Billings MT, August 1976

[bm10k]

Here's An Throw Back from the Billings Gazette

3 - CJOC (Now CISA) Lethbridge, AB
4 - KTVQ-2 CBS (NBC-ABC) Billings
5 - KULR-8 ABC (NBC) Billings
6 - Home Cinema (local pay channel i'm guessing)
7 - KWGN-2 Denver
9 - KTVX-4 (ABC) Salt Lake City (when station signs off, it airs KTXL/Sacramento)
10 - KUTV-2 (NBC) Salt Lake City
11 - KSL-5 (CBS) Salt Lake City
12 - KUED-7 (PBS) Salt Lake City (when station signs off, it airs KTVU/San Francisco following it's sign off KGSC/San Jose will continue with movies until morning

 

[ftballfan]

Kind of unusual that the SLC Big 3 + PBS were carried and not Denver. Was Salt Lake a larger market than Denver at the time?

 

[crainbebo]

This is VERY cool. I know CISA has had plenty of carriage in Montana in the past, they were carried in Montana's TV Guide as well. KOUS/4 (NBC) would have signed on in 1980, so I guess the cable company removed KUTV around that time.
KWGN was carried in not only Montana, but in WY, all of CO and portions of a few other states in the '70s and '80s. Helped that they were uplinked to C-Band in the late '80s, sending their station into nationwide carriage. Guessing KTVU, KTXL and even KGSC (?!!) were through microwave. Maybe the same 'microwave' link that a Southern Oregon TV Guide listed in 1982? But that one included a lot of KBHK and KPIX shows as well.

 

[bm10k]

Kind of unusual that the SLC Big 3 + PBS were carried and not Denver. Was Salt Lake a larger market than Denver at the time?

I think it was common practice at that time that cable systems in Montana carried either Spokane or SLC stations

 

[newsmark]

Kind of unusual that the SLC Big 3 + PBS were carried and not Denver.

Maybe the SLC stations had translator sites in Idaho or Wyoming that were a shorter microwave hop to Billings.

 

[IM42A]

This is VERY cool. I know CISA has had plenty of carriage in Montana in the past, they were carried in Montana's TV Guide as well. KOUS/4 (NBC) would have signed on in 1980, so I guess the cable company removed KUTV around that time.
KWGN was carried in not only Montana, but in WY, all of CO and portions of a few other states in the '70s and '80s. Helped that they were uplinked to C-Band in the late '80s, sending their station into nationwide carriage. Guessing KTVU, KTXL and even KGSC (?!!) were through microwave. Maybe the same 'microwave' link that a Southern Oregon TV Guide listed in 1982? But that one included a lot of KBHK and KPIX shows as well.

Is this the same as those weird "California" channels in one of the Oregon TV Guides? Just working from memory, the channel listing page didn't specify call letters, and it looked like they were "wildcard" channels, carrying various stations in rotation throughout the day.

 

[crainbebo]

The Southern Oregon TV Guide carried a couple of channels from California, but they rotated through stations. KTVU was full-time, and I believe KTXL as well, the other 'wildcard' channel as mentioned took KBHK and KPIX programs, maybe even KTZO.

 

[IM42A]

The Southern Oregon TV Guide carried a couple of channels from California, but they rotated through stations. KTVU was full-time, and I believe KTXL as well, the other 'wildcard' channel as mentioned took KBHK and KPIX programs, maybe even KTZO.

There was a similar situation in Frankfort KY where some stations shared a cable channel, with one station being carried part of the day, and another station carried during another part. There just weren't enough channel spaces to go around, keeping in mind that they were shoehorned into 12 channels. Cincinnati TV has long since disappeared from Frankfort cable. Frankfort was in the Louisville TV market until, IIRC, up into the 1980s when they moved over to Lexington. Several Louisville stations are still carried there.

Another example of "wildcard" channels was in Columbus OH where locally pre-empted network programs were brought in from WAKR-23 Akron (I think) and WTRF-7 Wheeling, and maybe other cities as well. Columbia SC cable did likewise with Augusta stations, which can still easily be received in Columbia with a better outdoor antenna such as the Televes.