WEBVTT - 2022 Holiday Spectacular! 0:00:01.440 --> 0:00:04.200 Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I 0:00:04.320 --> 0:00:24.600 Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the Holiday Cast. I'm Josh, 0:00:24.640 --> 0:00:27.200 and Chuck is here and Jerry's here, and there's a 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:30.080 million elves surrounding us and making us kind of nervous 0:00:30.120 --> 0:00:32.680 because they're just looking at us and not saying anything. 0:00:33.080 --> 0:00:36.440 And this is Stuff you should know. The Holiday episode 0:00:37.040 --> 0:00:43.120 the last recording of the year for us. It's great 0:00:43.440 --> 0:00:46.240 and I'm so excited about that. And you and I 0:00:46.280 --> 0:00:49.559 love our jobs, but it doesn't matter how much you 0:00:49.600 --> 0:00:56.200 love your job. Vacation is better. Yeah, some vacation is better. Yeah, 0:00:56.200 --> 0:00:58.880 I agreed. And this is gonna be our longest Christmas 0:00:58.920 --> 0:01:01.360 break yet, and we're both super excited to do that. 0:01:01.440 --> 0:01:04.679 But we're even more excited to share with you another 0:01:05.400 --> 0:01:09.759 set of it's getting thin, but another set of great 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:14.200 stories for Christmas. I disagree. I feel reinvigorated. I think 0:01:14.240 --> 0:01:17.880 we hit the We hit rock bottom two years ago 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:21.480 and and we've been coming back ever since then. I 0:01:21.560 --> 0:01:23.480 feel great about this one. Did you really look at 0:01:23.480 --> 0:01:25.920 two years ago? Was it bad? No? No, I just 0:01:26.319 --> 0:01:29.360 remember it. It was not It was not great. Yeah, 0:01:29.400 --> 0:01:32.200 I don't know. I need to be invigorated by you then, 0:01:32.280 --> 0:01:36.440 because every year I keep thinking, oh boy, have like, 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:38.440 that's a lot of years to be doing six to 0:01:38.600 --> 0:01:42.280 eight Christmas stories, Like how many are out there? There's plenty. Man, 0:01:42.319 --> 0:01:45.160 we'll we'll never run out. Come over here. I'll invigorate 0:01:45.240 --> 0:01:49.840 you right now. Okay, all right, thank you Hamana Hammanahammed. 0:01:50.840 --> 0:01:53.720 Uh okay, we're gonna start out with your pick, one 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:56.960 of your picks. Yes. Um, this is actually from uh 0:01:57.240 --> 0:02:00.880 a listener named Alexandra stock Or Still I'm not sure. 0:02:01.080 --> 0:02:03.800 I bet it's stuck. She wrote in for several years 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:06.240 with a bunch of really good ideas, but she really 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:10.360 really was pushing for the chestnut one. And I understand 0:02:10.360 --> 0:02:13.799 why now, because um, it's a really interesting story, the 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:20.280 story behind why chestnuts used to be basically like the 0:02:20.280 --> 0:02:24.080 the the symbol of Christmas in America for a couple 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:29.160 hundred years, until it just suddenly stopped being that way. Um, 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:31.400 and let's talk about that. Yeah, and big thanks to 0:02:31.520 --> 0:02:35.120 USA Today for a great article from Cape Morgan. I 0:02:35.120 --> 0:02:36.880 wonder if that's the same Cape Morgan that writes for 0:02:36.919 --> 0:02:40.160 How Stuff Works. Oh, I don't know. That's a great question. 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:43.079 I bet it is at any rate. Uh if you've 0:02:43.120 --> 0:02:47.600 ever heard the Christmas song, not a Christmas song, but 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:51.600 the Christmas song from Coroon or net King Cole. You 0:02:51.680 --> 0:02:54.840 might not even know. That was the title of what's 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:59.400 more commonly referred to as Chestnuts Roasting on an open fire. Yeah. Uh, 0:02:59.520 --> 0:03:01.720 this was corded in nineteen forty six. It was a 0:03:01.800 --> 0:03:04.000 very big hit, one of the biggest Christmas songs of 0:03:04.040 --> 0:03:07.919 all times. Uh. And I guess it's sort of acted 0:03:07.960 --> 0:03:12.880 like everyone around was in America was sitting around roasting chestnuts. 