Politico has a lovely story on the history and present of the NORAD Santa Tracker, which started because a 1955 Sears department store ad had “a digit wrong — and was instead the direct line into the secret military nerve center in Colorado Springs, Colo., where the Pentagon was on the lookout to prevent nuclear war.”

7 thoughts on “NORAD’s Santa Tracker

  1. Stuff You Missed in History also had a really nice podcast about the creation of NORAD’s Santa Tracker. It’s a longer story with more details than Mike Rowe’s podcast, just under 40 min. Here’s the link: https://www.missedinhistory.com/podcasts/norad-tracking-santa.htm
    The NORAD Santa Tracker is near & dear to my heart – as a child of a career Air Force officer, we used to listen to NORAD report the sightings on the radio (gasp, radio?) when I was growing up. It always made Christmas so special.

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