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KING History to disappear?

L

LITTLEBOYBLUE

KING has announced they put their building on the market...South Lake Union properties in incredible turnover thanks to bio techs and Amazon in the area. So lots of condos and apartments to support it all. Add to that KING's building is largely empty...it once housed the corporate HQ, NW Mobile management (operations next to the Battery tunnel where a popular nightclub now sits), a cable operation management, an apartment/office for the Bullitt family, and support for several local TV shows and two radio stations. Now it houses operations for ION affiliate, KONG & KING, NWCN .. but fewer people as the industry has trimmed functions over the years thanks to pencil sharpening and technology changes.

(Let me emphasize: TWO radio stations were there......so people don't get panties in a wad that I am talking about television on here).

Of course it was a furniture warehouse when Dorothy Bullitt and crew took it over (320 Aurora). Pieces got added on and added on ... funky stairways in that building which housed Charles Herring's newscasts, KING "NewsService" television, Stan Boreson, Wunda Wunda, King's Queen...and many public affairs, etc. Around 1981, the new building was added "to the back" on Dexter...and the back door became the front door, the address became 333 Dexter...and the whole thing flipped around. Corporate, the Bullits and Cable offices on the top floor...Business Operations and KING-AM on the new fourth floor; the old KING-AM became KING-FM with a new tunnel poked through to the fourth floor lobby. Third floor had TV sales & programming...the second floor the TV operations, Cafeteria, TV studios...and the first floor mostly all the legacy stuff in the old building (formerly the studios ... one of which converted to an employee gym) and all the news operations. Years later news moved up to the fourth floor where KING-FM and business operations used to be...and almost the entire original building's first floor became used for things like band practice for the house band ... a sign that maybe they had a little "too much" space.

Get some new owners in the place last year and people probably start walking around with clipboards & spreadsheets...while noticing on their visit to Seattle that all those "For Sale" signs are in the neighborhood with lots of zeros on there.


Guess all this will depend on if anyone bites to buy. Sure is a LOT of history in those walls, though. Wonder if a new plan would involve a custom news operation & studio...and all the other studio space will be outsourced to places like Fremont. Remember, Channel 11 didn't even HAVE a studio when they moved next to the sewer plant in Renton ... and now don't even have THAT (just sales on Dexter where radio stations are for CBS). KOMO compressed all Fisher-operations into about two-1/2 floors of Fisher Plaza (including corporate space) before Sinclair stepped in. Ironically....KIRO used to lease their third floor to Ford; then took over the space; but also downsized when they had bought what was called "the Annex" and leveled it for news van parking. Their external post-production facility, Third Avenue Productions, also got razed and turned into condos.
 
But still. That building is a landmark. Just the architecture in all it's funky early '80s chic is something to behold.

Like The KIRO Broadcast House, it even had a freaking CAFETERIA in there. I don't think they even have those in radio/TV facilities anywhere anymore, do they? With all this corporate cost cutting, I would think everybody's brown bagging or doing take out these days.

Has anybody actually ate at these places? I think for posterity, it would be interesting to note what was on the menus of those cafeterias. What sort of delicious fare broadcasters were enjoying back in the day. Some simple descriptions and critiques if you ate at one (and BEST yet, if there are images of an actual printed menu somewhere we all could see.)...
 
KING Lunchroom still open ... KIRO's was filled with vending machines years ago. I ate in both KING versions (old bldg. & new one) and in the KIRO one when it was still staffed. KING's was great for breakfast...I used to beat morning traffic to be there early so it was great to have some food to perk the energy back up! Great burgers...but mostly what I remember was the fun of running into coworkers while you're in line waiting to order or waiting for food. Many KING alum's will remember when Hazel worked at the 320 version of the cafeteria, then took over the mail room & loading dock when everything moved into the new half of the building.

Wondering if Amazon would end up with the facility and use it to produce any of their home-grown video content that they are starting to produce now?
 
