Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (song) Rudolph's general acceptance in the mythology as the lead reindeer of Joulupukki, the Finnish Santa. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (song) "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer" is a song by songwriter Johnny Marks based on the 1939 story "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" published by the Montgomery Ward Company. Gene Autry's recording hit No. 1 on the U.S. charts the week of Christmas 1949. In 1939 Marks's brother-in-law, Robert L. May, created the character Rudolph as an assignment for Montgomery Ward and Marks decided to adapt the story of Rudolph into a song. The song had an added introduction, paraphrasing the poem "A
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer characters from the Rankin/Bass special (as GoodTimes soon learned that Rankin/Bass had made a copyright error that made the characters unique to their special free to use). A live-action version of Rudolph (complete with glowing nose) along with Donner and Blitzen appears in the "Doctor Who" Christmas special, "Last Christmas" which was broadcast on BBC One on 25 December 2014. In this special, Santa is able to park him like a car and turn off his nose. Nathaniel Dominy, an anthropology professor at Dartmouth College (Robert L. May's alma mater), published a scholarly paper on Rudolph's red nose in the