How "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" became a Christmas tradition
Dec 04, 2024 02:01PM ● By Nick Thomas
’Tis the season when TV channels roll out round-the-clock Christmas movies and radio stations across the country add festive tunes to their playlists. Among these holiday hits, one song in particular stands out as both naughty and nice.
Elmo Shropshire didn’t write “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer,” but he’s been performing the jolly, yet darkly comic jingle since the late ’70s. Popularized by Shropshire and his then-wife Patsy Trigg, the song was released under the duo name Elmo & Patsy in 1979.
Credit: Prismic Photography (Prismic-photography.com)
Shropshire, now 88, performs under the name Dr. Elmo and has spent recent holiday seasons traveling with a group called The Holiday Express. He is also a competitive distance runner, earning several national and world titles in his 80s.
Before his music career took off, Shropshire graduated from Auburn University’s veterinary school and worked with racehorses in New York before moving to the Bay Area to open a medical clinic.
He soon became interested in bluegrass music, learning banjo and performing with Patsy. In 1978, songwriter Randy Brooks introduced the couple to the reindeer song while they were all stranded in a hotel due to bad weather. Shropshire was hooked and wanted to record his own version.
“I just made this funny Christmas recording as a gag,” he recalled. “A friend took it to a radio station and people started calling in to say they loved it—or hated it.”
After that first Christmas, he thought that would be the end of it, but radio stations kept playing it every year. By the early ’80s, it was on air nationwide.
Shropshire had a hit. In 1983, he sold his veterinary practice and invested $30,000 in a video for the song with one modification:
“Grandma survives in the video!” he said. “I played Grandma and Grandpa” while Patsy played Cousin Mel.
The video has since gathered over 15 million views on YouTube, while the song has sold millions in formats from vinyl and cassette to digital and ringtones.
“It’s impossible to tell the exact number because it’s been used so much and on so many different albums and online recordings,” said Pam Wendell, Shropshire’s wife since 2000.
Yet the royalties keep coming anytime his version is used in movies, TV shows and even a plush reindeer that plays the song.
Shropshire, who now lives in Novato, California, has also recorded other songs with similar themes, such as “The Ballad of Grandma” and “Grandma’s Killer Fruitcake.” But he takes the controversy around his original hit in stride.
“It’s just wonderful to have a hit song, even if you only have one,” he said. “I never thought I could still be making a living from it. It’s just one of those things you could never predict.”
For those who still can’t warm up to a Christmas song about a granny in a reindeer hit-and-run, take comfort—it could have been worse.
