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KTVT's "First 5 Minute" Mayhem

J

jd

Thursday at 10PM, the first day of sweeps. Channel 11 assaulted the viewer with a flurry of drive-by crime reporting, shoot from the hip television ala KXAS. And the natives on Bridge Street are restless: http://unclebarky.com/dfw.html

I saw it, and wasn't impressed. More like depressed, since KTVT seemed to be on a mission to hire more of best talent out there, but now they're taking the low road with their newscasts. Click on the first highlighted link in the article for a story on their new news director. You'll see who's responsible for this travesty.
 
KONO TV in San Antonio back in the 60's and early 70's pioneered "Fuzz and wuzz" news, "If it bled it lead". You could of had The old Soviet Union launching a nuclear IBM at Washington,but if there was a shooting on Zazamora st. that story lead. CVome to think of it,,San Antonio TV news hasn't changed much;)
 
KPLEXCOMPLEX said:
KONO TV in San Antonio back in the 60's and early 70's pioneered "Fuzz and wuzz" news, "If it bled it lead". You could of had The old Soviet Union launching a nuclear IBM at Washington,but if there was a shooting on Zazamora st. that story lead. CVome to think of it,,San Antonio TV news hasn't changed much;)
Click to expand...

You're right; all the S.A. stations seemed to be that way and a couple still are. After enduring the nightly barrage of murders, bloody wrecks and robberies, I kind of expected Chris Marrou to segue with the words "...but seriously, folks..."

I guess we're lucky that KTVT's "Kansas City Star" news director decided to do this with the first five minutes. It could have been the first "11 minutes."
 
Quote from jd: I guess we're lucky that KTVT's "Kansas City Star" news director decided to do this with the first five minutes. It could have been the first "11 minutes."


Hey - then they could call it "11 on 11 at 10." ;D
 
Hey, shorten the name to 11News, hire Midge and Cameron back, and voila you have "11News 11 on 11 at 10". Of course, the hysterical thing was when I went home to Seattle and saw "11News 11 at 11" with Dale Schornack (formerly of KDFW) and Neal Barton's (formerly of WFAA) weather forecast. :D :D
 
Kplex wrote: KONO TV in San Antonio back in the 60's and early 70's....

I remember that! The sponsor was always Porter Loring Mortuary. The show was called 12 star final, but we called it 12 star funeral. It opened with some circus music as the theme. They strung together the film of all the cuttings and car crashes and played them at the top of the show, with some dramatic music underneath. It was color but the only thing you could see was black and white and red... the red police lights, and the pool of blood in the street. They toned it down, then KENS took over the concept, and took over the ratings. At one point, in 1980, KENS had a 50 share at 10pm.
g
 
"12 star final" for many years was sponsored by "Pearl Beer". You're right the military march music was played at the very begining with various film cuts encompassing the screen like a kalidescope,with waterskiing, car crashes,police investigation ,fires all in the shape of a STAR with the words "12 star final' EMBLAZENED ACROSS. Ch.5 started making inroads when Gene Tuck was made anchor and the old sports director of Channle 12 was made News Director at Channel 5. Then Chris Marrou was hired from channel 8 in Dallas( he was a weather guy on the weekends, and was a weekend weather guy for channel 4 in San Antonio before that). When Chris got hired for Ch.5 here came the famous 1970's "Eyewitness News" and the "happy talk" format. Nothing like a few yucks when talking about a murder in south San Antonio, a few rapes,a bloody car crash,etc. Channel 5 then over took channel 12.
 
I always thought of Chris Marrou as "snide" talk, rather than "happy talk". :D

The Chris Marrou/Dan Cook/Albert Flores team at 10pm was positively scary! In other cities, they would have been fired for saying some of the stuff they did. And then don't get me started on the "Eyewitness Newsreel" at the end of the newscast.
 
