I have the TV supplement from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch for the weekend of August 6, 1995, the weekend that KTVI and KDNL swapped affiliations. KDNL bought a number of color advertisements in the supplement promoting the switch, one of which was an insert that included a program grid for all the network affiliates in St. Louis. KTVI’s only ad was less than a half-page which simply promoted the station’s new Fox prime-time line-up. KDNL was also a secondary UPN affiliate, as St. Louis did not have a full-time affiliate for the network. KDNL’s secondary UPN affiliation continued alongside the primary ABC affiliation until 1998.
The TV supplement starts its listings on Sunday the 6th, and the network switch took place early Monday (the 7th) morning. Regrettably, I do not have any listings for the previous Friday, so I can’t give you a comparison of weekday listings (which I’m sure would be more interesting). I posted the schedule for all the St. Louis broadcast stations (except WHSL, which aired primarily HSN programming) for August 6th and 7th, 1995 here:
http://www.radiodiscussions.com/sho...-6-7-1995-(weekend-of-KTVI-KDNL-network-swap) . Unlike some of the other stations switching to Fox around this period, I don’t recall KTVI getting preemption happy prior to the switch.
While the network swap in August of 1995 was the result of the corporate deal between Fox and New World, KTVI and ABC had not had the coziest of relationships in the years prior to the swap. At least a couple of the KTVI-ABC dust-ups made the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in the late 1980s and early ‘90s. Although a quick internet search turned up nothing, here’s what I remember:
In the late 1980s, ABC was growing more and more concerned that KTVI was unable to pull its local newscasts out of a distant third place behind KSDK and KMOV. It’s also possible that ABC network programming was not performing as well on KTVI as it was on most other ABC affiliates, but I can’t remember that being specifically referenced. While ABC was pressuring KTVI to improve, KTVI fueled the fire by canceling its 6PM local newscast at some point in 1989, and replacing it with “Geraldo.” As I recall, it was at this point that ABC had at least some informal talks with KPLR about taking the St. Louis ABC affiliation.
KPLR was a successful independent station (it became a WB affiliate in 1995) that had turned down the Fox affiliation at that network’s start in 1986 (the Fox affiliation went to KDNL). KPLR apparently was also not interested in an ABC affiliation in 1989 or ’90. While I don’t remember specifics being mentioned as to why KPLR and ABC could not work out a deal, there were several issues that may have been potential roadblocks.
At the time, KPLR was the flagship station of the St. Louis Cardinals Television Network, and also carried St. Louis Blues hockey games. Carrying all those games would have likely caused numerous network preemptions that ABC would not have to deal with if the network remained aligned with KTVI. It’s possible that ABC asked KPLR to abandon its sports affiliations as a condition of becoming an ABC affiliate, and KPLR was not interested in that.
Also, while KPLR did operate a news department and had a weeknight newscast, the station did not do news to nearly the level of the Big 3 affiliates in St. Louis. KPLR management may have realized that even with a major news department expansion and adding newscasts to the typical network affiliate time periods, it might take years to catch up to KSDK and KMOV, let alone overtake them, and ABC might end up disappointed. This is all speculation on my part, of course.
The second KTVI-ABC dust-up that I’m aware of occurred in 1991. KTVI had acquired or was acquiring the local rights to “The Arsenio Hall Show.” In addition, Arsenio Hall and Paramount (Arsenio’s syndicator) were about to introduce a companion show to Arsenio called “The Party Machine with Nia Peeples,” which was meant to be aired right after Arsenio. KTVI’s initial plan was to air Arsenio at 10:30 (or 10:35), Nia Peeples at 11:30, followed by “Nightline” at midnight. However, ABC had made a rule several years prior stating that ABC affiliates could not delay “Nightline” by more than an hour, and if an affiliate refused to air “Nightline” by at least 12:30E/11:30C, the affiliate could not air the show at all. ABC affiliates such as KMBC in Kansas City and KSAT in San Antonio were granted exceptions because those stations had aired “Nightline” at midnight since the program’s inception. For a brief time, there was some question as to whether “Nightline” would continue to air in St. Louis, as KTVI was initially steadfast about running Arsenio and Nia Peeples back-to-back (if KTVI would not cooperate, ABC likely would have at least tried to get “Nightline” cleared on KPLR or KDNL). However, KTVI relented and scheduled “Nightline” at 11:30, between “The Arsenio Hall Show” and “The Party Machine with Nia Peeples,” which ended up being aired at midnight.
ABC approached KPLR again in 1994 when it was announced that KTVI would be dropping ABC in favor of Fox in 1995, but by that time, KPLR was committed to the new WB network.
