GMT: Merry Christmas Eve Santa comes tonight

Mornin’

1942 – World War II: French monarchist, Fernand Bonnier de La Chapelle, assassinates Vichy French Admiral François Darlan in Algiers, Algeria.

1943 – World War II: U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower is named Supreme Allied Commander for the Invasion of Normandy.

1945 – Five of nine children become missing after their home in Fayetteville, West Virginia, is burned down.

1951 – Libya becomes independent from Italy. Idris I is proclaimed King of Libya.

1953 – Tangiwai disaster: In New Zealand's North Island, at Tangiwai, a railway bridge is damaged by a lahar and collapses beneath a passenger train, killing 151 people.

1964 – Vietnam War: Viet Cong operatives bomb the Brinks Hotel in Saigon, South Vietnam to demonstrate they can strike an American installation in the heavily guarded capital.

1966 – A Canadair CL-44 chartered by the United States military crashes into a small village in South Vietnam, killing 129.

1968 – Apollo program: The crew of Apollo 8 enters into orbit around the Moon, becoming the first humans to do so. They performed ten lunar orbits and broadcast live TV pictures.

1969 – The oil company Phillips Petroleum made the first oil discovery in the Norwegian sector of North Sea.

1969 – Nigerian troops capture Umuahia, the Biafran capital.

1973 – District of Columbia Home Rule Act is passed, allowing residents of Washington, D.C. to elect their own local government.

1974 – Cyclone Tracy devastates Darwin, Australia.

1980 – Witnesses report the first of several sightings of unexplained lights near RAF Woodbridge, in Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk, England, United Kingdom, an incident called "Britain's Roswell".

1994 – Air France Flight 8969 is hijacked on the ground at Houari Boumediene Airport, Algiers, Algeria. Over the course of three days three passengers are killed, as are all four terrorists.