0:03:13.600 --> 0:03:16.640 But I've never seen a chestnut, nor roasted or tasted one. 0:03:17.360 --> 0:03:20.000 And that's because by that point there were no chestnut 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:24.560 trees in the United States anymore. No, very sadly, a 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:28.000 blight started to spread, I think starting in nineteen o four, 0:03:28.880 --> 0:03:34.120 and within forty years almost every single American chestnut tree 0:03:34.240 --> 0:03:37.160 was dead. And how many were there, There were a 0:03:37.240 --> 0:03:40.960 lot of them. At one point, half of the trees 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:44.200 in the forests on the East coast from Maine to Alabama, 0:03:44.520 --> 0:03:48.720 as far west over to Kentucky and Ohio were chestnuts. 0:03:48.800 --> 0:03:52.560 Half of the trees in those in that stretch were chestnuts, 0:03:52.600 --> 0:03:55.160 and I think there were as many as four billion 0:03:55.240 --> 0:03:57.960 of them, So that's a lot of chestnut trees, and 0:03:58.000 --> 0:04:01.040 that's a lot of chestnuts. That's a lot of roasting 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:05.080 because people used to eat these things. The chestnuts themselves 0:04:05.080 --> 0:04:09.000 were small, They're about acorn size, and they had a 0:04:09.120 --> 0:04:13.280 very obviously nutty flavor, but very sweet and carrot like 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:15.800 is what I've seen. When you just eat them out 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:18.280 of the shell. But then you roast them up a 0:04:18.320 --> 0:04:20.880 little bit, things got even nuttier, and they got a 0:04:20.920 --> 0:04:23.680 little sweeter, as things often often happened when they roast, 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:28.080 And it was a it was like a American and 0:04:28.520 --> 0:04:33.279 especially a Christmas staple, where on street corners and cities 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:36.240 all over the United States and the Eastern Seaboard there 0:04:36.240 --> 0:04:41.080 were chestnut roasters serving up bags and bags of this stuff. Yeah, 0:04:41.160 --> 0:04:43.479 Kate Morgan puts it really, really great. She says, for 0:04:43.560 --> 0:04:46.320 more than a century it was the smell of Christmas 0:04:46.320 --> 0:04:50.039 in America. Nice I even wrote, gosh after that in 0:04:50.080 --> 0:04:53.159 my notes. But it's sad, I mean, think about that. 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:56.640 There was this amazing tradition that dated back easily to 0:04:56.800 --> 0:05:00.640 the eighteenth century, if not even a little earlier in 0:05:00.760 --> 0:05:05.160 North America. Um, once Europeans came over and discovered chestnuts, 0:05:05.160 --> 0:05:08.080 that I'm quite sure the indigenous people's were well aware 0:05:08.120 --> 0:05:10.880 of for long before that, and they said, hey, these 0:05:10.920 --> 0:05:14.360 are pretty amazing, and they made it not just part 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:17.159 of Christmas, but you could find chestnuts and dishes in 0:05:17.200 --> 0:05:20.960 America and like throughout the year. But something about roasting 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:24.800 chestnuts that Christmas time was was very Christmas ee um. 0:05:24.920 --> 0:05:27.880 And it's like you said, Chuck, were bereft. Those of 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:30.960 us alive today who were born after the mid forties 0:05:31.480 --> 0:05:34.320 have never tasted a chestnut the way that it's supposed 0:05:34.360 --> 0:05:37.160 to taste in America because the stuff we got now 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:42.000 it's not it's not holding up. No, they're importing chestnuts, uh, 0:05:42.160 --> 0:05:44.960 I think largely probably for the Christmas season, even though 0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:47.440 you can probably get them, I imagine all year round, 0:05:47.440 --> 0:05:51.760 but they're mainly imported from Korea or Italy or China apparently, 0:05:52.440 --> 0:05:56.600 and these are not the American chestnuts. They apparently do 0:05:56.720 --> 0:05:59.880 not taste like they taste that Apparently they don't taste 0:05:59.880 --> 0:06:02.159 that great at all. Uh. The way this one person 0:06:02.200 --> 0:06:05.080 that was interviewed in here described them was this is 0:06:05.279 --> 0:06:08.840 Libby O'Connell, who's a food historian. Wrote a book called 0:06:08.839 --> 0:06:13.800 The American Plate colon a culinary history and one bytes. 