Shoup agreed that Oldfield should announce it again, and the annual tradition was born. Shoup did not intend to repeat the stunt in 1956, but Oldfield informed him that the Associated Press and United Press International were awaiting reports that CONAD again was claiming to be tracking Santa Claus. Shoup and his family later modified the story further, adding that the child had dialled the 'red telephone'-an impossibility, because the hotline was connected with the Strategic Air Command by an enclosed cable, and no one could dial into from the outside-rather than the regular phone on Shoup's desk, that it was a misprint in an advertisement that led the child to call him rather than the child misdialing the number, and that a flood of calls had come in from children on Christmas Eve 1955 rather than from just one child on November 30. By 1961, Shoup's version of the story was that he had not been gruff with the child but instead had identified himself as Santa Claus when he spoke to the child on the phone. Over the following years, the legend of how the annual event originated began to change. against possible attack from those who do not believe in Christmas.' In his release to the press, Oldfield added that 'CONAD, Army, Navy, and Marine Air Forces will continue to track and guard Santa and his sleigh on his trip to and from the U.S. However, when a member of Shoup's staff placed a picture of Santa on a board used to track unidentified aircraft that December, Shoup saw a public relations opportunity for CONAD and he asked CONAD's public affairs officer Colonel Barney Oldfield to inform the press that CONAD was tracking Santa's sleigh. A more accurate description of the events of 1955 appears to be that on November 30, a child trying to reach Santa on a hotline number provided in a Sears advertisement misdialed the number and instead reached Shoup at his desk at CONAD. Shoup responded gruffly to one child who called and no additional Santa Claus-related calls came in to CONAD.

Colonel Harry Shoup, who was a crew commander on duty, answered the first call and supposedly told his staff to give all children who called in later a made-up 'current location' for Santa Claus. In some versions of the story, the calls were coming in to the 'red telephone' hotline that connected CONAD directly to command authorities at the Strategic Air Command. A call allegedly came through to Colorado Springs' Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Center as one digit was misprinted. According to legend, a Sears department store placed an advertisement in the Colorado Springs newspaper The Gazette, which told children they could place a call to Santa Claus and included the number ME 2-6681. The program originated before the actual formation of NORAD, as an annual event on December 24, 1955. It was the first time that the United States Armed Forces issued a statement about tracking Santa Claus' sleigh on Christmas Eve, though it was a one-time event, not repeated over the next several years. On December 24, 1948, the United States Air Force issued a communique claiming that an 'early warning radar net to the north' had detected 'one unidentified sleigh, powered by eight reindeer, at 14,000 feet, heading 180 degrees.' The Associated Press passed this 'report' along to the general public.

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