S, 1959
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
_-_9 9 H E M I HI A N D A L
a *
Rudolph Confesses Payola Participation
By PATRICIA GOLDEN
Children the world over were
shocked to learn this week that
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
has been dropped from the St.
Nicholas herd.
Although newsmen were barred
from the workshop and stables be-
cause of the unwrapped Christmas
presents stored there, one Daily
reporter was able to interview Ru-
4 dolph before he left the North Pole
by plane, bound for Washington,
D.C., and a Federal grand jury.
Rudolph achieved swift promi-
nence several years ago when he
led the St. Nicholas number one
reindeer team to victory through
fAstronomers
Fail To Solve
Star Mystery
4 The mystery of the Christmas
star brings popular interest in
astronomy to a peak in December,
Prof. Hazel Losh of the astronomy
department believes.
And It's a mystery astronomers
haven't solved yet.
"The narrative about the star is
too incomplete, the date of its ap-
pearance too uncertain, and the
early calendar too unreliable to
lead us to any definite conclu-
sions," she said.
Finds Ancient Scroll
Giving Great Liht
a very dark night in the annual
Dec. 24-25 midnight marathon.
On that occasion he was pressed
into service because of his bright
red nose, which emits a faint glow.
Announce Dismissal
His dismissal was announced
after a Senate investigation dis-
closed the fact that Rudolph had
been accepting payola. Subsequent
probing revealed that the entire
operation was fraudulent.
Flanked by FBI guards at the
Polar airfield, the former yuletide
hero admitted the monstrous hoax.
"The summer before the disc
made the charts, I was approached
by a New York distributor," Ru-
dolph admitted. "He said he had
a moving sound on wax and
needed some atmosphere to push
it.
Explains Deal
"The deal was that if I would
wear some strawberry jam on my
normally black nose throughout
the holiday season and sit for
publicity pictures, he would pay
me a designated sum of money
plus several cases of drops for
tired eyes," Rudolph confessed.
According to the prominent
deer, all went well until the dis-
tributor, who always referred to
himself as Mr. X, decided to
branch out Into novelties and toys.
To stimulate public demand for
Rudolph articles, he arranged a
clincher for the Christmas Eve
classic reindeer race.
Lacks Glow
Since the jam on Rudolph's nose
did not produce enough glow to
guide the team in total darkness
(the original idea had been to
stage an eclipse of the moon, but
this was not feasible since the
strawberry jam did not oblige),
Mr. X devised a scheme to impair
the vision of everyone but the
Red-Nosed Reindeer. He hid the
eyewash.
The scheme went off perfectly,
Rudolph said. Nicholas Claus, vet-
eran driver of the swift Nicholas
entry in the marathon, searched
for his eyewash for several hours
on the afternoon of Dec. 24. The
reindeer in the regular team were
helpless in the Arctic night as well.
Mr. X's assistants had prudently
removed the handy pocket-purse-
saddle-sized squeeze bottles of eye-
wash from the reindeer trappings.
Meanwhile, the distributor him-
self was administering the pre-
cious fluid to Rudolph.
A few minutes before the start-
ing gun, driver Claus dashed
blindly out of the house in the
By MICHAEL SIBLEY
Special to The Daily
TOURS -Prof. Alan DeMause,
historian emeritus of Institute
Bibliophage and part-time archae-
ologist by avocation, announced a
significant "find" last night.
"The scroll I have discovered
will change the face of the entire
Christmas carol myth," Prof. De-
Mause revealed.
He was referring to the yellowed
manuscript in his left hand, con-
spicuous in the absence of his
third finger (lost while digging
for the ruin last month). The
manuscript is evidently a docu-
ment copied by hand in a Dark
Ages monastery.
Prof. DeMause explained, "On
this manuscript are borne the
fruits of what may have been the
only creative attempt during the
entire 12th century. A monk, in
his dissatisfaction with existing
celebratory measures and theologi-
cal dicta in general, apparently
wrote Christmas carols of his own,
signed with the pseudonym Robert
Crowder."
Professor Describes
The carols, which Prof. De-
Mause calls "wonderous to be-
hold" though aged so greatly that
some words are obscured, seem to
cover the gamut of human ex-
perience of the time. (Obscured
words are translated with substi-
tutes indicated by parentheses.)
"Oh praise,
All praises due;
Oh praise, (praise), praise
And more praises, too."
Another expresses faith in the
future:
"Gloria, Gloria,
All praises due;
Oh praise, (praise), praise
And in the future, praises
(too)."
Notes Subtlety
"It is the subtlety of the metre
(sic) and the consummate skill
with which this Crowder utilizes
symbolic content that makes the
find significant," Prof. DeMause
continued. "For instance, there is
this five-lined quatrain:"
"Oh Truth, truth
Where art thou?
(Oh)
Truth your stamp is not
imprinted
And more praises, too."
A wild argument rages today
in the highest archaeological
circles as to Prof. DeMause's trans-
lation of the word "Oh" in the
third line. Several authorities have
suggested "God" might be a more
appropriate word, in the light of
the fact that the monk Crowder
was obviously a man of no little
intellectual scope.
"This is all nonsense," Prof.
DeMause's rebuttal (Paris Re-
view) begins, "but whatever hap-
pens, it will change the face of
the Christmas carol myth."
RED-FACED REINDEER
... stands revealed
direction of the stable, where all
reindeer except the prize eight of
the number one team are shel-
11
i
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r
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