0:06:14.760 --> 0:06:17.480 But Libby describes them as sort of like a soft 0:06:17.520 --> 0:06:22.080 potato and bland and not like this crunchy thing that 0:06:22.120 --> 0:06:24.240 you would think of when you think of eating a 0:06:24.320 --> 0:06:28.760 rusted chestnut. No, and in a horrible ironic twist, those 0:06:28.880 --> 0:06:33.000 chestnuts that were eating today in America, like shmos, come 0:06:33.080 --> 0:06:35.640 from the very same tree that was imported to Long 0:06:35.680 --> 0:06:39.000 Island in the late nineteenth century that started the blight 0:06:39.080 --> 0:06:42.919 that killed off the American chestnut. You won't catch me 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:46.719 buying those, then, it's terrible. Luckily, there is a glimmer 0:06:46.720 --> 0:06:50.200 of hope. There is a group called the American Chestnut Foundation. 0:06:50.640 --> 0:06:57.160 Since three they've planted at least seventy three thousand test trees. 0:06:57.720 --> 0:07:02.080 They've been trying really hard to crossbreed American chestnuts with 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:06.400 Asian chestnuts so that they'll be um immune to the blight. 0:07:06.680 --> 0:07:10.880 But they'll still produce those American chestnuts chest nuts. They 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:14.200 think maybe in a decade, maybe a little longer, we 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:18.040 will be able to experience the Christmas chestnuts like they 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:20.800 used to have back in the days of Nat King Cole. 0:07:21.080 --> 0:07:24.760 That's right. So if you live in North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:30.520 or Pennsylvania. Then your state is growing those chest chestnut trees, 0:07:31.120 --> 0:07:33.640 and uh, we all have our fingers crossed. A lot 0:07:33.720 --> 0:07:37.480 is writing on this. Yeah, yeah, that's really well put 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:39.760 in chunk. So shall we climb in our sleigh and 0:07:40.120 --> 0:07:42.840 hop over to the next roof. Yes, let's and we'll 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:45.720 have Jerry give us a little musical interlude in the meantime. 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:00.400 I gotta tell you the song's Jerry puts in or 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:02.800 that's my favorite part of this whole time. I like 0:08:02.920 --> 0:08:06.640 us talking, it's fine, but the the holiday trimming that 0:08:06.640 --> 0:08:09.520 that Jerry puts on it is just magnificent. And you 0:08:09.560 --> 0:08:13.200 know what you're not gonna hear. Oh yeah, what ads? 0:08:13.640 --> 0:08:17.240 That's right. We we we wall this one in the 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:19.800 Halloween episode off every year and say don't come near 0:08:19.880 --> 0:08:23.200 my episode. That's right. And I think it's a great 0:08:23.240 --> 0:08:25.080 tradition if you ask me, I think it is too. 0:08:25.160 --> 0:08:29.320 There's nothing like leaving money on the table, all right. 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:32.160 So you dug up some cool stuff along with Sean 0:08:32.200 --> 0:08:35.840 Flynn of Forbes Magazine on some very special places all 0:08:35.840 --> 0:08:40.960 over the world that kind of have a cottage Christmas 0:08:41.000 --> 0:08:45.360 industry in one way or another and for different reasons. Yeah, 0:08:45.520 --> 0:08:48.559 there's places that say this is Santa claus is home. 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:52.160 Another places, No, this is Sant Claus is. Another places, 0:08:52.200 --> 0:08:55.800 this is Santa claus Is summer home, um and or 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:58.640 other places are just like we're not saying that, we're 0:08:58.679 --> 0:09:02.520 just celebrating Christmas year round. One of them is called 0:09:02.840 --> 0:09:08.160 Rovaniemi Finland, where in Finland they know Santa Claus. You lpuki, 0:09:09.160 --> 0:09:12.559 that's in Finnish. I've seen Rare Exports enough times that 0:09:12.600 --> 0:09:15.719 I'm pretty sure that's how they pronounce it. It's rare Exports. 