Retro: Atlanta/Chattanooga/Macon Saturday, May 4, 1974

[bpatrick]

From TV Guide, North Georgia Edition:

WSB Ch. 2 Atlanta (NBC)

7 AM Jetsons (delay from noon)
7:30 Popeye
9 AM Emergency +4
9:30 Inch High Private Eye
10 AM Sigmund And The Sea Monsters
10:30 Pink Panther
11 AM Star Trek (animated)
11:30 Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kids
12 N News
12:30 Sights And Sounds Of Soul
1 PM Tarzan
2 PM Baseball Pre-Game Show
2:15 Baseball: White Sox-Brewers (rain game:
Padres-Mets)
5 PM Perry Mason (time approximate)
6 PM News
6:30 NBC News (Tom Brokaw)
7 PM Hee Haw (George Jones and Tammy Wynette,
Johnny Bush)
8 PM Emergency!
9 PM Movie: "Birdman Of Alcatraz"
11:30 News
12 M Movie: "Tobruk"
2:10 News
2:15 Movie: "See How They Run" (I believe this was
the first made-for-TV movie, from '64)

WRCB Ch. 3 Chattanooga (NBC)

7:30 Agricultural Science In Action
8 AM Lidsville
8:30 Addams Family (animated)
9 AM Emergency +4
9:30 Inch High Private Eye
10 AM Sigmund And The Sea Monsters
10:30 Pink Panther
11 AM Star Trek
11:30 Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kids
12 N Jetsons
12:30 Go! (NBC hockey announcer Ted Lindsay
explains the game)
1 PM Countdown To Destiny
1:30 Greatest Sports Legends (Eddie Arcaro, who
rode two Triple Crown winners: Whirlaway (1941)
and Citation (1948))
2 PM Baseball Pre-Game Show
2:15 Baseball (see Ch. 2)
5 PM Addams Family (the sitcom)
5:30 I Dream Of Jeannie
6 PM Jimmy Dean
6:30 NBC News
7 PM Hee Haw
8 PM Emergency!
9 PM NBC Movie: "You'll Like My Mother" (Patty Duke is
the star, a pregnant young widow trapped in a house
with strange goings-on, but Richard Thomas, around the
time "The Waltons" began--1972--also appears with the
actress he was dating (but for some reason they never
married), Sian Barbara Allen.)
11 PM Bobby Goldsboro (guest: Curtis Mayfield)
11:30 Don Kirshner's Rock Concert (Mike Oldfield, David Essex,
the Electric Light Orchestra, Bloodstone, Manfred Mann)

WAGA Ch. 5 Atlanta (CBS)

6:10 Video College
6:40 Farm Report
6:45 Box 5 R.F.D.
7:15 Tree Talks
7:30 4-H Club
8 AM Help! It's The Hair Bear Bunch!
8:30 Sabrina, The Teenage Witch
9 AM New Scooby Doo Movies: "Scooby Doo Meets Laurel
And Hardy"
10 AM My Favorite Martians (animated)
10:30 Jeannie (animated)
11 AM Vision On
11:30 Josie And The Pussycats
12 N Pebbles And Bamm Bamm
12:30 Fat Albert And The Cosby Kids
1 PM CBS Children's Film Festival ("Gosha, The Circus Bear,"
'71, from Russia)
2 PM World Of Survival
2:30 Dusty's Trail (a blot on the resumes of Bob Denver and
Forrest Tucker)
3 PM Soul Train (the Spinners, the Independents, Leroy Hutson)
4 PM UFO
5 PM Kentucky Derby (Cannonade won, but Little Current won the
Preakness and Belmont)
6 PM News
6:30 CBS News (Dan Rather)
7 PM National Geographic ("Ethiopia: The Hidden Empire")
8 PM All In The Family
8:30 M*A*S*H
9 PM Mary Tyler Moore
9:30 Bob Newhart
10 PM Carol Burnett (Bernadette Peters, Tim Conway)
11 PM News
11:30 Movie: "Boy, Did I Get A Wrong Number!" (Bob Hope and
Phyllis Diller star, watch for Danny Thomas' ex-TV wife,
Marjorie Lord.)

