The sad origins of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Plus: Impeachment and Dictionaries |

Email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser. SUBSCRIBE to TIME Magazine December 20, 2018 By Lily Rothman The story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer takes its protagonist from sadness to happiness. And, as it turns out, the history behind the story follows the same arc. Though Rudolph is now a holiday classic, he's actually less than a century old—young enough that TIME's Olivia B. Waxman spoke to the daughter of the man who came up with the tale. As it turns out, Rudolph was the product of a particularly sad time in his creator's life, but his bright red nose helped turn things around in real life too. You can click here to read more about it. And, as the holiday season kicks into high gear, we've also covered the reason people kiss under the mistletoe, what the history of midwifery can tell us about the birth of Jesus and how red and green became Christmas colors. There's even more to come at time.com/history. Here's more of the history that made news this week: HISTORY ON TIME.COM Clinton Was Impeached 20 Years Ago. Here's What to Know The history behind the process—and how it actually works The Zinke Resignation and the History of Cabinet Scandals The most infamous cabinet scandal in American history, Teapot Dome, involved a Secretary of the Interior Why Dictionaries Have Long Inspired Political Debates Noah Webster was dismissed by one contemporary linguist as "a thirsty reformer" James Baldwin Went From Literary Critic to Civil-Rights Icon The new movie If Beale Street Could Talk is based on a novel by the writer, who singled out an event in 1957 as the starting point for his identity as a voice on civil rights What Monuments Hide About the Civil War Some things can't be solved by tearing them down, writes Elizabeth D. Samet FROM THE TIME VAULT Today in 1937: Stalin’s Constitution “Soviet editors have been telling Russians for months about how the secret ballot, ‘that great boon conferred by Stalin, Our Sun,’ will protect them. The 100,000,000 prospective voters have been warned that of course they must not write their names on these secret ballots, that any ballot would be invalidated if so signed or marked that the voter revealed his identity. Suddenly upon this point the Soviet press reversed, proclaimed last week under banner headlines that every voter was privileged to sign the ballot, thus proving his or her individual loyalty to Bolshevism and to Stalin, thus giving all citizens the privilege not only of casting a useless ballot, but of usefully registering themselves as supporters of the right people.” (Dec. 20, 1937) Read the full story 70 Years Ago: Olivia de Havilland “Last week, in the opulent gloom of movie theaters in Manhattan and Chicago, the lovely woman screamed & screamed. For a moment, the scene looked exactly like the old-fashioned thrill shot that moviemakers call a ‘cliff-hanger.’ But what moviegoers were actually getting was a breathtaking glimpse of an abyss in the infinite mountains of the mind. Hollywood, certainly not the sanest community on earth, has managed to turn out an excellent movie about insanity. The Snake Pit (20th Century-Fox), starring Olivia de Havilland, is not a great work of cinematic art. It is, like the frightening scream from Miss de Havilland which rattles its sound track, an honest, accurate and dramatically powerful echo of certain ugly facts of modern life.” (Dec. 20, 1948) Read the full story Today in 1943: Greer Garson “For what cinemaddicts saw in Goodbye, Mr. Chips and Greer Garson, was something old and cherished in their hearts, but new and unexpected on the screen—the Ideal (if overidealized) Woman. Not a full-bosomed, cottontailed babe, a chromium goddess, an uncrowned martyr or a vampire bat, but a woman who simply looked and acted the way any grownup, good woman should. Miss Garson's beauty was neither parasitic nor predatory, but rich and kind.” (Dec. 20, 1943) Read the full story HIGHLIGHTS FROM AROUND THE WEB In the Queue The BBC’s History Extra rounds up 12 historical TV shows worth watching. (One caveat: the shows are listed with information about how to watch in the U.K., so it may take some sleuthing to find them elsewhere.) Late Laws After the U.S. Senate agreed to make lynching a federal crime—something that, shockingly enough, just happened this week—Encyclopedia Virginia editor Brenda Wolfe took to Twitter to discuss just how long, and how much, such a law has been needed. The thread is worth reading. Lost and Found The Guardian’s Mark Brown has the story on a 2,000-year-old statue that was recently revealed by the British Museum—after spending years forgotten in a margarine tub. Past Positive At Smithsonian.com, Rachael Lallensack covers a conversation between columnist David Brooks and Jon Grinspan, political history curator at the National Museum of American History, and explains Grinspan’s take on how history can be a source of empathy. Behind the Scenes Matt Kelly at the University of Virginia’s UVA Today site takes a look at how historians work, by interviewing four award-winning UVA faculty members about what motivates them. To Unsubscribe Unsubscribe here if you do not want to receive this newsletter. Update Email Click here to update your email address. Privacy Policy Please read our Privacy Policy. TIME may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice. 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