0:09:16.160 --> 0:09:20.280 It's a Finnish Christmas movie that came out five six, 0:09:20.280 --> 0:09:24.480 seven years ago. Yes, but they envisioned Santa Claus is 0:09:24.600 --> 0:09:27.360 like a demon, not a not a friendly elf, and 0:09:27.400 --> 0:09:30.120 they have to basically capture them and it's really interesting. 0:09:30.160 --> 0:09:32.320 It's a great movie. Okay, I'll have to check that out, 0:09:32.760 --> 0:09:37.559 you pukey uh so, and you'll wait. Not in yolla puki, 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:41.760 that's that's Santa Claus. What am I saying? And Rovaniemi 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:46.040 they are one of the ones to say, now this 0:09:46.040 --> 0:09:48.720 this is where Santa was born. It's the official home 0:09:48.760 --> 0:09:51.679 of Santa. We have the Santa Christmas House right over there. 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:55.000 You can go visit it. Uh, we have a post 0:09:55.040 --> 0:09:58.679 office here where it is chock full of letters from 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:01.959 children all over the world, and we even have a 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:06.160 toy factory, so we lay claim. I looked at pictures 0:10:06.160 --> 0:10:11.920 of Rovaniemi and enchanting under states that place. It's amazing. 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:14.800 It looks pretty pretty sweet. So that's one place. They 0:10:14.840 --> 0:10:17.200 don't necessarily say Santa lives here now, but they say 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:20.920 Santa was born here. They've got a contender over in 0:10:21.040 --> 0:10:24.400 Norway called drew Back, and they say, oh, yeah, you 0:10:24.440 --> 0:10:27.400 think Santa was born in Finland. Wrong, he was born 0:10:27.400 --> 0:10:32.040 in Norway under a rock outside of this town. Nothing 0:10:32.120 --> 0:10:36.920 is more fun and disturbing than Scandinavian folk tales. It 0:10:36.960 --> 0:10:39.959 seemed like they always fought something really weird, right, like 0:10:40.200 --> 0:10:43.040 sa was born under a rock a few hundred years ago, 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:46.080 and that rock is right over there. Uh. They also, 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:50.200 of course have their own post office. Uh where kids 0:10:50.200 --> 0:10:52.319 in their list? So kids are they're sitting their list 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:55.200 of different places all over the world where. I guess 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:58.120 it depends on where your parents allegiances lie. Yeah, but 0:10:58.200 --> 0:11:00.440 I think all of these post off us is like 0:11:00.480 --> 0:11:02.920 in drew Back and Roviniemi and the other places. We'll 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:05.560 talk about nowhere to forward him onto the North Pole. 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:08.520 So they get to Santa right. There a mere way station, 0:11:09.040 --> 0:11:13.599 right exactly? What about Alaska? Isn't there a North Pole Alaska? 0:11:14.080 --> 0:11:17.200 There is? Um. There's a place called the Santa Claus 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:22.360 House in North Pole, Alaska, and it is um supposedly 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:24.560 Satan Nick's home. I think it's one of as many 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:29.120 how homes UM and it's really cute. It's pretty kitchy looking. 0:11:29.480 --> 0:11:33.120 There's a lot of strange paintings outside of it. UM. 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:35.120 But one of the other things that they have are 0:11:35.240 --> 0:11:39.240 light poles. They are shaped like candy canes. That's yes, 0:11:39.400 --> 0:11:43.400 that's stretch along um roads and streets called Santa Claus 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:48.480 Lane St. Nicholas Drive. Um, there's one. I'm wondering if 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:51.440 this is a nod to the vacation movies Holiday Road. 0:11:52.360 --> 0:11:57.000 Oh yeah, that was Lindsey Buckingham, was it? It may 0:11:57.000 --> 0:11:59.559 have been Fleetwood mac r i p Christine mcneeh. He 0:11:59.720 --> 0:12:03.880 just asked away in real time. Yeah, very sad. Yeah, 0:12:03.960 --> 0:12:06.000 I know. It's it's pretty neat to see how many 0:12:06.040 --> 0:12:09.160 people are like this is a big deal. Yeah, very 0:12:09.160 --> 0:12:11.160 big deal. That was very sad. Listen to it all night, 0:12:11.880 --> 0:12:15.840 No but but that's not what this is about. This 0:12:15.920 --> 0:12:18.840 is about Santa Claus Is sounds around that world. Snowman 0:12:18.960 --> 0:12:22.160 Lane in North Pole, Alaska. Yeah, so North Pole, Alaska. 