Former Superstations

[dhett]

Some stations become sudden superstations when there's sunspot activity. When I lived in San Diego in the 70s, I flipped on the set one day, and while changing channels, I was shocked to see a signal on a channel that was normally blank, and it was a newscast on a station from Portland, Oregon! I wondered what the hell I had smoked, then remembered that this phenominon was known to happen. I've heard the stories of others, some of them involving international stations from Canada and Latin America.

Solar flares - ya gotta love 'em!

Could that have been why the following happened? ??? ;D

One night in 1985, shortly after moving to the Baltimore market from the Philadelphia market, I was channel surfing and suddenly, when surfing across channel 4, found myself hearing WRC's audio and seeing WNBC's video (it was during their 11 pm newscasts).

ixnay

I would have said e-skip, which affects primarily the low-VHF band, although I've never seen it happen where the video is from a distant station, while the audio is from nearby.

One time, I was getting an NBC station on channel 4 in Phoenix, which I thought was KVOA Tucson, until it ID'd, and I found out it was WOAI San Antonio.

 

[bk77]

Some stations become sudden superstations when there's sunspot activity. When I lived in San Diego in the 70s, I flipped on the set one day, and while changing channels, I was shocked to see a signal on a channel that was normally blank, and it was a newscast on a station from Portland, Oregon! I wondered what the hell I had smoked, then remembered that this phenominon was known to happen. I've heard the stories of others, some of them involving international stations from Canada and Latin America.

Solar flares - ya gotta love 'em!

Could that have been why the following happened? ??? ;D

One night in 1985, shortly after moving to the Baltimore market from the Philadelphia market, I was channel surfing and suddenly, when surfing across channel 4, found myself hearing WRC's audio and seeing WNBC's video (it was during their 11 pm newscasts).

ixnay

I would have said e-skip, which affects primarily the low-VHF band, although I've never seen it happen where the video is from a distant station, while the audio is from nearby.

One time, I was getting an NBC station on channel 4 in Phoenix, which I thought was KVOA Tucson, until it ID'd, and I found out it was WOAI San Antonio.

when I was staying with friends in Northern Virginia back in the 80s. They got a semi-good picture on channel 16. At first I thought is was the Eastern Shore's WBOC-TV, but it was actually Scranton, PA's WNEP-TV.

 

[Cincinnati Kid]

I remember WTTV, Channel 4, out of Indianapolis/Bloomington for its over-the-air signal in the early 1960's. They were owned by Sarkus/Tarzian and not affiliated with any network and had pro wrestling and numerous basketball games. They also carried the video-taped delays of Notre Dame football on Saturday nights. The first time I saw Lew Alcindor in action was on WTTV when the station picked up a game UCLA was playing on a Saturday night in Chicago when he was a sophomore.

WTTV's signal reached a large portion of Indiana and I was able to pick it up here in Cincinnati with various antennas. In an ad for WTTV that I saw in a magazine, the station also claimed they could be received in east central Illinois. While attending college in south-central Kentucky, WTTV could also be received via a deep fringe antenna on the room of the dorm. The antenna was pointed toward Louisville, but that angle also put it in line with the station's powerful signal.

When WTTV signed off at night, they would advise the station telecasted from a 1,250 foot antenna located in Trafalger, Indiana. I was never able to find that town on a map.

 

[rwells2265]

KXTX-39 in Dallas was on a large number of Arkansas cable systems in the '80s. In the Arkansas Edition TVG, its bullet was "39D"

Two other DFW stations were also on cable in Hot Springs, Ark. in the early '80s -- KTVT-11, and during overnight hours WFAA-8 (movies). KTVT was dropped when Little Rock's first indie (KLRT-16) signed on in July 1983.

WTCG-17 was a minor superstation prior to its going on the bird. Both it, and CBN-owned WHAE/WANX-46 were carried on most of the systems in metro Birmingham, via microwave.

Another 'mini-superstation' would have to be St. Louis' KPLR-11. It was carried as far south as the Missouri bootheel.

--Russell

 

[RadioDze]

Raleigh's WRAL-TV 5 (CBS)was once available via satellite nationwide (early to mid 1990s) but was replaced by WSEE-TV 35 in Erie, PA on that package. The station is still seen on some cable systems outside of the Raleigh-Duham-Fayetteville DMA. Both WRAL and WTVD 11 (ABC) were on cable in Wilmington, NC (along the coast) in the late 80s/early 90s. WTVD may be still but WRAL owner Capitol Broadcasting bought a Class A station there, the former WSSN-LP 10 and made it a CBS affiliate, WILM. I think both Raleigh's 5 and 11 are still on Jacksonville (NC, just up the coastline from Wilmington) cable.

 

[chuckydoll]

To this day Fox31/KDVR is imported well beyond Denver. Look closely for the blotches in Montana, Nebraska and Wyoming.

