It is the end of 1968.
Martin Luther King has been assassinated. Robert Kennedy has been assassinated. Soviet forces have invaded Czechoslovakia. There are Black Power riots across America. The Zodiac Killer murders his first victims.
On Christmas Eve, in Apollo 8, Jim Lovell, Bill Anders and Frank Borman—became the first humans to see the dark side of the moon.
On New Year's Eve, Raymond J. Quant, a property developer, is found dead in the empty street of a new Los Angeles development.