I was employed at KING-AM in 1981 when they moved the AM studios into the north part of the new addition. In fact, I was on the air when Bruce Murdock uttered the first words from the new studio (mostly just a test on a Sunday night). I was too young to appreciate the new surroundings, but now realize KING had built a state of the art facility that still makes most local broadcast facilities pale by comparison.

I guess the statute of limitations has passed, so I can share a story of a friend and myself, (after a few libations), deciding to explore the property on our own after hours. Of course, the security back then was lax, (on purpose, I think), and we found ourselves unknowingly walking into Dorothy Bullits unlocked honorary office. We looked around and then quickly decided it would be smart to get out of there. Of course, the story later was exaggerated into "the time we snuck into Dorothy's office at KING's new building and rifled through her files". Of course, no such thing ever happened, but stories like that tend to get exaggerated over the years! I also remember sneaking into the new KING news set days before it was to go on air, and nobody stopped us. Such lack of security would be unheard of today. (BTW, that first news set in the new studio was ugly, lots of whites and blues and a big world map in the background) and was replaced a couple of years later with a more mordern tanned-toned look). Anyway, great memories, fun times.
 
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Understand this sold now to a real estate company (like Fisher did a couple years ago). Will the building be split into multiple tenants? Studio side would make a nice warehouse space....and it has awesome off-the-street loading dock. TV stations will be moving down to same building as Real Networks @ Safeco field intersection.
 
Well, at least they'll get a new set out of it.

How old is the current one? 15 years?

The big question is: Does their lease on the new space include rooftop access so Rich Marriott and Jeff Renner can set up their weather terrace?
 
Eh, change happens. As you remember Eric, I also spent several years of my early broadcasting career in that building, but I also remember the staff concern that the old days officially ended when the new Dexter-side of the building was under construction. In my view, it was around that point in time when Dorothy and Ansel began to give up control of the old King Broadcasting Company, and the corporate regime began. In particular I remember sitting on the floor in the AM new control room around 9:00PM, soldering those countless, mind-numbing, stupid Ward Beck console "Christmas tree" connections, and was handed an E-mail from the new management regarding a new company dress code. Jeans and tennis shoes were officially banned at any hour or any day. An early sign of the times to be sure.
 
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Love these stories! Sounds a lot like the old WEBC studios in Duluth, Minnesota. They were probably built in the 40's and were big enough to originate live drama and music shows; and had a restaurant called the Radio Grill that served both as an employee lunchroom and a cafe open to the public. The grill and studios had large store-type windows so you could sit in the restaurant and "watch radio." They too had a lot of excess space when DJ radio took over.

The studios, unfortunately, burned out in the early 60's. WEBC operated for some time from their transmitting plant across the bridge in Superior, Wisconsin; which was designed to look like a residence to be "inconspicuous" (next to a tower??), then moved to a nondescript converted grocery store building in Duluth.
 
Kelly A said:
Eh, change happens. As you remember Eric, I also spent several years of my early broadcasting career in that building, but I also remember the staff concern that the old days officially ended when the new Dexter-side of the building was under construction. In my view, it was around that point in time when Dorothy and Ansel began to give up control of the old King Broadcasting Company, and the corporate regime began. In particular I remember sitting on the floor in the AM new control room around 9:00PM, soldering those countless, mind-numbing, stupid Ward Beck console "Christmas tree" connections, and was handed an E-mail from the new management regarding a new company dress code. Jeans and tennis shoes were officially banned at any hour or any day. An early sign of the times to be sure.
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And there was the famous "Spaghetti plate" memo when someone was taking a plate to their desk and inverted it on the new white carpet! Pat Cashman even did a mock editorial lip-syncing to an actual Ancil editorial changing the focus to be about carrying food! I noticed a culture change when Dexter opened; but at least there was the assurance it was still the same SITE, and the original building was integrated pretty well. This chapter is BIG-TIME shift, but I guess necessary. The building had huge unoccupied spaces (how many TV headquarters have dedicated space for the "house band" to rehearse?) ... and if you walk through KIRO it's much different these days too. One telling sign was when they bulldozed their annex and used it for news van parking instead....and that was after they sold off 3rd Avenue Productions building a block away so it could become another Belltown high-rise condo.
 