Denver's ABC7 (KMGH) is on cable in Glendive MT as well.

 

[Don62]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Kansas City's KBMA, TV-41, which is now an NBC affiliate as KSHB.

"From the early 1970s through the 1980s, it was available on many cable systems in Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma. This included many large Midwestern cities that didn't have independent stations of their own, such as Des Moines, Omaha, Lincoln, and Wichita."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KSHB-TV

KBMA, which like KTVT in Dallas and KLPR in STL, aired many old sitcoms such as Gomer Pyle, and shows such as Star Trek and Lost In Space, was carried all over Kansas on cable systems.

 

[tothedj]

WRAL-TV in Raleigh has not been on in Jacksonville, North Carolina since the
tower collapsed in the latter part of 1989.
WTVD in Durham might have been on cable there at one time, but is not right
now.
In Wilmington, WTVD is only on when WWAY pre-empts ABC and carries
"ABC11 Eye Witness News" at 12 Noon, 5pm, 5:30, 6pm and 11pm during
the week, and 6pm(when there is no sports program) and 11pm on the
weekends.
Meanwhile, WILM is seen via "fiber-optic" cable in Brunswick, Columbus,
Bladen, Pender, New Hanover, and in Richlands in Onslow County.

 

[ohdxer]

And what about Superstations that were affiliated with NBC, CBS and ABC? A friend of mine swears she remembers watching Columbus, Ohio's WBNS on a cable system in southwestern Virginia.

It is very unlikely that the cable system in southwestern Virginia carried channels 4,6, or 10 from Columbus,Ohio.

It is most likely that the cable systems in southwestern Virginia carried channels 4 and 6 from Bluefield and Oak Hill, West Virginia and channel 10 from Roanoke,Virginia.

 

[kirkiefan]

WSNS Channel 44 in Chicago in the 1970s was microwaved to localities in Indiana.
I remember "The Spanish Movie of the Week" hosted by Ricardo Montalban of "Fantasy Island" along with Bob Luce's "Chicago Wrestling" on Saturday evenings. I also remember the Joe Oriolo "Felix The Cat" cartoons from Trans-Lux. It transmited from the John Hancock Building along the Magnificent Mile along with WGN-TV.

WKBD-TV in Detroit (then owned by Field Communications which also owned WFLD in Chicago at the time) microwaved its signal to Toledo,Bowling Green and other communities in northwest, Ohio in the late 70s/early 80s.

 

[mleach]

And what about Superstations that were affiliated with NBC, CBS and ABC? A friend of mine swears she remembers watching Columbus, Ohio's WBNS on a cable system in southwestern Virginia.

It is very unlikely that the cable system in southwestern Virginia carried channels 4,6, or 10 from Columbus,Ohio.

It is most likely that the cable systems in southwestern Virginia carried channels 4 and 6 from Bluefield and Oak Hill, West Virginia and channel 10 from Roanoke,Virginia.

I wonder if one of those West Virginia stations ( WWVA or WOAY ) had aired some feed out of Columbus, Oh and allowed some local content to go through? Someone sleeping at the switch?

This sort of thing still happens. Hagerstown, MD's WJAL channel 68 for years aired "West Virginia Tonight". A statewide newscast. WJAL gets the feed from Clarksburg's WBOY. Sometimes WJAL does a good job blocking out the WBOY logo but other times, not so good. I myself have seen ads for such businesses in the WBOY region such as Meadowbrook Mall, Kroger or some car dealership in Fairmont...on WJAL when it should have been something local for Hagerstown.

 

[Tim-In-Houston]

To this day Fox31/KDVR is imported well beyond Denver. Look closely for the blotches in Montana, Nebraska and Wyoming.

Denver's ABC7 (KMGH) is on cable in Glendive MT as well.

The whole Denver DMA is a mess with parts of Wyoming, South Dakota and maybe western Nebraska, hundreds of miles away and in no way contiguous to the main part of the market, tacked on. One or two western South Dakota counties are litterally within spitting distance of the Rapid City DMA, but are considered part of Denver.

 

[TexasTom]

And what about Superstations that were affiliated with NBC, CBS and ABC? A friend of mine swears she remembers watching Columbus, Ohio's WBNS on a cable system in southwestern Virginia.

The Salt Lake City (and maybe Denver in some parts of the state) network affiliates were widely distributed in Montana back in the seventies and early eighties. At the time, no market in Montana had more than two local stations, and those local stations were cherry picking the schedules of more than one network and running shows out of pattern with the rest of the country. As a result, the microwaved signals from SLC on cable were the only way that Montana viewers could see the intact schedules of the three networks. That changed in the eighties, when Billings, Great Falls, and Missoula all saw their third commercial stations come on the air.

Here in Texas, WFAA-TV in Dallas was an ABC affiliate that was widely distributed by cable in Texas, back in the days when not ever market had its own ABC affiliate.

