Editorial Housecleaning

Editorial Housecleaning

In this issue we need to spend some time with a little editorial housecleaning. Here we are almost a month after Christmas (but our first issue of the new year), and we're still cleaning up some odds and ends.

After my comment in the Dec. 30, 2009, issue about the legend of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer originating with the popular song composed by Johnny Marks (and recorded by Gene Autry in 1949), reader Wyndee C. corrected me:

"I have a reprint of the original Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer by Robert L. May. The background information at the beginning says: 'The Story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer is as magical as Christmas itself. Did you know that Rudolph began his career at Montgomery Ward? It’s true. The year was 1939, and Montgomery Ward advertising copywriter Robert L. May was hard at work on new Christmas ideas for children. Then one day he thought to himself, What about a reindeer with a shiny red nose who helps Santa deliver presents on Christmas Eve? It was as simple as that -- Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was born. Montgomery Ward was just the beginning for Rudolph. From there, he achieved even greater fame. Singer and cowboy movie star Gene Autry immortalized him in song in 1949. And in 1964, Rudolph starred in his very own television program, now a Christmas classic and a favorite of children of all ages.'"

Wyndee is right. Interestingly, Johnny Marks was Robert May's brother-in-law, and he wrote the song that made Rudolph into the phenomenon he is today. Click here to read more about the origin of Rudolph.

The housecleaning from the Dec. 30 issue continues, and it wasn't the yule-related trivia that came over my e-mail transom.

Colleen S. dropped me a line asserting, "Did you know that Santa's reindeeer are all females? Yep! Male reindeer lose their antlers during the winter. Female reindeer don't lose theirs until after giving birth in the spring."

Now I didn't know that, Colleen. I guess I never even considered which gender the reindeer were. Actually, Clement Clarke Moore's poem that brought us the modern legend of Santa's sleigh being pulled by reindeer doesn't say whether the reindeer had antlers. That was added by artists' conceptions much later.

Snopes.com has an entry on the question as to the gender of antlered reindeer. If you would like to read that discourse, click here.

I like the Web site's conclusion:

"The way we see it, male reindeer retaining their antlers into late December is not nearly as unusual as a fellow who lives at the North Pole, spends the year making toys for millions of children all over the world, and manages to deliver all of them in a single evening. If Santa could develop a way to make reindeer fly, his coming up with a way to ensure that his bulls kept their antlers until late December must have been a piece of cake."

Trivia Answer Reader Gwen T. is right in her memory of Punkinhead, but the little bear with the thick woolly tuft of hair was around for a lot longer than one year. Eaton's launched the story of Punkinhead for the Christmas season of 1948. The original storybook was titled Punkinhead, the Sad Little Bear. Click here to access a Punkinhead archive maintained by the Canadian government. For more than a decade, the company distributed Punkinhead coloring books and storybooks and marketed lots of gift items including Punkinhead watches, mittens, etc. The company even produced a record album, The Punkinhead Song and The Punkinhead Story, in the early 1950s. The most popular item in the Punkinhead line, however, was a stuffed bear made by Merrythought of England. Today, collectors covet the antique bears; well-kept Punkinhead stuffed bears are worth thousands of dollars.