ostracize him.

I turned on the television last night to an evening of Christmas shows for kids. Dr. Seuss's The Grinch Who Stole Christmas was on. I doubt that there are many of my generation who don't love watching it.

Following the Grinch was Frosty. I wasn't interested so I went downstairs to make dinner. When I returned to my tv, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was on.

As a kid, I only got excited about two Christmas specials: The Grinch, and A Charlie Brown Christmas. I thought that I might have unfairly judged Rudolph, so I decided to watch it. I had thought that it was just sad reindeer has the last laugh.

I discovered a few things here:

Robert May created Rudolph in 1939 as a promotion for the Montgomery Ward chain of department stores. He created a poem (in rhyming couplets) and the store chain distributed a colouring book of the story as a Christmas promotion. By 1946, 6 million books had been distributed.

There was a huge demand for licensing, and since May was an employee of Ward's he received no royalties. His wife had had been ill and May was in debt as a result, and managed to convince Montgomery Ward president, Sewell Avery, to give him the rights to Rudolph.

May cashed in on Rudolph. He had his brother-in-law, Johnny Marks, write a Rudolph song which was sung by Gene Autry in 1949 and became a hit second only to "White Chirstmas" as top seller all-time.

I really wasn't that impressed with the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Christmas Special last night. I didn't like it as a kid and I couldn't believe that they had turned a five-stanza song into an hour-long special. I'd never heard of Sam The Snowman, Hermey the Misfit Elf, Yukon Cornelius, and The Abominable Snow Monster of the North, and was very skeptical of the show. It wasn't until I did a little research that I discovered that there was a story before the song, and that the characters in the special are actually based on original characters.

The best part of the show, by far, is during the credits. Santa's elves join him on the sleigh and give toys umbrellas and then throw them over the side. One elf decides not to give a little bird an umbrella and throws it off the edge without one. The funny thing is that earlier in the show, they made a big deal about this bird being a misfit toy and was unable to fly, but only was able to swim. I take it that misfit toy bird didn't find a child to love him!