I would expect that the majority of network affiliated superstations were in similar circumstances -- they were located in large or medium markets that were surrounded by smaller markets that lacked the full complement of three network affiliated commercial stations.

WKBD-TV in Detroit (then owned by Field Communications which also owned WFLD in Chicago at the time) microwaved its signal to Toledo,Bowling Green and other communities in northwest, Ohio in the late 70s/early 80s.

It was also distributed quite widely in the state of Michigan. When I was at a family reunion in Sault Ste. Marie (Michigan Panhandle) in 1980, WKBD was seen on the local cable system. Sault Ste. Marie is somewhere around 200 miles from Detroit.

 

[compubit]

In the Muskegon, MI area in the 70s, here's what I'd get to watch when visiting my grandparents:

2: WZZM/13 Grand Rapids (ABC)
3: WKZO/3 Kalamazoo (CBS)
4: WSNS/44 Chicago (Ind)
5: WKBD/50 Detroit (Ind)
6: WUHQ/41 Battle Creek (ABC)
7: WPBN/7 Traverse City (NBC)
8: WOTV/8 Grand Rapids (NBC)
9: WGN/9 Chicago (Ind)
10: WWTV/9 Cadillac (CBS) (Gets Fuzzy on 10/11/12, but do remember WWTV & WGVC...)
11: WGVC/35 Allendale (PBS)
12: ??? Another PBS, I think...)
13: Community Bulletin Board (with a booming overlay of WZZM - since the transmitter was close to Muskegon)

Gradually, the out of market stations started disappearing (starting with WPBN going to Local Origination Christian TV, then from there...).

I do remember the Muskegon Chronicle's TV Listing breakdown:

2, 3, 9, 12 (CBS) (WBAY, WKZO, WWTV, WISN)
4, 5, 7, 8 (NBC) (WTMJ, WFRV, WPBN, WOTV)
6, 11, 13, 41 (ABC) (WITI, WLUK, WZZM, WUHQ)
10, 35 (PBS) (WMVS, WGVC)
9, 18, 44, 50 (Ind.) (WGN, WVTV, WSNS, WKBD)

Jim

 

[FreddyE1977]

In October 1957, WKST-TV 45, (Now WYTV-33) Located in New Castle, Pa. (Youngstown Market) signed-on..It was actually the first full-time ABC affiliate In Western Pennsylvania..The Pittsburgh TV Guide in 1958 carried 12 stations, 8 of which were partial ABC affiliates alomg with Channel 45, making a total of 9 ABC stations in the area..WTAE-TV 4 in Pittsburgh finally signed on September 14, 1958..

On another website I heard that in the recent years WTAE has actually blocked a few stations in West Virginia from becoming ABC. Morgantown some years back got the own FOX affilate but I heard ABC was their first choice only to run into a problem with WTAE. That might be a bad example since I think Morgantown is in the Pittsburgh market even though being a college town ( West Virginia University is there ), WVU gets a ton of coverage on the two nearby Clarksburg stations ( WBOY and WDTV ).

I remember a news report some time ago that either WBOY or WDTV expressed interest in putting ABC on one of their digital channels, but again WTAE said no. This despite Clarksburg being their own market.

I have been told that WTAE has even as went as far as has Charleston's WCHS ( one of two WV's ABC ) getting taking off of cable in many parts of West Virginia, even in places that are not in the Pittsbugh market. Curious how WTAE could pull that off..

Must be a gentleman's aggreement somewhere in all of this.

Before local signals on DISH and DirecTV became the norm, WTAE was very aggressive at identifying and going after individual dish owners in the region who were receiving ABC on any signal other than WTAE. This despite the fact that TAE's over-the-air signal coverage is very poor even in some local pockets of the Pittsburgh area. I had a buddy who constructed an elaborate rig to receive WYTV-33 so he could watch Monday Night Football. The local reception of TAE was just too wavy, fluttery and full of ghosts.

 

[FreddyE1977]

When I lived in a very rural part of southern Michigan in the late 80's, my cable line-up looked something like this...

- 3 NBC Affiliates (4 from Detroit, 10 from Lansing-Jackson and 13 from Toledo)
- 3 CBS Affiliates (2 from Detroit, 6 from Lansing and 3 from Kalamazoo)
- 3 FOX Affiliates (17 from Grand Rapids, 50 from Detroit and 36 from Toledo)
- 3 PBS Affiliates (23 from Lansing, 56 from Detroit, 30 from Toledo)
- 2 ABC Affiliates (7 from Detroit, 24 from Toledo. 53 in Lansing would later
sign on and bump the Toledo signal)

...plus WGN, TBS, and other national superstatons.

I was always curious why they had so much duplication. I think it may have been because our local
cable system was taking those signals over the air from a tower rig, and at times some of them were
subject to interference. On certain high-skip days 13 from Grand Rapids would start to overpower
13 from Toledo, etc.