A Star To Guide The Way

The red phone was ringing.

It was almost Christmas, 1955. The cold war was in full swing. Tensions were at a new level, with the Soviet Union forming the Warsaw Pact only a few months earlier.

Nuclear war was a real possibility.

The red phone is not merely the stuff of fiction. In 1955, that phone was sitting on a desk in the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD). CONAD’s primary mission was to warn of an impending Soviet missile attack.

Colonel Harry Shoup knew that red phone was for emergency calls only. The only other person who had that number was a 4 star general at the Pentagon.

And the red phone was ringing.

Colonel Harry Shoup. Husband. Father. Decorated veteran of World War II and the Korean War.

Would the lives of millions of innocents be affected by that call?

He answered the phone.

“This is Colonel Shoup!” he nearly shouted into the phone.

A pause.

From the other end, the words came back that would affect the lives of millions of innocents for generations to come: “Is this Santa Clause?”

“Who is? What kind of joke is this?” Shoup demanded.

The small voice on the other end of the call stammered about his Christmas wish list, before beginning to cry.

That’s when Shoup realized the truth. This was no joke.

“And the people asked him, saying: What then shall we do?
…And the soldiers also asked him, saying: And what shall we do?”

Perhaps Harry Shoup thought of this verse before answering, “Ho! Ho! Ho! Have you been a good boy this year?”

Colonel Harry Shoup. Recipient of the Soldier's Medal for saving the life of another airman decided that cold Colorado December day to save a child’s hope and innocence.

He did ask though to speak to the child’s mother.

The mother quickly explained that Sears had printed an ad in the paper that ran, “Hey Kiddies! Call me direct on my Merry XMAS Telephone.” The advertisement quite ironically directed the kids to “be sure to dial the correct number.” They had. It was the number in the advertisement that was wrong.

In the first Christmas story, 2000 years earlier, soldiers had attacked innocents. On this Christmas, a soldier would defend innocence.

The calls kept pouring in and Colonel Harry Shoup would answer the call. Quite literally. In fact, he set up airmen to play Santa to children around the clock.

On Christmas Eve, some of the airmen couldn’t help themselves and on the board CONAD used to track aircraft, someone had placed a cutout of Santa’s sleigh.

Shoup wasn’t offended by the little joke at all. CONAD was supposed to track objects in the sky wasn’t it? No doubt to the airmen’s astonishment, Shoup was suddenly on the phone with a local radio station. “This is the commander at the Combat Alert Center and we have an unidentified flying object. Why, it looks like a sleigh!”

The radio stations loved it. So did the children. CONAD would report back every few hours about Santa’s current position.

The next year, CONAD reported on St. Nick again.

And so, a Christmas tradition was born.

You might know CONAD now as the North American Aerospace Defense Command, NORAD. As I write this, on Christmas Eve 2024, NORAD’s Santa tracker tells me that Santa is currently headed for Paris, France.

Millions of children have been delighted in the 70 years since the tradition began by calling NORAD to find out Santa’s whereabouts on Christmas eve.

Why? Because of one, Harry Shoup. Harry Shoup who had medals enough to cover his chest, a nearly 30 year distinguished career in the military. But Harry Shoup didn’t carry medals and accolades around to show others. In his later years, he carried a locked brief case. Some top secret papers perhaps? No. The many, many, letters from parents thanking him for giving their children some Christmas joy.

He would frequently read them, and remember that fateful December day. Colonel Harry Shoup. Or, as he became known, “The Santa Colonel.”

Colonel Harry Shoup, whose job it was to look to the skies. “And the soldiers also asked him, saying: And what shall we do?” Colonel Harry Shoup, who, like some wise men before him, watched the skies, and found a star to guide his way.

Merry Christmas!