How Old Is
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer?

When was Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer born?

Do you want to know when Rudolph was born?  Do you want to know his birthday?

The short answer is that Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer was born in 1939.

The long answer, if you want to have a birthday party for Rudolph, is that the famous red-nosed reindeer was born August 10th, 1939 at 12:25 a.m. Everyone at the North Pole, except me, wears one of those blinking red nose lights on his birthday (it's one of the birthday traditions around here).

I'm Santa's Grumpy Elf and I know all about Santa's reindeer, including Rudolph.

Do you want to know Rudolph's age?  Just how old is Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer right now anyway?

The short answer is that Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer is 85 years old.

The longer answer is that Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer is 85 years, 4 months, 11 days, 12 hours and 30 minutes old!  But that is his age in human years, not Christmas reindeer years!

Keep reading to find out even more about Santa's most famous reindeer!

So, you want to know more about how old Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer is?  Well, if you really must know:

🦌 In years, Rudolph is 85 years old!  (But that is human years, not Christmas reindeer years.)

🦌 In months, Rudolph is 1,024 months old!  (But the best month is December!)

🦌 In days, Rudolph is 31,180 days old!  (Well, the days do fly by when you're playing reindeer games!)

🦌 In hours, Rudolph is 748,332 hours old!  (What's a few hours when you have red-nosed powers!)

🦌 In minutes, Rudolph is 44,899,950 minutes old!  (Time flies fast, as fast as Christmas past!)

🦌 In seconds, Rudolph is 2,693,997,046 seconds old!  (But Rudolph is second to no one Christmas Eve!)

Rudolph is 85 human years old.  But in Christmas reindeer years, he is only 18 years old. That's young for a reindeer!

The other reindeer are quite a bit older than Rudolph.  They are in their mid-20's.  So Rudolph has plenty of years left to guide Santa's sleigh.

Did you know Santa's most famous reindeer has quite a history? I guess that's why he went down in it!

Robert L. May first told the world the Rudolph the red nosed reindeer story in 1939. May's four year old daughter, Barbara, helped him write about Rudolph. It was easy for May to write about Rudolph. May was very small and weak as a child so he wasn't asked to play in games either.

Did you know that Rudolph's parents first thought of calling him Rollo or Reginald? Yikes! No wonder the other reindeer wouldn't let him play reindeer games!

When Mr. May told his employer, The Montgomery Ward Department store, about the story, they didn't want Rudolph either. Montgomery Ward had been buying coloring books to give to Christmas shoppers but they were trying to save money during the Great Depression. When Mr. May's co-worker, Denver Gillen, made some cute drawings for the story well... the rest was history! Montgomery Ward handed out 2.4 million copies that Christmas!

Did you know that no one wanted to sing about Rudolph either. Can you imagine if there was no Rudolph the red nosed reindeer song. It's true! Music publishers didn't want it. They thought a song about a misfit reindeer would never sell.

Not only that, famous singers back then, like Bing Cosby, didn't want to sing about Rudolph either. In the end, Gene Autry finally sang about Rudolph. But that was only because his wife, Ina, told him to sing it. She liked the ugly duckling feeling about Rudolph's story.

At least everyone wanted to do the Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer movie and TV special!

There is a sad part to all of this. Mr. May's wife had become very sick and died while May was writing Rudolph's story. But there is a nice ending too. Mr. May made enough money from Rudolph's story to pay off all the money he owed taking care of his wife. May called Rudolph his "generous son".

Now if you'll excuse me, this grumpy old elf has to go give Rudolph a hug.

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