0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:25.200 Another place that says this is where Santa lives. There's 0:12:25.200 --> 0:12:28.520 a place in Indiana called Santa Claus Indiana and they say, no, no, 0:12:28.679 --> 0:12:31.480 this is where Santa Claus lives. I can understand the 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:35.880 distinction here because Indiana is much further south than Alaska 0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:40.120 or Norway or Finland. So this is possibly Santa Claus 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:43.120 is like summer home, one of his summer homes. Yeah, 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:46.520 this seems like the k o a campground of kitche 0:12:46.520 --> 0:12:50.080 Santa places. Yeah, because they do have a campground. They 0:12:50.080 --> 0:12:53.439 have a Lake rootolf there with a campground and they 0:12:53.480 --> 0:12:55.560 they pour it on pretty thick there in Indiana with 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:59.319 a light show that tells the story of Rudolph and 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:04.040 his Trevia Hills. And they have a Santa's Candy Castle. Yes, 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:06.520 it's you know, they've made it. I'm glad you included 0:13:06.559 --> 0:13:08.240 links to these places. You should go look them up. 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:11.360 It's it's pretty fun to look at. Santa's Candy Castle 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:15.480 was sponsored by the Curtis Candy Corporation, who make Butterfinger 0:13:15.640 --> 0:13:18.800 and Baby Ruth and they they opened this place in 0:13:18.920 --> 0:13:21.800 nineteen thirty five to really kind of give Santa Claus 0:13:21.800 --> 0:13:25.800 Indiana boost. Of course, there's also a Santa Claus Museum 0:13:25.840 --> 0:13:27.760 that would be worth visiting. I'd love to go visit 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:31.480 that someday. Yeah, you get in the Christmas spirit, right, Yeah. 0:13:31.600 --> 0:13:33.560 Another thing they'll get you in the Christmas spirit in 0:13:33.679 --> 0:13:40.560 July even is the eighty one foot wide star over Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. 0:13:40.920 --> 0:13:43.160 That's right, that's on South Mountain that was built in 0:13:43.280 --> 0:13:47.960 nineteen thirty seven, and apparently in nineteen thirty seven it 0:13:48.120 --> 0:13:52.320 was a real, uh sort of sign of hope during 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:56.400 the Great Depression, right, And I believe that the city 0:13:56.440 --> 0:14:00.439 itself was founded on Christmas Eve there in a lahem, 0:14:00.520 --> 0:14:02.880 and so I'm sure, I mean that's why they got 0:14:02.920 --> 0:14:05.320 the name, right, Yeah, for sure. And they make no 0:14:05.400 --> 0:14:08.840 claim whatsoever on Santa Claus having a home there, having 0:14:08.840 --> 0:14:13.120 been born there. They're just fans, really big fans, you know. Uh. 0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:16.120 And then finally, I guess Santa has his beach condo, 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:19.680 because who wouldn't if he were Santa and you could 0:14:19.720 --> 0:14:25.160 just you know, he basically prints money every year. You know, sure, Uh, 0:14:25.200 --> 0:14:28.080 this is where where exactly? This is in Florida. This 0:14:28.160 --> 0:14:31.000 is inland, um kind of along the St. John's River, 0:14:31.160 --> 0:14:34.240 So rather beach, he would have like, this is his airboat, 0:14:34.800 --> 0:14:38.360 um swamp? Getaway. Okay, give me a north or south. 