Poet. He is remembered as the creator of "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer." In a poem with 100 rhyming phrases spread over 32 pages, he told the story of an unusual reindeer, who helped Santa to deliver Christmas toys to children around the world and making him "the most famous reindeer of all." The idea of Rudolph came to him while working as an advertising copywriter for the Montgomery Wards department store chain. Born into a wealthy secular Jewish family, he had three talented siblings. After attending private schools, he graduated magna cum laude with a A.B majoring in psychology from Dartmouth College in 1926. After his first marriage, he was employed by Macy's Department Store, Rich's in Atlanta, and Butterwick Company before the Great Depression caused him to become unemployed as well as his father's lumber business becoming bankrupt. By 1936, he had accepted a low-paying position in Chicago at Montgomery Wards. While he was writing Rudolph's story, his wife died from cancer, leaving him as a widower with a three-year-old daughter. In 1941, he remarried a devoted Roman Catholic, Virginia, and the couple had five children. The "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" poem began as a 1939 Christmas promotional for the store with 2.4 million copies printed in a pamphlet-form. After World War II and no more paper shortage, the poem was reprinted at Christmas of 1946 with 3.6 million copies made. Since Montgomery Ward held the rights to his poem, he did not get clear rights to his poem for his use until 1947. By Christmas of 1947, a hardcovered book was published as well as a stuffed reindeer toy, picture-puzzle books, children's slippers and a RCA record of the poem being spoken. The poem was set to music by his brother-in-law Johnny Marks, with a singing cowboy, Gene Autry, recording it in 1949, selling 25 million copies. "Frosty the Snow Man" was on the B-side of the 1949 release. In 1959 Rock n' Roll vocalist, Chuck Berry, release another version of the song with different lyrics, "Run Rudolph Run," which has been covered by a host of other recording artists. In 1951 May left Montgomery Wards to manage the Rudolph project, which brought financial prosperity to his family. With his second wife's death, he married for a third time to his wife's sister and eventually converted to Roman Catholic. Animated films were made of the reindeer with the red nose. They include, "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" in 1944, "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" in 1964, "Christmas Unwrapped: The History of Christmas" in 1997, and "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer: the Movie" in 1998. In 2010 a "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer' video game was released. In 1950 "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" ranked 25th on the Top 40 Billboard list of favorite Christmas songs. Although "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer" is still a popular Christmas song in the United States, it never was in the top ten, yet ranked number eleven in 2021 according to "Reader's Digest."