50 Fun Facts About Rudolph

Who created the character of Rudolph, in 1939?

It was a work assignment: his employer wanted a Christmas giveaway booklet of its own.

Which department store commissioned the original booklet?

The chain had been buying booklets to give away each Christmas and decided making its own would be cheaper.

Which two names did the author consider before settling on Rudolph?

He picked a reindeer at all because his daughter loved the deer at Chicago's Lincoln Park Zoo.

How many copies did the store give away in the first year?

It was written as a poem, in the same metre as 'A Visit from St. Nicholas'.

What gave the author the idea for the glowing nose?

He said it hit him at his office window: a nose that would shine through fog like a spotlight.

Why was the red nose idea initially rejected?

In 1930s popular culture a bright red nose meant a drunkard, and management took some convincing.

Which illustrator's sketches convinced management to approve the story?

He drew from live deer at the zoo, and the bouncy character he produced won the argument.

In which poetic metre is the original story written?

It is the same metre as 'A Visit from St. Nicholas', which is why it reads like a Christmas Eve poem.

Which publisher issued the first mass-market edition, in 1947?

The copyright on that edition runs until 2034.

What was the 1954 sequel called?

Another sequel, written in 1947, sat unpublished until Applewood Books printed it in 1992.

Which unpublished 1947 sequel finally appeared in 1992?

Penguin later reissued it under the title Rudolph to the Rescue.

Who wrote the 1949 song that made the character famous?

The television special two decades later took its title and its story straight from that song.

In which year did the stop-motion television special first air?

It went out on 6 December on NBC, sponsored by General Electric under a Fantasy Hour banner.

Which sponsor backed the special's first broadcast?

The umbrella title on air was The General Electric Fantasy Hour.

Which studio made the 1964 special?

It was later renamed Rankin/Bass, the name most people know it by.

What is the stop-motion process used in it called?

It was filmed at MOM Productions in Tokyo under Tadahito Mochinaga.

In which city was the special's animation actually shot?

The voices were recorded in Toronto, and the songs polished afterwards in New York.

Which folk singer voiced Sam the Snowman?

He was hired to please the network and the sponsor, a tactic Rankin/Bass repeated in later specials.

Who was originally cast as the snowman narrator before the change?

The producers wanted a bigger celebrity name to sell the special to NBC.

Which actress voiced the title character?

Most of the cast were Canadian, recorded over two days at RCA Studios in Toronto.

In which city were the voices for the special recorded?

Rankin and Bass used Canadian actors partly because American radio drama work had dried up.

What job does Hermey the elf want instead of making toys?

He and Rudolph sing 'We're a Couple of Misfits' after both walk out on the workshop.

What is Yukon Cornelius searching for?

He spends the whole special licking his pickaxe to check, and never finds either.

Who rules the Island of Misfit Toys?

He flies out each night to find unwanted toys and bring them somewhere safe.

How is the Abominable Snow Monster finally subdued?

Yukon Cornelius later brings it back tamed, and it turns out to be very good at trimming trees.

What job does the tamed monster do at the end?

Yukon explains that its bouncing ability had saved all their lives on the way home.

Which network aired the special from 1972 to 2023?

NBC had it from 1964 to 1971 and took it back again in 2024.

What did CBS unveil in 2005?

It was re-scanned frame by frame from the original 35mm film elements.

Which anniversaries fell in 2014?

The character had first appeared in 1939 and the stop-motion special in 1964.

As of 2024, which rights holder controlled the Rudolph story?

Character Arts managed the licensing alongside DreamWorks Classics.

Where does Rudolph sit among Santa's reindeer?

The other eight come from the 1823 poem; he is a twentieth-century addition to the team.

What does his nose do for the team?

He is mocked for it as a fawn before it becomes the only thing that saves Christmas.

Which two Rankin/Bass sequels followed the original special?

GoodTimes Entertainment later made two more Rudolph films of its own.

What is the scientific name of the real reindeer?

It is the only member of its genus, spread right across the Arctic and subarctic.

What makes reindeer unique among deer species?

The proportion of females that grow them varies a lot between populations, and males' are larger.

Which is the smallest subspecies of the real animal?

Osborn's caribou is the largest, and the two differ in coat colour and antler shape as well as size.

What is a female reindeer called?

The male is a bull, and both sexes can grow a new set of antlers each year.

Which regions are reindeer native to?

Some populations migrate enormous distances; others stay put all year.

In which year did NBC begin airing the special annually again?

It had been a CBS fixture for over fifty years before the rights moved back.

Which artist provided new artwork for Penguin's 2003 reprint of the original story?

Penguin also reissued both of the author's sequels around the same time.

Whose recording of the Rudolph song hit No. 1 on the US charts at Christmas 1949?

The singing cowboy's version sold 1.75 million copies that first season and entered the National Recording Registry in 2024.

In the 1964 special, what is the name of the doe who tells Rudolph he is cute?

Her compliment is what sends him soaring at the reindeer games, moments before his fake nose pops off.

How does Donner first try to disguise his newborn fawn's glowing nose in the special?

When that fails he fits Rudolph with a prosthetic nose, which works right up until the reindeer games.

Which of Santa's reindeer serves as the coach who expels Rudolph from the reindeer games?

Paul Kligman voiced both the coach and Rudolph's father Donner in the Toronto recording sessions.

Which song was cut from the special in 1965, replaced by 'Fame and Fortune', and restored in 1998?

An executive at the sponsor ordered the swap. From 2005 to 2023 one network even played the restored audio over the 'Fame and Fortune' footage.

Which scene was missing from the 1964 broadcast and added in 1965 after viewers wrote in?

Jules Bass said audiences wanted to see Santa keep his promise to the island, so the new stop-motion footage was animated for the rerun.

Roughly how much did each stop-motion puppet figure for the 1964 special cost to make?

The figures were designed by Antony Peters, whose name has been misspelled in every print of the special since 1965.

Because of a missing Roman numeral, the special's copyright notice gives its year as what?

An 'M' was dropped from MCMLXIV, and the invalid notice has aired every year since without correction.

The restored original Rudolph and Santa puppets sold at auction in November 2020 for how much?

They had survived years in a family attic and an Antiques Roadshow appraisal of about $10,000 before being donated to Atlanta's Center for Puppetry Arts.

Arthur Rankin Jr. later said the misfit toy Dolly for Sue was a misfit because she was what?

Nothing in the script ever said what was wrong with her; Rankin quipped that she had been cast off by her mistress and 'they didn't have Prozac back then.'