0:14:38.400 --> 0:14:44.800 It's south south of what South Florida is. It's south 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:50.920 of Gainesville. It's east of Gainesville. It's due east of Orlando. Okay, 0:14:51.000 --> 0:14:52.800 so I got you, I got you, so right there 0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:55.120 in the center of the state sort of, yeah, pretty 0:14:55.200 --> 0:14:58.240 much the center right. The Florida is very misleading because 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:01.360 it takes as long to drive to Miami me from Atlanta, 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:04.280 as it does to drive to New York, which seems 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:07.160 hard to believe, but it's true. But to drive from 0:15:07.240 --> 0:15:10.920 um like Orlando to Tampa, it takes a hour and 0:15:10.960 --> 0:15:14.000 a half. Basically, it's crazy. You can get to so 0:15:14.040 --> 0:15:16.880 many places in Florida in two or three hours. It's 0:15:16.680 --> 0:15:20.040 it's just nuts, right, But from tip to top to 0:15:20.120 --> 0:15:24.200 bottom it's a long way. Yes, agreed. But Christmas, Florida 0:15:25.080 --> 0:15:27.000 used to be Fort Christmas because it was a ford. 0:15:27.000 --> 0:15:28.960 It was an army stock aide that was built an 0:15:29.000 --> 0:15:32.440 eighteen thirty seven and they said, hey, I guess we 0:15:32.520 --> 0:15:34.800 got this place with this name, and we got a 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:37.920 post office that kids are gonna want that postmark once 0:15:37.960 --> 0:15:41.160 again from Christmas on stamped onto their letter. So that 0:15:41.200 --> 0:15:44.160 seems to be the main industry. How yeah is their 0:15:44.200 --> 0:15:47.800 post office? It's it's true, and they keep it decorated 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:51.240 year round to really attract people. Yeah, I love it 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:54.040 for sure. So there's some places you could visit if 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:55.920 you were like I really wanted to feel closer to 0:15:55.960 --> 0:15:58.560 Santa this year, and I feel like doing some traveling. 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:07.720 There's a great list for or you everybody, all right, 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:10.360 and now we are going to talk about the two 0:16:10.360 --> 0:16:15.640 worst Christmas songs in history. Oh my h you might 0:16:15.640 --> 0:16:17.320 be right though, now that I think about it, I 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:19.960 hadn't hadn't considered that, but I think you're right. I mean, 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:23.200 there are certainly some annoying like pop rock versions of 0:16:23.360 --> 0:16:28.400 Christmas songs, but it does not get much worse. Then 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:31.400 Grandma got run over by a reindeer and all I 0:16:31.400 --> 0:16:35.000 want for Christmas is my two front teeth. Uh. I 0:16:35.000 --> 0:16:37.320 will say this, Grandma got run over by a reindeer 0:16:38.120 --> 0:16:42.200 is so infuriating, Lee catchy. It's been stuck in my 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:46.000 head all day and I didn't listen to it. Oh wow, 0:16:46.040 --> 0:16:49.000 that's hilarious. Just from reading it and doing this research, 0:16:49.400 --> 0:16:52.360 I've been walking around bashing my head against the wall 0:16:52.400 --> 0:16:55.840 all day. It is catchy. It's what people in the 0:16:55.840 --> 0:16:59.640 corporate world would call sticky. It's very sticky. Um. And 0:16:59.800 --> 0:17:02.960 it's actually way older than I thought. I think of 0:17:03.040 --> 0:17:07.520 that song is firmly in the mid eighties, but apparently 0:17:07.560 --> 0:17:09.720 it was written all the way back in the seven 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:14.120 by a songwriter from Dallas named Randy Brooks. And depending 0:17:14.119 --> 0:17:17.800 on who you ask, either his grandmother left him out 0:17:17.840 --> 0:17:22.119 of her will or he no, I don't either. I 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:24.479 think it was a joke by whoever said it. And 0:17:24.520 --> 0:17:27.800 then um, the likelier one that I think Randy Brooks 0:17:27.800 --> 0:17:30.400 says that he was just thinking about those country songs 0:17:30.840 --> 0:17:32.800 he as he put it, where they dragged you into 0:17:32.840 --> 0:17:34.639 love with the character and then killed him off in 0:17:34.680 --> 0:17:37.440 the third verse, and how he was kind of sick 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:40.240 of that, that kind of songwriting, and he wanted to 0:17:40.320 --> 0:17:42.600 kind of make light of it. So he started thinking 0:17:42.600 --> 0:17:46.520 about grandma being killed off, and even worse, what about 