Having spent 3 years at Avenue E and 4th Street, I recall the marrou-cook-flores team. That's the one I was referring to, with the 50 share. Kym, Barry and I had a 54 share on weekends at the time, but I digress...
The push was to have something new and breaking in the first segment, and in San Antonio there was always a shooting, a stabbing, a car crash or a big fire. But there were also some damn good reporters actually enterprising stories... Richard Tillory, Ed Gonzales, Carlos Aguilar, Bill Shields and more than a dozen others actually broke stories that mattered. The happy talk helped viewers relate (although it was Jud Ashmore who crossed the line into offending the hispanic demographic, and was fired for it). Eyewitness Newsreel was GREAT. It was always cleverly written and kept people tuned in til the end. There will never be a local news organization dominating a market like KENS did in the late '70s and early 80's. You joke about it Bleeding and Leading, but that was just one facet in the most dominant news presentation in Texas EVER.
g
 
aa wrote: if the same team was on 25+ years earlier!

Indeed, Albert Flores joined the team in early '79, replacing Maclovio Perez, who went to California. Albert resigned in 2001 amid a scandal about cutting and pasting his weather discussion in the newspaper from the NWS.
Chris Marrou came in 1973, from KRLD-AM, and replaced Gene Tuck. He left for WBZ Boston in '81, then came back the next year. He's still there.
Dan Cook was the first sportscaster for KENS TV, adding that duty to his job editing the sports page at the San Antonio News. That was 1956. He retired in 2000.
Deborah Knapp began as a 'Live Eye' reporter in 1978 or 1979. She left for Philly in '81, then came back the next year.
Fred Lozano has been at KENS since the mid '70s.
The station became number one after Tom Ellis left KONO-TV for Boston, and Bob Rogers took over KENS as News Director, which happened around 1970 or so. They kept the top ranking well into the 1980's, when I moved out of town.
 
formeraa said:
Hey, shorten the name to 11News, hire Midge and Cameron back, and voila you have "11News 11 on 11 at 10". Of course, the hysterical thing was when I went home to Seattle and saw "11News 11 at 11" with Dale Schornack (formerly of KDFW) and Neal Barton's (formerly of WFAA) weather forecast. :D :D
Click to expand...

I was in Seattle in the mid 90s and felt like I was back in Dallas when I saw Dale Schornack and Neal Barton on the CBS Affiliate Channel 11 KSTW. They had the same owners as KTVT (Gaylord), they had just switched to CBS like KTVT, and they had the same set and graphics. The station's ratings never took off, Belo was operating former CBS affiliate KIRO as a true indy. KSTW had been a fairly successful indy with a 10 o'clock news, but switching to CBS and trying to go against the big guys turned out to be difficult, just like at KTVT.

KSTW's life as a CBS affiliate didn't last long, Neal and Dale left, they were bought by Paramont and became a UPN affilate and went back to a 10 o'clock only news for a few years before it was finally cancelled too.
 
grantchester said:
aa wrote: if the same team was on 25+ years earlier!

Indeed, Albert Flores joined the team in early '79, replacing Maclovio Perez, who went to California. Albert resigned in 2001 amid a scandal about cutting and pasting his weather discussion in the newspaper from the NWS.
Chris Marrou came in 1973, from KRLD-AM, and replaced Gene Tuck. He left for WBZ Boston in '81, then came back the next year. He's still there.
Dan Cook was the first sportscaster for KENS TV, adding that duty to his job editing the sports page at the San Antonio News. That was 1956. He retired in 2000.
Deborah Knapp began as a 'Live Eye' reporter in 1978 or 1979. She left for Philly in '81, then came back the next year.
Fred Lozano has been at KENS since the mid '70s.
The station became number one after Tom Ellis left KONO-TV for Boston, and Bob Rogers took over KENS as News Director, which happened around 1970 or so. They kept the top ranking well into the 1980's, when I moved out of town.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the history. Interesting that I watched Tom Ellis in Boston during the 80's while in college!

Meanwhile, KENS is still struggling to regain its #1 status, after conceding it to WOAI. But I hear they did much better in the Feb. book. Moving Vicki to mornings was a brilliant move. She was seriously underutilized on the weekends.
 
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