• 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

Retro: Central Indiana - Saturday, December 13, 1958

Courtesy of TV Guide via What Columbus IN Watched on Television.

Stations
4 WTTV Bloomington/Indianapolis (Ind.)
6 WFBM-TV Indianapolis (NBC)
8 WISH-TV Indianapolis (CBS)
10 WTHI-TV Terre Haute (CBS, ABC, NBC)
13 WLWI Indianapolis (ABC)
49 WLBC-TV Muncie (NBC, CBS, ABC)
59 WFAM-TV Lafayette (CBS, NBC)

Stations in Ft. Wayne and Champaign IL are also listed in this edition but are omitted here.

Times are Eastern Standard Time (or, as they called it in Indiana, Central Daylight Time). Subract one hour for Central Standard Time (listed in parentheses in the original listings).

7:50 AM
13 - News, Weather

8:00 AM
13 - Looking Around

8:30 AM
6 - Movie: "Get Along Little Dogies" (1937 Western w/Gene Autry)
13 - Rural Almanac

9:00 AM
8 - Indiana Farmer
13 - Police Blotter

9:15 AM
13 - Dateline UN

9:30 AM
6 - High School Highlights
8/10 - Captain Kangaroo (CBS)
13 - University of Michigan (Educational)

10:00 AM
6/49 - Howdy Doody (NBC)
13 - Shopper's Guide

10:15 AM
13 - Through the Porthole

10:30 AM
6/49 - Ruff & Reddy (NBC)
8/10 - Mighty Mouse (CBS)
13 - Timothy Churchmouse

11:00 AM
6 - Fury (NBC)
8 - Cartoons
10 - Heckle & Jeckle (CBS)
13 - Uncle Al (from WLWT Cincinnati)
49 - Cartoons

11:15 AM
49 - Sacred Heart

11:30 AM
6 - Sky King (NBC)
8 - Sweet Time (local music show?)
10 - Robin Hood (CBS)
49 - Joe Palooka ('30s movie shorts?)

12:00 Noon
6 - Movie: "West of the Badlands" (1940 Western w/Roy Rogers)
8 - Young People's Concert (CBS)
10 - St. Mary of the Woods (local college in Terre Haute)
13 - Movie: Unidentifed Western
49 - Sherlock Holmes

12:30 PM
10 - Indiana University (Educational)
49 - I Spy (Obviously not the Robert Culp/Bill Cosby show)

1:00 PM
6 - Flash Gordon ('30s serial)
8 - Heckle & Jeckle (CBS)
10 - Religion in the News
49 - Confidential File (Drama)

1:15 PM
10/59 - Sports Page

1:30 PM
6 - The Big Picture (Army film)
8/10/49/59 - NFL Football: Chicago Cardinals at Pittsburgh Steelers (CBS)
13 - Movie: "Bad Guy" (1933 Crime Drama)

2:00 PM
6 - Indiana University (Educational)

2:30 PM
6 - Paris Precinct

3:00 PM
6 - College Basketball: St. Louis at Kentucky
13 - Movie: "Stand Up and Fight" (1939 Adventure)

3:30 PM
4 - Industry on Parade

3:45 PM
4 - New Germany (Talk)

4:00 PM
59 - Inside Football

4:15 PM
4/10/49/59 - Basketball Preview

4:30 PM
4/10/49/59 - College Basketball: Texas Tech at Iowa
8 - Marion County Schools

4:45 PM
13 - This is the Story

4:55 PM
13 - News

5:00 PM
6 - Wrestling (local)
8 - The Trouble with Father
13 - All-Star Golf

5:30 PM
8 - Lone Ranger

6:00 PM
4 - Command Performance
6 - Circus Boy
8 - Annie Oakley
10 - Walt Disney (ABC)
13 - Public Defender

6:15 PM
49 - News, Sports
59 - Industry on Parade

6:30 PM
4 - Boston Blackie
6/49 - Jeff's Collie (Syndicated version of Lassie)
8 - Man Without a Gun
13 - Midwestern Hayride (from WLWT Cincinnati)
59 - Mighty Mouse (CBS)

7:00 PM
4 - Baptist Temple
6 - Burns & Allen
8 - Death Valley Days
10 - Jeff's Collie
49 - 49ers (A local music show?)
59 - Faith for Today

7:15 PM
4 - To Be Announced

7:30 PM
4 - City Detective
6 - People are Funny (NBC)
8/10/59 - Perry Mason (CBS)
13 - Dick Clark (ABC)

8:00 PM
4 - Basketball Preview
6/49 - Perry Como (NBC)
13 - Jubilee USA (ABC)

