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From BookSmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, a podcast about language.

I'm John McWhorter and

Yeah, Christmas. A Christmas show. A show about Christmas words, but do you really want that?

Think about it. Here's where the word Christmas comes from, and there it went. What's the

etymology of tensile? Do you really? I don't really, but I know that

well, Christmas did happen and podcasters are supposed to do this, and so what I will do is

there are these albums, real albums. Well, not exactly real, but this is the era of the LP. And the Firestone

Tire Company used to put out these Christmas Carol LPs to make you by Firestone Tires. This was back

in the mid-60s, and my parents had some of the Firestone Tire LPs. They had beautiful covers. They

looked like, you know, classic Rudolph Christmas presents. And for people of a certain age,

and I'll admit that I am at that point, the Firestone Christmas albums somehow often come off

as what Christmas, as in tacky American Madison Avenue Christmas, is all about, at least sonically.

And my favorite cut from the ones of those that I have had forever, this is what I remember my parents playing in the late 60s, early 70s, Charlie Brown, Christmas, the energy crisis, and Firestone Christmas LPs.

Was Gordon McRae, yes, Gordon McRae from the film of Carousel, etc.?

He's always pulling up his pants to show that he's masculine.

Gordon McRae, who was all over the variety shows back then,

he's singing Go Tell It on the Mountain,

and he's trying to sound what they would have called in 1965 soulful. This cut is both bad for the reasons

you'll completely understand, but also good. It's actually kind of a good arrangement,

and Gordon is trying his best, and I play this in my home every Christmas season. People

...