The NORAD Santa Tracker Makes Us Feel Like Kids Again — Here's How It All Began

A lot of people have holiday traditions that are passed down from generation to generation. Some of them involve specific dishes that are made but once a year for Christmas. The only difference is perhaps there is less Crisco and more coconut oil. The 1950s really loved a lard-based meal.

Maybe your family has a holiday movie they always watch together, like It's a Wonderful Life or Home Alone. Perhaps a white elephant gift exchange gives everyone the opportunity to be extra goofy. Some folks like to open one gift on Christmas Eve because the anticipation is almost too much to handle. If you have kids, keeping tabs on Santa Claus using the NORAD Santa tracker is always a good time. Let's take a look at how it began.

The existence of the NORAD Santa tracker is actually a happy accident. It all started in 1955 with a misprint in The Gazette out of Colorado Springs, per the Los Angeles Times. An advertisement placed by Sears, Roebuck & Co. included a phone number claiming children could reach Santa Claus if they called. One evening, a child reversed two digits, which is how a little girl rang up Col. Harry Shoup at the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD), per The Atlantic.

The young girl asked Harry if he was really Santa Claus. Once he figured out what was happening, Harry softened. A few weeks later, someone from CONAD (now NORAD) drew a sleigh on the glass board typically used to track planes in U.S. or Canadian airspace. Harry immediately called up a local radio station and said, "This is the commander of the Combat Alert Center, and we have an unidentified flying object — Why, it looks like a sleigh!"

When NORAD took over for CONAD in 1958, the annual reports grew increasingly more elaborate. Sometimes stories of Santa making unauthorized landings were reported, like the one in 1960 when he had to make an emergency landing on the Hudson Bay. Thank God it was frozen!

The less cynical people believe that NORAD tracks Santa Claus because it's something fun to do for the children. It provides yet another reason a family can spend time together and buy into the magic of Christmas. Everyone gives themselves permission to believe, even if it's just for a little while.

If you're pessimistic and somewhat negative, allow us to offer up another explanation for the NORAD Santa tracker. Before Harry was involved in a very sweet mix-up, the Air Force was using the idea of Santa to "sell the public on the utility of its early warning radar and vectored fighter interceptors," said The Atlantic. The NORAD Santa tracker helps accomplish this more effectively.