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:50.760 Grandma dying at Christmas? And he started wondering, like, exactly 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:53.520 how would Grandma die at Christmas and it hit him 0:17:53.560 --> 0:17:57.399 like a flash. Yeah, it strikes me that Brooks may 0:17:57.400 --> 0:18:00.160 have been sort of trying to get on the out 0:18:00.200 --> 0:18:04.440 tales of like Ray Stevens, who was a country sort 0:18:04.480 --> 0:18:08.280 of hed He wrote some serious songs, but he was 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:11.359 kind of known for novelty and joke songs, and it 0:18:11.520 --> 0:18:14.879 was like the American Yakov. Yeah, sort of. Uh. He 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:17.280 definitely looked like, I'm not any thing about it. But 0:18:17.359 --> 0:18:19.679 it was sort of a thing back then in country 0:18:19.760 --> 0:18:23.040 music where you could write some songs that were humorous 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:26.320 and they could end up being big hits. So Brooks 0:18:26.359 --> 0:18:29.399 would apparently do some of this apparently, Uh, did you 0:18:29.440 --> 0:18:32.639 mention the Johnny Walker thing? No, I didn't. Supposed he 0:18:32.680 --> 0:18:35.840 was headed to bed with his guitar and quote his 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:40.720 co writer Johnny Walker black and and wrote this song, 0:18:40.840 --> 0:18:44.040 which you know, if you've never uh, certainly that chorus 0:18:44.040 --> 0:18:47.320 will stick in your head. But how I'm not gonna 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:50.880 sing it, but I don't remember any of the words. 0:18:50.920 --> 0:18:53.159 I knew Grandma got run over just from the chorus. 0:18:53.160 --> 0:18:56.320 But when you look at the lyrics, it is, uh, 0:18:56.359 --> 0:19:01.359 it's very dark. Grandma's drunk on Eggna is like leaving 0:19:01.359 --> 0:19:04.320 the party and they're like, no, don't go, Grandma, and 0:19:04.359 --> 0:19:07.680 she's like, I need to get my meds and goes 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:12.680 to get medication drunk and gets run over by Rudolph 0:19:12.800 --> 0:19:15.080 and they say they find her dead in the snow 0:19:15.119 --> 0:19:19.320 with footprints on her forehead and claws as in Santa 0:19:19.359 --> 0:19:24.880 Claus marks on her back. That's pretty clever. What else? Um? 0:19:25.080 --> 0:19:29.040 So the family celebrates Christmas dressed in black because their mourning, 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:31.520 and they have like a whole conundrum in front of him. 0:19:31.560 --> 0:19:33.959 They were like, should we just open Grandma's presence or 0:19:34.240 --> 0:19:37.760 should we send them back? And then the song goes 0:19:37.760 --> 0:19:40.560 over and focuses on Grandpa, who's handling the whole thing 0:19:40.640 --> 0:19:43.240 really really well. He's having a party. He's hanging out 0:19:43.240 --> 0:19:46.280 watching football on TV and drinking beer and playing cards 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:49.520 and seems to be okay about this whole thing. Yeah, 0:19:49.640 --> 0:19:53.520 so that's the essence of the song. Uh, Like I said, 0:19:53.560 --> 0:19:56.080 Brooks had made a name sort of. It sounds like 0:19:56.119 --> 0:20:00.399 regionally um writing these Ray Stevens esque country song And 0:20:01.119 --> 0:20:04.040 I was performing it out one night when a married 0:20:04.119 --> 0:20:06.879 duo married at the time just divorced a handful of 0:20:06.960 --> 0:20:11.080 years later named Elmo and Patsy were in the audience 0:20:11.280 --> 0:20:13.600 and they were recording artists, and they said, hey, can 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:17.480 we record your song? Uh. There they weren't huge stars, 0:20:17.520 --> 0:20:19.280 but I looked them up and they were. They were 0:20:19.320 --> 0:20:21.560 pretty well known at the time in that in the 0:20:21.600 --> 0:20:25.520 country music scene. Uh. And Dr Elmo went on to 0:20:25.600 --> 0:20:29.120 be a doctor veterinary medicine, which I thought was interesting. 