Hardrock, Coco, & Joe
One of the things Ben tries to do when crafting our Christmas themes is to find and to highlight the fun, bizarre, or heartwarming characters of Christmas that others have maybe never been introduced to. In this spirit, our family learned about and celebrated “Hardrock, Coco, and Joe” of Chicago today. It is a three-minute, black-and-white, stop-motion film that celebrates three of Santa’s helpers who ride in his sleigh each Christmas.
Hardrock drives the sleigh, Coco navigates with maps, and Joe is just tagging along for fun. The short film first aired on WGN-TV in Chicago in 1956 and has been an annual family tradition for many Chicagoans ever since. In the spirit of “Hardrock, Coco, and Joe”, we watched the film, we played some sleigh driving and Santa’s Elf Village computer games, and we listened to some hard rock Christmas albums.
We continued to honor Chicago as best we could with an attempt at authentic Chicago dogs complete with steamed poppy seed buns, all-beef hot dogs, sport peppers, relish, and more. It was an added bonus that they looked quite Christmassy. And we paired them with a Chicago-based Goose Island Brewing Christmas IPA. To cap off the evening, we enjoyed some Oreo coal bites (ie: hard rocks) and mochas (ie: cocoa & joe) while listening to “Santaland Diaries”, the famous 1992 essay by David Sedaris (who was discovered in a Chicago club by radio host Ira Glass) which details his time as Santa's elf.
MENU:
Goose Island Brewing Christmas IPA
Oreo Coal Bites (Hardrock)
Mochas (Coco + Joe)
ACTIVITIES:
“Hardrock, Coco, & Joe” Stop Motion Film
Hard Rock Playlists (Weezer, Hawk Nelson, Relient K, Trans-Siberian Orchestra)
Santa’s Sleigh Driving Computer Game (Hardrock)
Navigation Games from Google's Santa’s Elf Village (Coco)
Laughs from David Sedaris’ “Santaland Diaries” (Joe)
INTERESTING READS & CONTEXT:
WGN Radio : History of “Hardrock, Coco, & Joe”
