The History of Animation: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

You know the 1961 version, the 1998 version, but do you recall...

...the oldest theatrical rendition of all?

The very first adaptation of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was released during the 1940s, and it's also the most faithful to the original book.

...Yes, it was a book...more on that later...

It's a simple, innocent story; Rudolph is mocked by the other Reindeer for his funny nose, and Santa gets lost in the fog.  Unable to navigate it on his own, Santa has to turn to Rudolf in order to solve the problem, and we all know the rest!

Here it is right now, it's a short film that was intended as a theatrically released cartoon of a similar kind of the Merry Melodies of the same decade:

If you'd rather watch this on a television screen, it's available on Amazon.