8:30 PM
4 - College Basketball: Indiana at Missouri
8/10/59 - Wanted, Dead or Alive (CBS)

9:00 PM
6 - Steve Canyon (NBC)
8/10/59 - Gale Storm (CBS)
13/49 - Dancing Party w/Lawerence Welk (ABC)

9:30 PM
6 - Cimarron City (NBC)
8/10/59 - Have Gun, Will Travel (CBS)

10:00 PM
8/10/49/59 - Gunsmoke (CBS)
13 - Sammy Kaye (ABC)

10:15 PM
4 - Movie: "Man Alive" (1945 Drama)

10:30 PM
6 - Brains & Brawn (NBC - game show?)
8 - Highway Patrol
10 - New York Confidential
13 - News
59 - Championship Bowling

10:45 PM
13 - Movie: "Marie Antionette" (1938 Drama)

11:00 PM
6 - Championship Bowling
8 - News, Weather, Sports
10 - Dancing Party w/Lawerence Welk (ABC)

11:15 PM
8 - Movie: "Bond of Fear" (1950 Drama)

12:00 Midnight
6 - Movie: "Heart of the North" (1938 Adventure)
10 - News, Sports, Weather

12:20 AM
10 - Movie: "Forever Amber" (1947 Drama)

1:00 AM
8 - Movie: "Mysterious Mr. Moto (1938 Adventure)
 
WTTV, Channel 4, had a nice signal that could be received in parts of the Greater Cincinnati area. They aired sports events that were not available on other stations. I remember even back then, they had a tower well over 1,000 feet tall.
 
Cincinnati Kid said:
WTTV, Channel 4, had a nice signal that could be received in parts of the Greater Cincinnati area. They aired sports events that were not available on other stations. I remember even back then, they had a tower well over 1,000 feet tall.

Their tower is about 1250 feet high (not sure about the exact HAAT) in Trafalgar, about 25 miles due south of Indianapolis. Bloomington-licensed WCLJ/42 and WIPX/63 also transmit from there, although I don't believe they are on the exact same site.

But WTTV couldn't (and doesn't) cover the north side of the Indy market very well. That's why they lost their network affiliations (NBC to start, then ABC in 1956-57). They have to cover Bloomington (their COL) as well as Indianapolis, so they bought then-WWKI/29 in Kokomo in the '80s, and made it a satellite station (WTTK) to cover the north end of the market. I was able to watch WTTK in NW-suburban Chicago fairly regularly back then, so it had a pretty decent signal (and I had a pretty decent antenna. ;D ).

At least it was better than their original setup on Channel 10 - a fairly short tower (less than 100 feet high, IIRC) attached to their studio building behind the main Sarkes Tarzian plant on the south side of Bloomington.

Linked images courtesy of Broadcasting101.ws:
WTTV Channel 10 Facilities circa 1952 (judging by the cars parked outside).
WTTV had a very small studio!
More pictures from Indy-area stations
 
KeithE4 said:
13 - Uncle Al (from WLWT Cincinnati)

This would have been via the ABC network feed of Uncle Al. The local Cincinnati version of Uncle Al was at WCPO, not WLW-T.
 
AndTheLambGoesBAA said:
KeithE4 said:
13 - Uncle Al (from WLWT Cincinnati)

This would have been via the ABC network feed of Uncle Al. The local Cincinnati version of Uncle Al was at WCPO, not WLW-T.

The original listing just said "From Cincinnati." Since WLWI and WLWT were co-owned, I assumed (apparently incorrectly) that this show, like Midwestern Hayride, came from WLWT.

All network references I made were from memory and a minimal amount of research. I had very little info about ABC shows compared to those from CBS and NBC.

Even the CBS reference for the Cards-Steelers game is somewhat questionable since CBS didn't sign a full TV deal with the NFL until 1962. Individual teams did sign deals with the networks, however, and this may have been a local broadcast from WBBM-TV Chicago sent to other CBS affiliates in the midwest, rather a nationwide CBS network game.
 
KeithE4 said:
Even the CBS reference for the Cards-Steelers game is somewhat questionable since CBS didn't sign a full TV deal with the NFL until 1962. Individual teams did sign deals with the networks, however, and this may have been a local broadcast from WBBM-TV Chicago sent to other CBS affiliates in the midwest, rather a nationwide CBS network game.

