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History of network relays

Having watched a few NFL games from NBC on YouTube from the 1970s, they would often switch live to another regional game for a brief update, or if the main game was a blowout. I thought that was impossible, but NBC use to have a separate line so that they could switch to another game in case of a rout. CBS had to catch up to NBC big time. NBC could also delay Wonderful World of Disney in all markets if needed to finish a game that was exciting too. CBS might start 60 Minutes in one set of markets, but switch another set to a game in progress. When Terry O Neil came to CBS in 1981, he got them to change the format quite a bit, from having Bent Musburger cut in more often with updates, and also start 60 Minutes at the same time everywhere if needed. But NBC also pioneered the live switches during the NCAA Tournament, and ESPN soon followed too. ABC never did it with CFB, until the NCAA changed the rules in 1982. However, CBS had done that with the NBA in the 70s as well, so i can't say that NBC was the first to do live switches on sports.
 
danderson6500 said:
Having watched a few NFL games from NBC on YouTube from the 1970s, they would often switch live to another regional game for a brief update, or if the main game was a blowout. I thought that was impossible, but NBC use to have a separate line so that they could switch to another game in case of a rout. CBS had to catch up to NBC big time. NBC could also delay Wonderful World of Disney in all markets if needed to finish a game that was exciting too. CBS might start 60 Minutes in one set of markets, but switch another set to a game in progress. When Terry O Neil came to CBS in 1981, he got them to change the format quite a bit, from having Bent Musburger cut in more often with updates, and also start 60 Minutes at the same time everywhere if needed. But NBC also pioneered the live switches during the NCAA Tournament, and ESPN soon followed too. ABC never did it with CFB, until the NCAA changed the rules in 1982. However, CBS had done that with the NBA in the 70s as well, so i can't say that NBC was the first to do live switches on sports.
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Perhaps this is already common knowledge, but the networks still can dump out of NFL games if they are blowouts, but ONLY in markets that are not contractually required to carry the teams. In other words, if Seattle is blowing out Arizona, and Fox wants to take viewers to another game, they can except in Phoenix and Seattle. Likewise, if a network offers bonus coverage of a game, the home/away markets will blow out of that coverage if their game is starting. Fans can avoid all this with Sunday Ticket, but unless you play fantasy or are legitimately interested in games outside your market, it may not be worth the extra cost.
 
My example was in week 14, when FOX stick with the Cardinals-Dolphins game, rather than join the Bucs-Saints game from kickoff. CBS did that too a couple of times last season too.
 
I'm always amazed when people complain because a sports event preempts their favorite shows; I've had that occur to me a few times when i wanted to watch a show and a sporting event is still on; my grandmother used to do that because she wanted to watch 60 Minutes and CBS sometimes decided to switch to another game.
 
BD Sullivan said:
In 1975, NBC preempted the first 40+ minutes of Willy Wonka because the Raiders-Redskins game went into OT. Not surprisingly, the reverse Heidi move brought with it plenty of complaining phone calls.
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Which the Peacock aired in its entirety a couple of years before*, so the night of OAK/WAS was a rerun (and I watched the truncated Wonka that night too).

*The day after *that* broadcast, I heard one of my middle school classmates (great at cutting up, he was, say "Willy Wonka, Billy Bonka, Silly Sonka...". Another time he referred to a couple of Disney characters as "Dicky Douse" and "Ronald Ruck". :)

ixnay
 
newsmark said:
CBS would "normalize" the network. That was one reason, once your game was over, they would join another game in progress. Eventually, everyone would be on the same game and the CBS Sports would sign off the entire network at the same time 93 seconds later (except on the west coast), 60 Minutes would start. Other times, after each game was over, they'd join the post-game show in progress.
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I remember one time, in 1986 when WSPA/7 was showing 60 Minutes after the Falcons/Dolphins game, but WBTV/3 was showing the Eagles/Raiders game, which was still in progress. that happened a lot back then, since sometimes the stations might be showing diffrent games, and 60 Minutes would start at diffrent times
 
danderson6500 said:
I remember one time, in 1986 when WSPA/7 was showing 60 Minutes after the Falcons/Dolphins game, but WBTV/3 was showing the Eagles/Raiders game, which was still in progress. that happened a lot back then, since sometimes the stations might be showing diffrent games, and 60 Minutes would start at diffrent times
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before Fox had The OT on their doubleheader days, anything scheduled in the 7:30/6:30 slot would be joined in progress, although if a game ran into the Simpsons time slot they would run the whole episode, and still do if that happens
 
NBC usually(but not always) had the 7pm show eat the bonus game's overrun, if needed. Sometimes, they would even not schedule anything for 7e/6c if they had more than one late game.

I've always wondered why CBS doesn't just start 60 Minutes at 8, since most games don't end by 7:30 eastern anyway.
 
danderson6500 said:
NBC usually(but not always) had the 7pm show eat the bonus game's overrun, if needed. Sometimes, they would even not schedule anything for 7e/6c if they had more than one late game.

I've always wondered why CBS doesn't just start 60 Minutes at 8, since most games don't end by 7:30 eastern anyway.
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Traditionally, they kept a lot of the football audience through their other Sunday night shows, by being offset from the other networks. People would presumably switch at the end of the game to find the shows on the other networks had already started. So they'd switch right back to CBS.
 
When ABC had two 'Monday Night Baseball' games back in the day, did 'Nightline' air live on the stations that had the first game end, and then they would tape the show for the stations that had the other game ending later?
 
newsmark said:
Great topic. I'd love to know more of the history, and which lines went where.