I found a stack of 45's recently at the 1090 transmitter plant from the KING days. 51, 45's with tittles like "Working my way back to you" the Spinners, "fooled around and Fell in love" Elvin Bishop, "Somebody to love" Queen, "Steel Away" Robbie Dupree, "Rubber Band Man" The Spinners, "On Broadway" and others from the 70's I would say. And a lot of Frank Sinatra. They used to have an old Gates console and turntables out therefor when they lost the program loop from Seattle. And several reels of tape that may have 1 hour segments they could play from reel to reel. I have not listen to them yet.
 
Yep, they had an old Ampex reel to reel set up and ready to run. I think we actually used it one time for a few minutes during a Sunday night maintenance period. KOMO had a backup reel to reel at Vashon too. I fired it up one time off the air just for grins and the old oxide started falling off the tape.
 
KMan said:
Well, at least they'll get a new set out of it.

How old is the current one? 15 years?

The big question is: Does their lease on the new space include rooftop access so Rich Marriott and Jeff Renner can set up their weather terrace?
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Are they taking over the entire building?
 
xmtrland said:
I found a stack of 45's recently at the 1090 transmitter plant from the KING days. 51, 45's with tittles like "Working my way back to you" the Spinners, "fooled around and Fell in love" Elvin Bishop, "Somebody to love" Queen, "Steel Away" Robbie Dupree, "Rubber Band Man" The Spinners, "On Broadway" and others from the 70's I would say. And a lot of Frank Sinatra. They used to have an old Gates console and turntables out therefor when they lost the program loop from Seattle. And several reels of tape that may have 1 hour segments they could play from reel to reel. I have not listen to them yet.
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"Steal Away" Robbie Dupree was 1980, I think. "Working My Way Back To You/Forgive Me Girl" The Spinners came out right around the same time. If those tapes are stable (one could hope), we'd all love to hear what they sound like......
 
I'd give the odds 50/50....I have a room full of reel tape I salvaged from KING when moving from old-->new building (mostly production room work tapes, but other stuff too). So much of that reel/reel stock from the mid 70's to mid 80's turned to MUD when you let it sit for a long time...as I'm digitizing all these things I'm splicing a TON as the tape keeps breaking, etc. There is a way to "bake" reel tapes in convection oven ... so you remove the "mud" aspect and have one decent shot to play the tape; but I've never tried that.
 
LITTLEBOYBLUE said:
I'd give the odds 50/50....I have a room full of reel tape I salvaged from KING when moving from old-->new building (mostly production room work tapes, but other stuff too). So much of that reel/reel stock from the mid 70's to mid 80's turned to MUD when you let it sit for a long time...as I'm digitizing all these things I'm splicing a TON as the tape keeps breaking, etc. There is a way to "bake" reel tapes in convection oven ... so you remove the "mud" aspect and have one decent shot to play the tape; but I've never tried that.
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Some of the very WORST tape stock came from the early '70s. In fact, most of the MGM studio recordings of the early '70s are beyond salvation and when The Osmonds compiled their '90s CD reissues, they had to find mint condition vinyl, transfer them to digital via a laser turntable and artificially tweak them. And they weren't the only ones.
 
Well that didn't take too long. Kilroy Real Estate (and apparently was here) purchased the entire block including the KING Broadcasting building and will probably tear it down. Cue the outrage..
 
Kelly A said:
Well that didn't take too long. Kilroy Real Estate (and apparently was here) purchased the entire block including the KING Broadcasting building and will probably tear it down. Cue the outrage..
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I'm not outraged. Just disgusted by the thought. I already knew it was going be one of the most likely outcomes for that property.
 
I'm not outraged, either. With that being said, I find it annoying that a piece of history needs to be ripped down to accommodate another condo building. Its a similar (but worse) situation up in Vancouver. Vacant lots are now occupied by condo construction and old buildings are regularly torn down to make room for new construction. I'm not partial to the "tear it down and start over" attitude that people live by in this day and age.
 
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