...I see from the source site that WANE/15 Ft. Wayne also carried the game, and they were (and are still) a CBS affiliate, so your idea of a WBBM-produced game being sent out to regional CBS affiliates is certainly plausible. On the other hand, I notice that two of the stations carrying the game are also affiliated with other networks as well, CBS affiliate WCIA/3 Champaign didn't carry the game (they carried the U of Illinois-College of the Pacific basketball game instead), Du Mont had carried NFL games in the years before their folding, and this was less than a year before ABC began its first prime-time NFL schedule. So, could it also be possible that the game was produced by WGN-TV/9 or WBKB/7 in Chicago, and the CBS affiliations of the Indiana stations carrying the game were merely coincidental to their picking it up?...
 
The Cards-Steelers game had to have been either the last or next-to-last game ever for the Chicago Cardinals before they moved to St. Louis. Also, unless I missed it, I didn't see longtime Indy kids show host Harlow Hickenlooper listed anywhere.
 
Corky Marlowe said:
The Cards-Steelers game had to have been either the last or next-to-last game ever for the Chicago Cardinals before they moved to St. Louis.

The Cardinals moved to St. Louis for the 1960 season, but 1958 was their last year at Comiskey Park. They played at Soldier Field in 1959.

Also, unless I missed it, I didn't see longtime Indy kids show host Harlow Hickenlooper listed anywhere.

IIRC, Fryar did radio in Indy before joining Channel 6 in 1960. WIBC, I think.
 
The Cardinals moved to St. Louis for the 1960 season, but 1958 was their last year at Comiskey Park. They played at Soldier Field in 1959.
Silly me...Weren't the Cards the South Side's team pretty much during their time in Chitown? The Bears still played most of their games at Wrigley at this time, didn't they?
 
I still miss the announcers who did their NFL team's games over their own newtworks before everything went to the nation networks in 1968. The Cleveland Browns were seen here in Cincinnati with Ken Coleman & Warren Lahr. On another channel here one season the Bears' games were featured with Red Grange doing the announcing. Another year, that channel had the Lions with Van Patrick. Apparently, Indiana, that did not have an NFL club at that time, got both Chicago teams on TV.
 
Corky Marlowe said:
The Cardinals moved to St. Louis for the 1960 season, but 1958 was their last year at Comiskey Park. They played at Soldier Field in 1959.
Silly me...Weren't the Cards the South Side's team pretty much during their time in Chitown? The Bears still played most of their games at Wrigley at this time, didn't they?

Yes. Da Bears played at Wrigley until moving to Soldier Field in 1970. Wrigley Field was too small by NFL standards (50,000 seats minimum - it held about 45,000 for football) and didn't have lights yet, so Monday Night Football games there were impossible.

The Cards were, depending on which urban legend you believe, (1) kicked out of Comiskey Park by new White Sox owner Bill Veeck, or (2) left on their own but needed to play in Chicago one more season before moving to St. Louis.

I'm not old enough to remember the Cards in Chicago, but I became a Bear fan because they were always on TV in Indy. Somebody there can elaborate/correct, but when the Colts arrived from Baltimore, it probably took a long time to win the fans over since that was Bear country previously. Almost everybody I grew up with was a Bear fan if they followed the NFL. Of course, it didn't help that the Colts were horrible and owned by the inept/bizarre/senile Bob Irsay at the time (Irsay in the mid '80s was like Al Davis today). ;D
 
KeithE4 said:
Corky Marlowe said:
The Cards-Steelers game had to have been either the last or next-to-last game ever for the Chicago Cardinals before they moved to St. Louis.

The Cardinals moved to St. Louis for the 1960 season, but 1958 was their last year at Comiskey Park. They played at Soldier Field in 1959.

Also, unless I missed it, I didn't see longtime Indy kids show host Harlow Hickenlooper listed anywhere.

IIRC, Fryar did radio in Indy before joining Channel 6 in 1960. WIBC, I think.

Hal Fryar did TV and presumably Radio work in Youngstown, Ohio at WFMJ-TV 73/21 and WFMJ-AM Radio from at least 1953-57, Hosting a show called "Hal's a Poppin" and playing kiddie host "Captain Hal" featuring Popeye Cartoons..
 
At the time AVCO (Crosley) owned three NBC and
two ABC affiliates; the NBC ones were WLW-T
Cincinnati, WLW-C Columbus, and WLW-D Dayton.
The ABC ones were WLW-I and WLW-A Atlanta.
WLW-I (now WTHR) and WLW-A (now WXIA) are
NBC affiliates today, and WLW-D (now WDTN)
switched from ABC back to NBC four years ago.
Of course, all five stations have different ownership
now, and except for WLWT, different call letters
(WLW-C is WCMH).

As for the NFL games, I'm not sure exactly how
that worked. In North Carolina, Redskins games
came on all the CBS affiliates even in 1958, while
Colts (then in Baltimore) games were on the NBC ones.
We simply considered the 'Skins to be on CBS and
the Colts to be on NBC.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom