-
Get involved.
We want your input!
Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.
After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.
After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/
Thanks in advance and have fun!
RadioDiscussions Administrators
Old Cable Lineups from Missouri
- Thread starter Nutball
- Start date
How about Columbia? 1977, TV and FM, from a headend just off Route PP and visible from Interstate 70.
Though not in Missouri; Here's one from Centerville, Iowa in 1969.
Source: Cable TV in 1969, Cable TV in 1969
Source: Cable TV in 1969, Cable TV in 1969
Attachments
Yeah, that one's mine. I can tell by the number "12" I wrote over the "3" for KTVO, which was after the system had to move KTVO to 12 to deal with ingress problems.
Interesting that KPLR wasn't carried.
I would like to see some from Carrollton, MO, from the 1990's.
I don't know if you're referring to Columbia or Centerville (Iowa) but that's true in both places.
Centerville had a string of franchise elections in the late 1960s. One proposed franchisee was going to offer KPLR, brought in by microwave relay. But they were going to charge $6 a month for service, and a local group came up with a proposal for a system that was going to charge $5 a month, but that system would not bring in any independent stations. Guess what happened?
The $6 a month system was voted down, the $5 a month system was voted in, and that's what we got.
As for Columbia, there's a long and rancorous history of cable TV controversies. There were two local stations until 1971, with ABC programming fit in on the two stations on a space-available basis, and always in black and white. Over time, local viewers started expressing their unhappiness with the limited choices. And, in the university community, the lack of an NET (later PBS) station was a major complaint. Finally, a cable franchise was approved in 1977, from a new St. Louis company that promised a high-capacity system for the time...22 channels. This spooked the local TV stations, especially the new UHF that had come on the air in 1971 as an ABC affiliate. There were negotiations. The local stations did not want an independent outlet on the system. They were fine with having PBS from Kansas City and St. Louis. But they especially feared KPLR, which had started functioning as a mini-network with carriage on many outstate systems. There was a cross-state CARS band system at the time, piping in St. Louis and Kansas City stations for the Moberly and Jefferson City cable systems. (Don't ask me why those two systems were up and running well before Columbia was...I don't know.) The new Columbia system bought into that relay, which also had KBMA (now KSHB) from Kansas City available. The new system proposed replacing KPLR with KBMA in Columbia, and that was deemed acceptable. I believe St. Louis's KDNL was not on the CARS-band relay at all.
Columbia did get some of the early satellite channels that surrounding communities didn't have the capacity for, and converter boxes were used from the very start. HBO was available, too.
One channel not shown on that card was CBN, which, if I recall correctly, was put on channel 20. Madison Square Garden came a little later and was on 22.
Last edited:
Group W Cable - Columbia, Missouri
Sunday November 25, 1984
2 KTVI-2 ABC St. Louis
3 Home Box Office
4 KMOX-4 CBS St. Louis
5 KSDK-5 NBC St. Louis
6 KMOS-6 PBS Sedalia
7 KOMU-8 ABC Columbia
8 Cable News Network
9 Entertainment and Sports Programming Network
10 KCBJ-17 NBC Columbia
11 Government Access/Weather
12 KRCG-13 CBS Jefferson City
13 KSHB-41 Ind. Kansas City
14 Turner Broadcast Service
15 Public Access
16 The Movie Channel
17 Nickelodeon
18 Home Theater Network
19 KCPT-19 PBS Kansas City
20 Showtime
21 CBN Cable Network
22 Sporttime St. Louis
23 The Disney Channel
24 Cable and Satellite Public Affairs Network
25 Music Television
26 The Nashville Network
27 Lifetime
28 KETC PBS St. Louis
29 USA Network
30 Local News
31 Satellite Program Network
32 Local Weather/Radar
Source: Full Page
Sunday November 25, 1984
2 KTVI-2 ABC St. Louis
3 Home Box Office
4 KMOX-4 CBS St. Louis
5 KSDK-5 NBC St. Louis
6 KMOS-6 PBS Sedalia
7 KOMU-8 ABC Columbia
8 Cable News Network
9 Entertainment and Sports Programming Network
10 KCBJ-17 NBC Columbia
11 Government Access/Weather
12 KRCG-13 CBS Jefferson City
13 KSHB-41 Ind. Kansas City
14 Turner Broadcast Service
15 Public Access
16 The Movie Channel
17 Nickelodeon
18 Home Theater Network
19 KCPT-19 PBS Kansas City
20 Showtime
21 CBN Cable Network
22 Sporttime St. Louis
23 The Disney Channel
24 Cable and Satellite Public Affairs Network
25 Music Television
26 The Nashville Network
27 Lifetime
28 KETC PBS St. Louis
29 USA Network
30 Local News
31 Satellite Program Network
32 Local Weather/Radar
Source: Full Page
In at least one instance, that's actually not accurate. Cable channel 8 had weather radar from the Columbia office of the National Weather Service, with audio from the NWS weather-band station intended to serve Columbia, but based on the tower of the Fulton cable TV system.
I was back in Columbia by then but don't have a cable card from that time.
I was back in Columbia by then but don't have a cable card from that time.
I sourced it from an issue of the Columbia Missourian Newspaper as aformentioned.
The Missourian subscribed to a listing service which possibly had outdated information.
how many cable systems had 3 PBS stations?
That makes sense.
Finally I found a couple. This one is from Kansas City in 1990 - a really crappy system, including channel sharing, considering the size of city it was serving. Johnson County, Kansas had the much better TeleCable but I never lived in Kansas.
This one from March 1993 in Columbia (as my mom indicated from her writing on the cover) - this was a tri-fold. TCI was the cable provider there.
I'll add that, in 1996 when KCWE came on the air, it replaced WGN on 24. After I left Kansas City that year, the system was finally upgraded and the channel lineup totally rearranged.
Telecable also had channel sharing in Kansas - I think one of the shared channels was A&E and that those went away sometime in the mid 90’s. They also had FM services, but I don’t remember what they were.
TeleCable had the A/B system and thus had more capacity. American Cablevision was also wracked by ingress - which is why WDAF, KCTV, and KMBC were on channel numbers not matching their over-the-air broadcasts. Part of the problem, at least with the first two, was their transmitter sites right in the heart of Kansas City - at 31st & Summit and 31st & Grand, respectively.
The "KCXL" listing in the FM service is a little odd since that station actually went off the air in 1990.