WGTV Ch. 8 Athens/Atlanta (PBS)

7 PM Course Of Our Times
7:30 Fun And Games
8 PM Discovery ("A Corner Of France")
8:30 Lenox Quartet: Haydn's Opus 20
9 PM Wilburn Brothers (I kid you not, this actually was on a
PBS station; guests: Jean Shepard and Larry Cunningham)
9:30 Story Of An Ocean Liner
10 PM Movie: "Friends And Lovers"
sign off 11:10 PM

WTVC Ch. 9 Chattanooga (ABC)

6:30 Science In Action
7 AM Bob Brandy
8 AM Bugs Bunny
8:30 Yogi's Gang
9 AM Super Friends
10 AM Lassie's Rescue Rangers
10:30 Goober And The Ghost Chasers
11 AM Brady Kids
11:30 Mission: Magic!
12 N ABC Saturday Superstar Movie: "Mini-Munsters"
1 PM American Bandstand (Sami Jo ("Tell Me A Lie") and
the Soul Children)
2 PM Mull's Singing Convention
3 PM Know Your Bible
3:30 Golf: Byron Nelson Classic (third round)
5 PM Wide World Of Sports (Permatex 300 stock-car race
from Daytona; World Professional Target Diving Championship)
6:30 Reasoner Report
7 PM TBA
7:30 Political Talk (Democrat whose name is not given)
8 PM Partridge Family
8:30 ABC Movie: "The Cat Creature"
10 PM Owen Marshall, Counselor At Law
11 PM Movie: "The Gorgon"
12:30 Movie: "Curse Of The Voodoo"
2 AM ABC News (anchor not given, may have been from one of
the o&os)

WXIA Ch. 11 Atlanta (ABC)

6:30 Adventures In Living
7 AM Ebony Beat Journal
7:30 Romper Room
8 AM Bugs Bunny
8:30 Yogi's Gang
9 AM Super Friends
10 AM Lassie's Rescue Rangers
10:30 Goober And The Ghost Chasers
11 AM Brady Kids
11:30 Mission: Magic!
12 N News
12:30 Green Acres
1 PM American Bandstand
2 PM Movie: "Vicki"
3:30 Golf: Byron Nelson Classic (third round)
5 PM Wide World Of Sports
6:30 News
7 PM Reasoner Report
7:30 Action Line
8 PM Partridge Family
8:30 ABC Movie: "The Cat Creature"
10 PM Owen Marshall, Counselor At Law
11 PM News
11:40 ABC News
11:55 Movie: "Can-Can"
1:45 Movie: "Villa" (as in Pancho)

WDEF Ch. 12 Chattanooga (CBS)

7:30 Uncle Hank
8 AM Help! It's The Hair Bear Bunch!
8:30 Sabrina The Teenage Witch
9 AM New Scooby Doo Movies
10 AM My Favorite Martians
10:30 Jeannie
11 AM Speed Buggy
11:30 Josie And The Pussycats
12 N Pebbles And Bamm Bamm
12:30 Fat Albert And The Cosby Kids
1 PM Soul Train (Eddie Kendricks, Martha Reeves (of
Martha and the Vandellas), the Dramatics)
2 PM Speakeasy
3 PM International Skating Conference (wonder if this
is roller derby)
4 PM Wrestling (from the studio)
5 PM Kentucky Derby
6 PM News
6:30 CBS News
7 PM Treasure Hunt
7:30 That Girl
8 PM All In The Family
8:30 M*A*S*H
9 PM Mary Tyler Moore
9:30 Bob Newhart
10 PM Carol Burnett
11 PM Movie: "Love With The Proper Stranger"
sign off 12:40 AM

WMAZ Ch. 13 Macon (CBS/ABC)

