The Touching Story of How Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer Was Written

Robert May was a poor copywriter in Chicago, living in a shabby two-room apartment  His wife Evelyn was suffering from cancer and was bedridden for two years.  All his earnings and savings went into her treatment  It was then, when on a December night, his daughter Barbara asked him, "Why isn't mommy just like everybody else's mommy?"  The question touched Bob's heart like a glass splinter  All his life, he had been 'different', weak and delicate as a child and just a lowly copywriter for Montgomery Ward, the big Chicago mail order house, as an adult.  He was 33 years at the time and was already deep in debt, depressed and sad.  However, he made up a story for her to placate the child and inspire to her be optimistic.  The story so pleased Barbara that Bob decided to draft it into a poem as a Christmas gift to her  When he was still working on the verses, Evelyn died.  Yet Bob kept his courage up for the sake of his daughter.  He recited it in one of his office holiday parties in 1938 and won spontaneous applause  The booklet with crude illustrations that he had prepared for his daughter became so popular that by 1947, 6 million copies had already been circulating around and Rudolph was in great demand for sponsoring products.  Bob May naturally became a very rich man.  Since then, Rudolph has occupied a permanent niche in the Christmas legend.      www.worldofchristmas.net Blogger:Being Sane Takes Too Much Work