So the last card I need to catch up with from this week`s newsletter is this one, the reindeer - and of course, it is a little nudge to our rosy nosed compadre Rudolph.
Now Rudolph was a late addition to Santa`s reindeer squad, which first drew a sleigh in 1823, as part of Clement Moore's 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. And he did not start off as a song, but as a character written by Robert L. May, for a booklet published by Montgomery Ward, the huge department store, in 1939 - simply to serve as a little Christmas delight, a free colouring book just for juvenile shoppers as they visited Father Christmas in his in store grotto. And Montgomery Ward actually saved money, because before this their colouring books had been printed and designed elsewhere, whilst this was an entirely in-house effort.
In this book he was the youngest of them all, which I do not think appears in the song, but he still had the illuminated proboscis, and the others made fun of him, which I always felt very sad about and sympathetic with.
He first appeared on screen in cartoon form in 1948, but his big break, and the reason he is here, is that in 1949 his story was adapted into a song, by none other than the brother of the writer. This was then recorded, by Gene Autry, the Singing Cowboy, who we have spoken of before, in our newsletter of 22nd July 2023 - and it made number one in Christmas 1949, becoming one of the best selling records of all time pretty much until the 1980s.
Anyway you can read some other details at Mental Floss/Rudolph
Our British Trade Index part II lists these as section 2 of the Brooke Bond story - as "ISSUES WITH ROUNDED CORNERS. Issued in North America by Brooke Bond Canada and Brooke Bond Tea Co. Inc. Small size 68 x 37 m/m" The description for our set is :
SERIES No.2 ANIMALS OF NORTH AMERICA. Sm. Nd. (48) CU.2
A. Back in black with Montreal address
B. Back in blue with New York address
No overseas issues appear in our updated volume so this is its only record. However you can see the other cards at Trading Card Database/BB-ANA. And more will appear tomorrow!