Exceptional ‘Rudolf’

Respect otherness

CBy Cezary Owerkowicz

hristmas and New Year is so special for many. It is also time for special music, seasonable songs some of which have become eternal hits and have been sold in shops (now even in malls, of course), homes, even streets.

What is the secret of these hits? What is the technology of creating such a popular phenomenon? Of course behind every success is a sort of technology: skills and talent, knowledge or intuition, but sometimes also by chance we answer the needs of human dreams. Sometimes it is also a certain history. The latter is probably behind the most popular Xmas carol, ‘Silent Nights’ as and the seasonal song ‘Red Nosed Reindeer’.

I have already written about the ‘Silent Night’. A short reminder: in the small provincial church there was no cooperation just before the Christmas Eve. Poor like a ‘church mouse’ the organist, Franz Gruber wrote ‘on his knee’ a short song, possible to sing with guitar accompaniment, and performed it during the Mass with the young priest curate.

From the small Austrian countryside, the song reverberated the globe made the list of hits of Christian songs. Supposedly even during the WW I (19141918) soldiers in trenches during routine bombing stopped in their tracks when someone sang the impressive melody of ‘Silent Night’ which carries the banner of peace everywhere it is played or hummed.

Owerkowicz

Impressive

Among the Christmas songs, ‘Rudolf – the Red-Nosed Reindeer’ copies were sold in huge numbers except for the ‘White Christmas’, of course. What is a secret behind it? It is a story, not widely known but really impressive that in December of 1938, the last years of 3rd decade of the 20th century the Great Depression was nearing its end in the United States or rather it was the beginning of coming out from that economic and social disaster.

However, certain people were still stuck in the black hole of misery, and found it difficult to make ends meet, if any … On a chilly December night, the Chicago resident, Bob May, deeply depressed psychologically and in despair, was sitting in his ‘home’ looking out through the window.

His 4-year-old daughter, Barbara was sitting on his knee and crying. His wife was dying of cancer at the hospital. The small girl neither understood nor approved that her mummy was not able to come home from hospital for Christmas?

‘Why my Mom is not here like every other Mom’, she said blankly. Father’s jaw dropped in a sad grimace and tears rolled down his cheeks. This question disturbed the waves of pains, sadness and even anger. Painful memories rekindled the misery of his life.

This life for him was different than many other people. As a child he was short, he didn’t participate in school sports events and bigger boys often struck him. He was scoffed at and called names that he would rather not remember. He felt excluded and abandoned.

Bob was different than the others and somehow from his childhood it was difficult for him to adjust to the group. In spite of that he succeeded in completing his college education and got married to the woman he fell in love. He was happy, that he got a job as a copyist in a catalogue department of a multi branch company Montgomery Ward at the difficult time of Great Depression.

Imagination

The pair was blessed with a sweet daughter, but their happiness appeared short-lived when his wife Eveline became sick. She was fighting cancer and this depraved them of any savings and Bob with his daughter was forced to move to an apartment he could ill afford in the Chicago slums. Eveline had passed away just a few days before Christmas holidays in 1938.

Bob doubled and tripled his efforts but he could not even buy a gift and place it under the Christmas tree for his daughter. What a horrible feeling for a loving father. With such circumstance he got the idea: to prepare a gift himself. It was a handmade book with a short story. He created in his imagination a story about a young animal and told the story to Barbara. Every time he repeated the story he added a new element.

The main hero of the story was a young reindeer ‘Rudolf’, different from other reindeers in the herd, because he had a shining red nose. That nose was the matter of his alienation in the herd. Other reindeers laughed at him and did not allow him to join them.

Persisted

The situation persisted until one night, the Christmas Eve special night. Santa Claus had to go around the whole world with his sleigh overloaded by gifts for pretty and obedient children. However that night was extremely foggy; so much that Santa reindeers stopped. Nothing could be seen at hand. Santa was close to postpone his travel when he noticed specially ‘equipped’ Rudolf. His shining red nose would be a perfect lamp to illuminate the road.

Since that moment all other reindeers changed their attitude to towards Rudolf, the funny and strange comrade. So what’s the story about? Do you remember Christian Andersen’s story ‘Ugly Duckling’? The problem was similar but Bob put into the fable also a metaphor of his own fate.

This is a story of some members of the society who are rejected, because of mismatch, whose otherness at some point turns out to be valuable and even beneficial. He liked to offer to his daughter consolation and hopes. He didn’t predict that his own story would be crowned with great success.

Bob wrote his book on time, for Christmas Eve but it is not the end of the story. His company Montgomery Ward bought rights to print the book. Printed copies of ‘Rudolf – the Red-Nosed Reindeer’ they offered to the children visiting their shops and – Santa Claus waiting there. It became so popular that until 1946 6 million copies were ‘distributed’. When the bigger company offered to buy rights to the story something unexpected happened, or rather sort of a miracle. The General Manager of Montgomery Ward got back their rights to Bob, as wonderful as a rare gesture of goodwill.

Bestseller

Book became the bestseller in whole of United States. Various types of toys, pictures and this all ended in marketing agreements. Bob got married second time and became a rich man thanks to the story, which was created to console his sad daughter, and to express his own sorrow. Happy ending…? Not yet. His brotherin-law composed the song about Rudolf.

A few great vocal stars as Bing Crosby or Dinah Shore refused the offer, but the musical cowboy, Gene Autry sang and recorded it. Disc ‘Rudolf – RedNosed Reindeer’ was edited in 1949 and became an exceptional success all over the world. The only song ‘White Christmas’ had sold bigger number of copies.

What a lesson comes from that story? First: the otherness really would be a value, although not at once discovered. Let us respect otherness. But the more general conclusion is: never lose the hope. (Hope dies last, isn’t it?)

Editor’s Note:

Cezary Owerkowicz is the chairman of the Kuwait Chamber of Philharmonia and talented pianist. He regularly organises concerts by wellknown musicians for the benefit of music lovers and to widen the knowledge of music in Kuwait. His email address is: cowerkowicz @ yahoo.com and cowerkowicz@ hotmail.com