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Hammond native Jean Shepherd was a late-night radio personality with a cult following who broadcast live at a Greenwich Village cafe on Saturday nights, sold out Carnegie Hall and got his listeners to make the wholly fictitious "I, Libertine" novel a New York Times bestseller.
He was a raconteur who talked for hours without a script, a humorist whose writings appeared in national magazines like Mad Magazine and an author who regaled readers with nostalgic and bitingly humorous stories about growing up in Northwest Indiana. He hosted several television shows, including "Jean Shepherd's America" on Boston Public Television, the same PBS affiliate that gave the world Julia Child's "The French Chef," "American Experience," "Frontline," "Masterpiece," "NOVA" and "This Old House."
Shepherd remains best known for "A Christmas Story," a lightly fictionalized version of his Region childhood that airs on 24/7 marathons on cable. It was recently enshrined as one of the greatest Christmas movies of all time by Stacker, which compiled data from Metacritic. The Deseret News in Salt Lake City also named it a Tier 1 Christmas movie one should watch every year, along with "The Santa Clause," "Home Alone," "Christmas Vacation," "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Miracle on 34th Street."
Theatrical versions of "A Christmas Story" are again being performed on stages all over the country this holiday season, including in Maryland, Georgia, Minnesota, Missouri and Nebraska.
"The 'A Christmas Story' play is being staged all over the country because it's a wonderful family topic that allows each family member to share in the spotlight. Everyone has a role," said filmmaker Nick Mantis, who's been working on a documentary about the Northwest Indiana native whose first radio gig was on WJOB in Hammond. "I believe Jean Shepherd is so special because he voices the conscience of the average person."
Shepherd wrote and narrated "A Christmas Story" set in Hohman, which is of course the main drag of his hometown Hammond. The classic is endlessly quoted this time of year with immortal lines like, "Fragile — must be Italian," "It's a major award," "Ovaltine? A crummy commercial?" "You'll shoot your eye out, kid" and "My father wove a tapestry of obscenity that as far as we know is still hanging in space over Lake Michigan."
"In my opinion, the film earned the distinction because it's exactly what Shepherd always argued it's not," Mantis said. "It's not nostalgic. It touches on the basic themes that can be substituted for anything today but the premise of coveting and jealousy to peer pressure to the daily everyday struggle of life. It embraces human kindness."
"A Christmas Story" has been deemed by many to be one of the best Christmas movies of all time "because it is," said Jim Clavin, who runs the Flicklives.com website celebrating Shepherd's work.
"Shepherd was a great storyteller, often referred to as a modern-day Mark Twain," Clavin said. "He not only came up with good stories, based on childhood experiences, his and others, he skillfully wove them with enough fiction to capture the interests of a widespread audience. He had a unique ability to captivate his radio audience for over 20 years not only telling 'childhood' stories, but talking of current events, travels, life in the Army, history, and whatever else he would think of. He had a talent of starting with a story, sidetracking to several others, punctuating them with all sorts of background music, and bringing it all to a climax finishing up the initial story right at the closing bars of his theme song: 'Bahn Frei Polka' by Eduard Strauss."
Theatrical adaptations of "A Christmas Story" are performed by local theater groups around the country every year. There's both a play and a musical.
"If you love the movie, what better thrill than to be a part of it on stage or watch it live," Clavin said. "I've seen several of these local performances, and they were always packed."
Clavin works to preserve Shepherd's legacy as a radio raconteur, humorist and author of such books as "In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash."
"There seems to be a mix of those who grew up listening to Shep on the radio and those who discovered him through the movie and found his old radio shows on the internet," Clavin said. "Those in the first group could relate to the stories on a personal level. As for the new generation, maybe the movie teaches them about the trials and tribulations of life, and although it's not perfect, there are lessons to be learned every day and more importantly what it's like being a real family."
Mantis said Shepherd created a major cultural touchstone that has only grown in stature in time. In December, one can see leg lamps and pink-clad Ralphies looking like "a deranged Easter bunny" in Christmas decorations outside homes across the Region and country.
"Jean Shepherd's status continues to grow thanks to social media and the vast amount of work Shep performed in each of the media fields: radio, cinema, theater and literature," Mantis said. "Jean paved his own immortality."
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