Apollo 8, Christmas Eve 1968 and a message for today

The year had seen student protests worldwide, the Tet Offensive in the Vietnam War, a chaotic Democratic National Convention, the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy and countless other examples of discord.

NASA came through with an uplifting message. On Christmas Eve, half a billion people around the world watched historic, Emmy-winning TV coverage of Apollo 8 orbiting...