7 AM Navy Film
7:30 Georgia TV Monitor
8 AM Help! It's The Hair Bear Bunch!
8:30 Sabrina The Teenage Witch
9 AM New Scooby Doo Movies
10 AM My Favorite Martians
10:30 Jeannie
11 AM Speed Buggy
11:30 Josie And The Pussycats
12 N Pebbles And Bamm Bamm
12:30 Fat Albert And The Cosby Kids
1 PM CBS Children's Film Festival
2 PM Ebony Speaks
2:30 Movie: "Three Faces West"
4 PM CBS Golf Championship (Johnny Miller, Forrest
Fezler, Chi Chi Rodriguez)
5 PM Kentucky Derby
6 PM Porter Wagoner (guest: Charlie Walker)
6:30 CBS News
7 PM Lawrence Welk (well-known tunes)
8 PM All In The Family
8:30 M*A*S*H
9 PM Mary Tyler Moore
9:30 Bob Newhart
10 PM Carol Burnett
11 PM News
11:20 Don Kirshner's Rock Concert (Rod Stewart and
Faces, Osibisa, Livingston Taylor (James' brother))
sign off 12:50 AM

WDCO Ch. 15 (WMUM Ch. 29) Cochran/
WCLP (WNGH) Ch. 18 Chatsworth (PBS)

8:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
9 AM Sesame Street
10 AM Electric Company
10:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
11 AM Sesame Street
12 N Electric Company
12:30 Sesame Street
1:30 Electric Company
2 PM Zoom
2:30 Sound Of Youth
3 PM Fashion Focus
3:30 America Be Fit
3:45 Living Better
4 PM Lilias, Yoga And You
4:30 Book Beat
5 PM French Chef
5:30 A Touch Of Spice (cooking)
6 PM Garden Show
6:30 Humanist Alternative
7 PM Firing Line
8 PM Wall Street Week
8:30 Theater In America: "To Be Young, Gifted
And Black"
10 PM Energy Crisis: End Of The Beginning?
sign off 11 PM

WTCG (WPCH) Ch. 17 Atlanta (Ind.)

7 AM Popeye
7:30 Cartoon Carnival
8 AM Spiderman
8:30 Speed Racer
9 AM Ultra Man
9:30 Three Stooges
10 AM Abbott And Costello
10:30 Flipper
11 AM Roller Game Of The Week
1 PM Wagons Ho! ("Wagon Train" reruns)
2 PM Baseball: Braves-Pirates
4:30 Party! (time approximate)
5 PM This Week In The NBA
5:30 Fishin' Hole
6 PM Georgia Championship Wrestling
7 PM All South Wrestling
8 PM That Good Ole Nashville Music (Mel Tillis,
Diana Trask, Billy Walker)
8:30 Wilburn Brothers (Jeanne Pruett, Mel Street)
9 PM Porter Wagoner (guest: Red Morgan)
9:30 Buck Owens (Kenni Huskey (a woman), Tony
Booth, Susan Raye)
10 PM Jim Ed Brown
10:30 Del Reeves
11 PM ABA Playoff: New York (now New Jersey) Nets
vs. Utah Stars for the championship (Nets won, 4
games to 1, taped telecast)
1 AM Movie: "All Mine To Give"

WETV (WPBA) Ch. 30 Atlanta (PBS)

7:30 Sesame Street
8:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
9 AM Sesame Street
10 AM Electric Company
10:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
11 AM Sesame Street
12 N Electric Company
12:30 Sesame Street
1:30 Electric Company
2 PM Zoom
2:30 Electric Company
3 PM Hodgepodge Lodge
3:30 Erica (needlework)
3:45 Theonie (cooking)
4 PM French Chef
4:30 Woman
5 PM Bill Moyers' Journal
5:30 Should The Lady Take A Chance?
6 PM Interfusions
7 PM The Advocates
8 PM Washington Straight Talk (guest is then-
Vice President Gerald Ford)
8:30 War And Peace (Part 3)
10 PM Energy Crisis: End Of The Beginning?
11 PM Nation's Economy Out Of Control

WCWB (WMGT) Ch. 41 Macon (NBC)