0:20:29.480 --> 0:20:33.280 I saw that too. Yeah, so um uh Randy Brooks 0:20:33.280 --> 0:20:35.960 said sure, you guys can record my song, and they 0:20:35.960 --> 0:20:39.879 actually started pressing their own copies of this. I guess 0:20:39.880 --> 0:20:42.960 a single like a forty five of Grandma got run 0:20:42.960 --> 0:20:46.320 over by a reindeer, so this was I saw. They 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:49.120 met at a high in Lake Tahoe during a blizzard 0:20:49.119 --> 0:20:52.240 and that's where the whole thing happened. But the upshot 0:20:52.280 --> 0:20:55.760 of it is um. By Christmas Day ninety nine, one 0:20:55.800 --> 0:20:57.920 of these singles had made its way into the hands 0:20:57.960 --> 0:21:01.000 of a DJ in San Francisco, and this DJ played 0:21:01.040 --> 0:21:04.280 it on the radio for the first time, and uh, 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:07.480 it apparently was very polarizing from the outset. Some people 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:09.840 called the radio station and said, don't ever play that 0:21:09.920 --> 0:21:13.040 record again. Other people said, like, where can I get 0:21:13.040 --> 0:21:16.359 a copy of that record? And year by year, it 0:21:16.440 --> 0:21:19.240 just kind of slowly started to spread around the country, 0:21:19.440 --> 0:21:22.160 and then in three that was the year it just 0:21:22.280 --> 0:21:25.399 absolutely blew up. Yeah. I mean that's why you remember 0:21:25.400 --> 0:21:28.160 it as mid eighties because in eight three it became 0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:33.199 a big, big hit for ish plus years after it 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.560 was written and a few years after it was first recorded, 0:21:36.600 --> 0:21:40.960 So that's it's definitely or I guess actually more like, uh, 0:21:41.160 --> 0:21:43.200 six years after it was written, in four years after 0:21:43.200 --> 0:21:47.080 it was recorded. Yeah, Apparently it got a big boost 0:21:47.200 --> 0:21:50.199 because Elmo and Patsy had gone to the trouble of 0:21:50.359 --> 0:21:54.400 paying for a video to be made just in time 0:21:54.440 --> 0:21:57.760 for MTV, and MTV put it in heavy rotation and 0:21:57.800 --> 0:22:00.520 it ended up being the number one song on the 0:22:00.520 --> 0:22:03.320 Billboard Holiday Charts for several years in a row, and 0:22:03.359 --> 0:22:05.679 it spawned a whole bunch of stuff. It went gold, 0:22:05.960 --> 0:22:10.800 it eventually went platinum. There's toys, ugly sweaters, there's a 0:22:10.840 --> 0:22:14.960 cartoon based on it, sended candles. UM. Randy Brooks said 0:22:14.960 --> 0:22:17.560 there was a hot chocolate mix. Couldn't find that to 0:22:17.680 --> 0:22:21.680 corroborate it. Uh. And then there's a Christmas theme podcast 0:22:21.720 --> 0:22:25.240 I found UM that seems to have released the most 0:22:25.280 --> 0:22:28.120 recent episode last year. UM but they have twenty nine 0:22:28.160 --> 0:22:33.000 episodes under their belt. Grandma got run over by a podcast. Uh. 0:22:33.160 --> 0:22:35.760 And as far as the two singers, they got divorced. 0:22:36.400 --> 0:22:40.120 I think that next year or so. So yeah, maybe 0:22:40.119 --> 0:22:42.719 all that success went to their head. Yeah, that'll do it. 0:22:43.080 --> 0:22:46.600 I've seen that movie. It could happen to you. Can 0:22:46.640 --> 0:22:51.360 I read the last line? You wrote this last line right? Yeah, 0:22:51.960 --> 0:22:54.080 not a bad run for a man who's co writer 0:22:54.320 --> 0:22:59.199 is Scotch. You like that? That's great, very much tickled me. 0:22:59.800 --> 0:23:01.760 So are we going to put a musical interlude in 0:23:01.800 --> 0:23:04.199 between these two? Are we gonna head right over to 0:23:04.480 --> 0:23:06.600 All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth. 0:23:06.720 --> 0:23:09.960 Let's just head right over there. Big thanks. I got 0:23:10.040 --> 0:23:13.080 most of this stuff. There's a bunch of histories of 0:23:13.080 --> 0:23:16.280 this song, but the most thorough was from the Greenville 0:23:16.280 --> 0:23:19.840 Theater in Greenville, South Carolina at Greenville Theater dot org. 0:23:19.880 --> 0:23:22.399 And they they do Christmas plays and I think they 0:23:22.440 --> 0:23:26.240 performed this every year. It will have been ended by 0:23:26.240 --> 0:23:29.080 the time this comes out, But support local theater and 0:23:29.119 --> 0:23:32.080 support the Greenville, South Carolina Theater. Yeah, And I found 0:23:32.080 --> 0:23:34.400 it confusing at first. I was like, what does Greenville 0:23:34.480 --> 0:23:36.639 Theater in South Carolina have to do with this, because 0:23:37.040 --> 0:23:41.159 this whole thing took place in at Smithtown Elementary in Smithtown, 0:23:41.200 --> 0:23:44.760