Today is Tuesday, December 23, the 357th day of the year 2025. There are eight days left in the year.
Today in history:
On December 23, 1972, during an NFL playoff game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Oakland Raiders, Steelers running back Franco Harris scored a game-winning touchdown on a deflected pass with less than 10 seconds left. The “Immaculate Reception,” as it came to be called, is often cited as the greatest NFL play of all time.
Also on this date:
In 1823 the poem “Narrative of a Visit from St. Nicholas” was published anonymously in the Troy Sentinel of New York; the verse, better known as “The Night Before Christmas”, was later attributed to Clement C. Moore.
In 1913, the Federal Reserve was established when President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act.
In 1941, during World War II, American forces on Wake Island surrendered to Japanese forces.
In 1948, former Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo and six other Japanese leaders from World War II were executed in Tokyo after being tried for war crimes and sentenced to death by hanging.
In 1968, 82 crew members of the intelligence ship USS Pueblo were freed by North Korea, 11 months after their capture.
In 1986, the experimental Voyager aircraft, piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana (JEE’-nuh) Yeager, made the first non-stop, non-refueling flight around the world, returning safely to Edwards Air Force Base in California.
In 2003, a Virginia jury sentenced young sniper Lee Boyd Malvo to life in prison, sparing him the death penalty. Malvo and his older partner in crime, John Allen Muhammad, shot 10 people in three weeks in October 2002, terrorizing the Washington, D.C. area. Mohammed was executed in 2009.
In 2024, President Joe Biden announced he was commuting the sentences of 37 of 40 people on federal death row, converting their sentences to life in prison weeks before Donald Trump, a staunch supporter of capital punishment, begins a second term.
Today’s birthdays:
- Former Emperor Akihito of Japan is 92 years old.
- Actor-comedian Harry Shearer is 82 years old.
- Retired U.S. Army General Wesley K. Clark is 81 years old.
- Actress Susan Lucci is 79 years old.
- Long-distance runner Bill Rodgers is 78 years old.
- Football Hall of Famer Jack Ham is 77 years old.
- Political commentator William Kristol is 73 years old.
- The author Donna Tartt is 62 years old.
- Rock musician Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam is 61 years old.
- Singer, model and former first lady of France Carla Bruni is 58 years old.
- Actor Finn Wolfhard is 23 years old.