8 AM Lidsville
8:30 Addams Family (animated)
9 AM Emergency +4
9:30 Inch High Private Eye
10 AM Sigmund And The Sea Monsters
10:30 Pink Panther
11 AM Star Trek
11:30 Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kids
12 N Jetsons
12:30 Go!
1 PM Wrestling (from the studio)
2 PM Baseball Pre-Game Show
2:15 Baseball (see Ch. 2)
5 PM Soul Train (time approximate)
6 PM Bobby Goldsboro
6:30 NBC News
7 PM Hee Haw
8 PM Emergency!
9 PM NBC Movie: "You'll Like My Mother"
11 PM Police Surgeon
11:30 Saturday Tonight Show (Roy Clark, Phyllis Newman,
Charles Grodin)

WTCI Ch. 45 Chattanooga (PBS)

10 AM Electric Company
10:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
11 AM Sesame Street
12 N Electric Company
12:30 Sesame Street
1:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
2 PM Zoom
2:30 Hodgepodge Lodge
3 PM Fashion Focus
3:30 America Be Fit
3:45 Living Better
4 PM Lilias, Yoga And You
4:30 Book Beat
5 PM Nation Time
5:30 Country Music Spectacular
6 PM Garden Show
6:30 Men And Ideas
7 PM Cinema Showcase
7:30 The People's Business
8 PM Aesthetic Venture
8:30 War And Peace (Part 3)
sign off 10 PM

WHAE (WGCL) Ch. 46 Atlanta (Ind.)

7 AM Huck And Yogi
7:30 Mighty Mouse
8 AM Porky Pig
8:30 Bozo's Big Top
9 AM Deputy Dawg
9:30 Batman (Vincent Price as Egghead)
10 AM Batman
10:30 Lone Ranger
11 AM Jungle Jim (Johnny Weissmuller's only series)
11:30 Circus Boy (Micky Dolenz, then known as Mickey Braddock)
12 N Mr. Magoo
12:30 Mayberry R.F.D.
1 PM News Spectrum
2 PM Call Of The West ("Death Valley Days" reruns)
2:30 Trails West (more "Death Valley Days" reruns)
3 PM American Horse And Horseman
4 PM Lone Ranger
4:30 My Friend Flicka
5 PM Time Tunnel
6 PM Cowtown Rodeo
7 PM Mayberry R.F.D.
7:30 Circus!
8 PM Untamed World
8:30 Audubon Wildlife Theatre
9 PM Oral Roberts
9:30 The Lesson
10 PM George And Diane Ivey
10:30 New Directions
11 PM Waters Family

WRIP (WDSI) Ch. 61 Chattanooga (Ind.)

12 N Porky Pig
12:30 Gigantor
1 PM Daffy Duck
1:30 Faith For Today
2 PM Norman Vincent Peale
2:30 Scope
3 PM Three Stooges
3:30 25 Years Young
4:30 Roller Game Of The Week
5:30 Untamed World
6 PM Invisible Man
6:30 Jimmy Swaggart
7 PM Peter Gunn
7:30 Lassie
8 PM Movie: "Men Are Such Fools" (Humphrey Bogart,
not yet a full-fledged star although he had already
done "The Petrified Forest", appears in this comedy
from '38--only after "High Sierra" in '41 would he never
get second billing again; also in this is Penny Singleton,
the movies' and radio's Blondie and the voice of Jane Jetson.)
10 PM Movie: "Never Say Goodbye" (another dramatic actor tries
comedy--Errol Flynn, from '46--watch for Forrest Tucker in
this one)
11:30 Star Performance
sign off 12 M

 

[Mike Stroud]

WGTV Ch. 8 Athens/Atlanta (PBS)

7 PM Course Of Our Times
7:30 Fun And Games
8 PM Discovery ("A Corner Of France")
8:30 Lenox Quartet: Haydn's Opus 20
9 PM Wilburn Brothers (I kid you not, this actually was on a
PBS station; guests: Jean Shepard and Larry Cunningham)
9:30 Story Of An Ocean Liner
10 PM Movie: "Friends And Lovers"
sign off 11:10 PM

WDCO Ch. 15 (WMUM Ch. 29) Cochran/
WCLP (WNGH) Ch. 18 Chatsworth (PBS)

8:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
9 AM Sesame Street
10 AM Electric Company
10:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
11 AM Sesame Street
12 N Electric Company
12:30 Sesame Street
1:30 Electric Company
2 PM Zoom
2:30 Sound Of Youth
3 PM Fashion Focus
3:30 America Be Fit
3:45 Living Better
4 PM Lilias, Yoga And You
4:30 Book Beat
5 PM French Chef
5:30 A Touch Of Spice (cooking)
6 PM Garden Show
6:30 Humanist Alternative
7 PM Firing Line
8 PM Wall Street Week
8:30 Theater In America: "To Be Young, Gifted
And Black"
10 PM Energy Crisis: End Of The Beginning?
sign off 11 PM

WTCG (WPCH) Ch. 17 Atlanta (Ind.)