For instance, I know AT&T distributed NBC. But, at least in my area of north and east Texas, CBS & ABC were distributed via Western Union.

I know the two systems were interconnected, since at one affiliate, Western Union could switch me to an AT&T line for NBC. It always came to me via the same line as our ABC programming.

I can only imagine how intricate the system must have been. On a Sunday afternoon for football, there were multiple NBC and CBS feeds to be distributed across the nation. When, as a CBS affiliate in Sherman-Ardmore, we were running a noon game but the NFL required us to switch to a Dallas Cowboys game at 3:00, a Western Union operator in Dallas made the switch for us.
I know the Jerry Lewis telethon came to us in Tyler via our Western Union lines. In Sherman, we got it via KXAS in Fort Worth (which is also where we got our NBC feed). Our engineer always had to make a trip to a little shack behind KXAS and move a patch to get the right feed. But he'd have to stay to switch us back to NBC after the telethon and before the Tonight Show that night.
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newsmark said:
Great topic. I'd love to know more of the history, and which lines went where.

For instance, I know AT&T distributed NBC. But, at least in my area of north and east Texas, CBS & ABC were distributed via Western Union.

I know the two systems were interconnected, since at one affiliate, Western Union could switch me to an AT&T line for NBC. It always came to me via the same line as our ABC programming.

I can only imagine how intricate the system must have been. On a Sunday afternoon for football, there were multiple NBC and CBS feeds to be distributed across the nation. When, as a CBS affiliate in Sherman-Ardmore, we were running a noon game but the NFL required us to switch to a Dallas Cowboys game at 3:00, a Western Union operator in Dallas made the switch for us.

I know the Jerry Lewis telethon came to us in Tyler via our Western Union lines. In Sherman, we got it via KXAS in Fort Worth (which is also where we got our NBC feed). Our engineer always had to make a trip to a little shack behind KXAS and move a patch to get the right feed. But he'd have to stay to switch us back to NBC after the telethon and before the Tonight Show that night.
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What about when CBS aired NBA regional games, for example?(note; i'm having a hard time quoting posts, so excuse me for my earlier error.) for example, Philadelphia at the New York Nets in the East, Indiana at Milwaukee in the Midwest, New Orleans at Seattle in the South, and Boston at Golden State in the Pacific. Now the Boston CBS station would carry Boston at Golden State rather than Philadelphia at the New York Nets.
 
It does make me wonder tohugh, if WNAC-7 as carrying the Boston at Golden State game, if it started at 6:45 P.M., how would they be able to switch back to the network in time for Kojak? Would there be someone in a little shack to move a patch to get the right feed?
 
bpatrick said:
A bit of trivia: when the two coasts were joined on September 4, 1951, there were 107 stations on the air (the last pre-freeze licensee, Atlanta's Ch. 11, then WLTV Ch. 8, would sign on Sept. 30). One station, however, was not linked into the system: KOB Albuquerque, and I don't know when it was. To mark the occasion, President Harry S Truman addressed the UN, then still headquartered in San Francisco, and Douglas Edwards began using his longtime opening, "Good evening everyone, from coast to coast." Still, there was some crazy scheduling in those early days; I once posted a retro for San Francisco for a Monday in 1951; KPIX carried the live feed of "Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts" at 5:30 (PT)/8:30 (ET), while Los Angeles saw it on "fast kine" three hours later (or someone at the station made the kinescope during the live feed).

Somebody mentioned the practice of welcoming new stations to a broadcast; sometimes that was the biggest news of the day, and the networks (particularly ABC) wanted to promote their steady expansion. I still remember Aug. 1, 1962, the day WRAL switched from NBC to ABC and became the second fulltime ABC affiliate in North Carolina (after WLOS); it was mentioned on three daytime shows, "Yours For A Song" with Bert Parks, "Camouflage" with Don Morrow, and "American Bandstand," all of which were live. And even when ABC began picking off other networks' affiliates in the '70s and '80s, the practice continued; I remember the morning in 1990 when WHAS Louisville joined ABC and Charlie Gibson acted delighted that one of the oldest and most prestigious stations in the country had moved from CBS to ABC.

It's still probably a hassle to switch football games; CBS went to bonus coverage of the Browns-Titans game yesterday, but both WCBS and KCBS had to cut away by NFL rules to show the Jets-Chargers game in its entirety. WFMY and WRAL, my local CBS affiliates, stayed with the Browns-Titans game to the end.
But this discussion is otherwise getting too technical for me; all I know is that the first live network broadcast we got in North Carolina came in 1950, before I was born; WFMY carried DuMont's telecast of the North Carolina-Notre Dame football game on the day live network programming was extended southward from Richmond at least to Birmingham. I do have some insight now as to how, if in the '50s I had worked at a station that carried both Jackie Gleason (CBS) and Sid Caesar (NBC) on Saturday nights, I could have switched from CBS to NBC at 9, when Gleason went off and Caesar came on, to use one example (or in the '60s, how CBS/ABC affiliate WMAZ Macon, GA could go directly from Gleason to Lawrence Welk (ABC) at 8:30).
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It's a lot easier now to have the whole network join the prime time schedule together after regional football; Sunday was a prime example, when the Saints-Rams game ended, CBS went to bonus coverage of the Jaguars-Cardinals game, so that 60 Minutes would be on the same schedule. Fox does that too, for the same reason; that way, The Simpsons starts at the same time. As long as the game doesn't run into NBC's slot at 8:30(like what happened when there was a lightning delay in Denver one time.)
 
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