Donner or Donder

What is the name of Santa's seventh Reindeer? I always thought it was Donner, because, as I learned when I studied German, Donner and Blitzen are German for thunder and lightning. It bothers me to hear that Reindeer called Donder. Today I googled Donner and Blitzen and found out that I'm right and wrong -- if you believe Snopes (www.snopes.com/holidays/christmas/donner.asp).

The earliest version of "A Visit from Saint Nicholas" (1823) named those reindeer for the Dutch words for thunder and lightning: Dunder and Blixem. Someone later changed it to the German versions, but that dunderhead misspelled Donner as Donder, so that's how it appears in the 1844 version. The 1844 version became a standard, so everybody who says Donder does have a leg to stand on.

Subsequent publishers have used both versions -- some sticking with the 1844 Donder and some reasoning that the author must have meant Donner. 

In 1949, when I was 8 years old, the newly minted "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" became a wildly popular Christmas song. In those days, everyone listened to the radio, and every radio station played Christmas songs from Thanksgiving through Christmas. I must have heard that song hundreds of times since then. It uses Donner -- another reason why that version sounds so natural to me.

So go ahead and say Donder if you must, but I'll continue to regard it as a typo.