Dec 19, 2014 3 min read

Every Christmas, it’s become my tradition to make fun of some Christmas traditions. I love the holiday, but you have to admit there are some wacky things about the season. Every year, I listen to a near-infinite stream of Christmas music on the car radio. It puts me in a joyful mood, even while people are cutting me off in traffic.

Some of the songs are brilliant. I am particularly fond of Burl Ives’ “Holly Jolly Christmas” and Angela Lansbury’s “We Need Another Christmas.” Some of the tunes are just plain weird. For some reason, every Christmas, the local oldies station whips out this little ditty, “Snoopy’s Christmas,” by the Royal Guardsmen. It’s a song about Charlie Brown’s dog and his fictional fight against a real-life historical figure, Baron Manfred Von Richthofen, AKA the Red Baron. I am here to roast the Royal Guardsmen and the famous Peanuts character.

It’s an unusual choice for a Christmas song. The Royal Guardsmen would have (should have?) faded into obscurity if not for this Christmas ballad.

In the song, Snoopy is a World War I fighter pilot. Apparently, that white doghouse with the candy-apple red roof must be bigger on the inside, because Charlie Brown’s dog seems to be some sort of time traveler. Snoopy and the Red Baron engage in an aerial battle in their WWI fighter planes. The beleaguered beagle is about to be gunned downed by the bloody baron, but, in a rare moment of kindness brought on by the bells in the village below, the baron stays his trigger finger. They call a Christmas truce and share a drink together, toasting to the New Year.

In 1914, during the real WWI, a Christmas truce was enacted. So, there is quite a lot of historical fact intermingled with a song about Woodstock’s favorite pooch. Though the aerial battles were called dogfights, no actual dogs participated. According to the history books, Richthofen was shot down by a pilot named Brown, but it was not Snoopy Brown. I am not even sure if dogs take the last name of their owners.

Side note: For the life of me, I cannot understand why there is a frozen pizza named after Richthofen. He’s an actual, real-life supervillain. Though he’d be considered a war hero, if he wasn’t on the wrong side. I can’t figure out his connections to dough, tomato sauce or mozzarella. It’s not like the Germans were noted for their pizza-making abilities.

But I digress, like I do. After the toast, our hero and the baron part ways vowing to meet again (most likely to kill one another). The song does end on a happy note: “Christmas bells, those Christmas bells ringing through the land, bringing peace to all the world, and good will toward man.” Those words make the whole silly song worth it. I’m hoping this year, those bells ring true and we have some peace to all the world and good will toward man … and dog. Happy holidays!