8:30 Wilburn Brothers (Jeanne Pruett, Mel Street)

WETV (WPBA) Ch. 30 Atlanta (PBS)

7:30 Sesame Street
8:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
9 AM Sesame Street
10 AM Electric Company
10:30 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
11 AM Sesame Street
12 N Electric Company
12:30 Sesame Street
1:30 Electric Company
2 PM Zoom

Well, bp, we got us a right smart mess here, as they say in Alabama, where I'm from ...

1) First off, did Georgia ETV allow local opt-outs back in the Seventies? Or was WGTV actually part of the network at that time? WGTV was (and still is) located at the University of Georgia and, if Wikipedia can be believed, was more or less the mother station of the network; the other stations, WDCO and WCLP, served respectively, middle and northwestern Georgia and were almost certainly repeaters of the main signal in Atlanta. I think that these days, or perhaps beginning in the 1980s, Georgia Public TV allows for local opt-outs, as the public radio network does. What do your other TV Guides indicate? (Alabama's system, by contrast, was almost totally uniform, with only a once-weekly opt-out, for local public affairs.)

2) That is truly strange for a PBS outlet to be carrying one of the Show Biz country music syndie half-hours. I suspect the network probably carried more than that at one time, but began dropping them as commercial stations throughout the state picked them up over time. One thing is for certain: WGTV's management at UGA wasn't paying any attention to the fact that Ted Turner included the Wilburn Brothers in his Saturday night country block on WTCG, just one half hour earlier. Would you imagine that Turner raised hell about it to UGA officials, that a taxpayer-funded station was duplicating a commercial offering?

3) There would have duplication of a different sort had WGTV signed on in the morning and taken the Georgia Public TV feed--it would have been the same exact lineup as the local Atlanta station, WETV. Wonder whether WETV just tapped into the GPTV feed for those hours, and covered up the promos and ID cards between the shows? It sure looks like it.

 

[bpatrick]

Your questions are a little hard to answer; I've never known Alabama
Public Television stations to opt out of a statewide feed; neither have
I known UNC-TV (where I am) stations to do this. WGTV exercised
considerable independence from the rest of GPTV in those days. WGTV
and WETV did duplications, such as "Masterpiece Theatre" and "Sesame
Street," but I suspect that WETV, owned by the Atlanta school board,
did not rely on GPTV for its feeds (for the record, most of what was on
15, 18, 30, and 45 that Saturday also aired on Ch. 3 in Tampa and/or
Ch. 24 in Orlando; I've just posted a Central Florida listing for the same date
and you can compare the two).

I don't know of any other PBS station carrying the Wilburn Brothers, Porter
Wagoner, or anything else from Show Biz, and my first thought when I saw
the Wilburns on 8 and 17 was the same as yours: what did Ted Turner make
of that? (Parenthetically, it was a joke around PBS stations at one time that
if PBS could carry Lawrence Welk, "Hee Haw" would be next.)

Georgia and South Carolina are the only statewide public-TV systems I've ever
seen with local opt-outs (WNTV Greenville and WNSC Rock Hill used to occasionally
do their own thing separately from the rest of SCETV).

 

[Mike Stroud]

Now it's coming to me, bp. Apparently PBS ran a feed on Saturday morning and afternoon re-running the previous week's children's favorites, and all the stations concerned in the two listings, except for WGTV, ran that. At about this same time frame, Alabama ETV also re-ran the shows on Saturdays, but in a different pattern, with (I believe) five hours of Sesame Street from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. CT, Electric Company between 1 and 3:30, and three episodes of Mister Rogers from 3:30 to 5, when evening adult programming began (no "how-tos" back in those days, except for Julia Child and a few odd assortments). One wonders why--it would have been a lot less expensive to just tap into the feed (if that's in fact what it was), rather than spend all that money and time taping the shows during the week. But that's the 1970s culture of PBS localism for you, I suppose.

