Singer Tony Martin is 95.

Actor Gary Sandy is 63.

Singer Jimmy Buffett is 62.

Country singer Barbara Mandrell is 60.

Actress Sissy Spacek is 59.

Actress CCH Pounder is 56.

Singer Annie Lennox is 54.

Singer Dido is 37.

On Dec. 25, A.D. 336, the first recorded celebration of Christmas on Dec. 25 took place in Rome.

In 1818, "Silent Night" was performed for the first time, at the Church of St. Nikolaus in Oberndorf, Austria.

In 1991, Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev announced his resignation as the eighth and final leader of a communist superpower that had already gone out of existence.

In 2003, sixteen people were killed by mudslides that swept over campgrounds in California's San Bernardino Valley.

In 2006, James Brown, the "Godfather of Soul," died in Atlanta at age 73.

In 2007, a tiger at the San Francisco Zoo escaped her enclosure and killed a park visitor; two brothers also were mauled, but survived.