The reason I mentioned Alabama Public TV having opt-outs was that, on Monday evenings during the early 1980s, I recall a show on my station, WHIQ in Huntsville, titled Upstate. The program was a magazine format containing features about local life in northern Alabama, produced by (I believe) the Alabama A&M University telecommunications department. Also, TV Guide listed an apparently similar program on WBIQ in Birmingham titled Metrospect, concerning that area. The other two APTV stations listed in the North Alabama edition ran, IIRC, MacNeil-Lehrer. By the end of the 1980s, though, the network realized that very few people were watching and pulled the plug on those, bringing all stations back into a full-time identical pattern, which has held since.

 

[azumanga]

WGTV exercised considerable independence from the rest of GPTV in those days.

That's because it was independent from GPTV -- until 1982, the station was owned by the University of Georgia, and had a completely different schedule from GPTV, which served the rest of the state. In 1982, GPTV would acquire WGTV and bring the station into the GPTV network.

 

[bpatrick]

Being a graduate of UGA I should have known that the university
used to own WGTV; I was long gone by the time it became part
of GPTV. Some of the programs produced at WGTV were fed to
GPTV even in the '70s; notably, "University News." My strongest
memory of Channel 8 is that they ran Richard Hittelman's "Yoga For
Health" to death; my second strongest is that after Justin Wilson's
"Cookin' Cajun" I had to get something to eat, I'd be soooo hungry.

As for the Alabama network, there may have been an occasional
local opt-out when I lived there in the early '70s; I've forgotten now,
but since I was no longer living in Alabama in the '80s I was not aware
of any at the time.

 

[DToTheJ]

WDEF Ch. 12 Chattanooga (CBS)
4 PM Wrestling (from the studio)

WCWB (WMGT) Ch. 41 Macon (NBC)
1 PM Wrestling (from the studio)

Well, I knew wrestling might be scripted, but this seals the deal!

 

[fortmill]

Your questions are a little hard to answer; I've never known Alabama
Public Television stations to opt out of a statewide feed; neither have
I known UNC-TV (where I am) stations to do this. WGTV exercised
considerable independence from the rest of GPTV in those days. WGTV
and WETV did duplications, such as "Masterpiece Theatre" and "Sesame
Street," but I suspect that WETV, owned by the Atlanta school board,
did not rely on GPTV for its feeds (for the record, most of what was on
15, 18, 30, and 45 that Saturday also aired on Ch. 3 in Tampa and/or
Ch. 24 in Orlando; I've just posted a Central Florida listing for the same date
and you can compare the two).

I don't know of any other PBS station carrying the Wilburn Brothers, Porter
Wagoner, or anything else from Show Biz, and my first thought when I saw
the Wilburns on 8 and 17 was the same as yours: what did Ted Turner make
of that? (Parenthetically, it was a joke around PBS stations at one time that
if PBS could carry Lawrence Welk, "Hee Haw" would be next.)

Georgia and South Carolina are the only statewide public-TV systems I've ever
seen with local opt-outs (WNTV Greenville and WNSC Rock Hill used to occasionally
do their own thing separately from the rest of SCETV).

WNTV of the South Carolina Educational network never opted out of the statewide network. On the other hand, WRET/49 of nearby Spartanburg certainly did. WNSC, WRJA, WRET, and WJWJ, all had full independent studios and produced shows for local audiences--I think WRJA and WJWJ still may, through relentless budget cuts by right-wing legislators has pretty much put a stop to that. The original vision was two statewide networks---WRLK, WNTV, WITV, WJPM, and WEBA would provide a static statewide network, while WNSC, WRET, WHMC, WRJA, WJWJ, as well as stations in Greenwood and Orangeburg would provide local programing. The Orangeburg station was never built, and several of the local stations never got a local studio.