• 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: Evansville/Paducah Wed 6/25/80

B

Bluenoser

from TV Guide: Evansville-Paducah edition

Evansville
* WTVW 7-ABC *
5:55 PTL Club
6:55 News
7:00 Good Morning America
9:00 Phil Donahue
10:00 Romper Room
10:30 Family Feud
11:00 $20,000 Pyramid
11:30 Ryan's Hope
Noon All My Children
1:00 One Life to Live
2:00 General Hospital
3:00 Edge of Night
3:30 Merv Griffin
5:00 Mary Tyler Moore
5:30 ABC News
6:00 News
6:30 Muppet Show
7:00 Family
8:00 Charlie's Angels
9:00 David Hartman
10:00 News
10:30 ABC News (Nightline)
10:50 Love Boat
Mid. Baretta
1:10 News

* WNIN 9-PBS *
3:00 Sesame Street
4:00 Ride the Reading Rocket
4:30 Zany Zoofari
5:00 Sesame Street
6:00 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
6:30 MacNeil-Lehrer Report
7:00 Great Perfomances
8:30 Chinese Americans: The Second Century
9:00 Yakutat
10:00 Dick Cavett
10:30 Captioned ABC News

* WFIE 14-NBC *
6:55 Farm & Family
7:00 Today
9:00 David Letterman
10:30 Wheel of Fortune
11:00 Doctors
11:30 Password Plus
Noon News
12:30 Days of Our Lives
1:30 Another World
3:00 Gong Show
3:30 Bugs Bunny & Friends
4:00 Adam-12
5:00 Tom & Jerry
5:30 NBC News
6:00 News
6:30 M*A*S*H
7:00 Real People
8:00 Diff'rent Strokes
8:30 Facts of Life
9:00 Quincy
10:00 News
10:30 Tonight Show
Mid. Tomorrow
1:00 News

* WEHT 25-CBS *
6:00 Wednesday Morning
7:00 Cartoons
7:30 Peggy Mitchell
8:00 Captain Kangaroo
9:00 Jeffersons
9:30 Alice
10:00 Price is Right
11:00 Lucy Show
11:30 Search for Tomorrow
Noon Young & the Restless
1:00 As the World Turns
2:00 Guiding Light
3:00 One Day at a Time
3:30 Flintstones
4:00 Timmy & Lassie
4:30 Leave It to Beaver
5:00 News
5:30 CBS News
6:00 News
6:30 Match Game
7:00 Movie "Charlotte's Web" (pt 1)
8:00 Movie "The Last Giraffe"
10:00 News
10:30 Black Sheep Squadron
11:40 Medical Story
1:35 News/Focus

Paducah/Cape Girardeau/Harrisburg/Carbondale
* WSIL 3-ABC *
7:00 Good Morning America
9:00 700 Club
10:30 Family Feud
11:00 $20,000 Pyramid
11:30 Ryan's Hope
Noon All My Children
1:00 One Life to Live
2:00 General Hospital
3:00 Edge of Night
3:30 Mike Douglas
5:00 America's Top 10
5:30 Cactus Pete (The Funny Company)
6:15 News
6:30 ABC News
7:00 Family
8:00 Charlie's Angels
9:00 David Hartman
10:00 News
10:30 ABC News (Nightline)
10:50 Love Boat
Mid. Baretta
1:10 News

* WPSD 6-NBC *
6:20 Weather
6:30 News
7:00 Today
9:00 Phil Donahue
10:00 Pastor Speaks
10:05 Romper Room
10:30 Wheel of Fortune
11:00 Card Sharks
11:30 Password Plus
Noon News
12:30 Days of Our Lives
1:30 Doctors
2:00 Another World
3:30 Bugs Bunny & Friends
4:00 Brady Bunch
4:30 Gilligan's Island
5:00 News
5:30 NBC News
6:00 News
6:30 That Nashville Music
7:00 Real People
8:00 Diff'rent Strokes
8:30 Facts of Life
9:00 Quincy
10:00 News
10:30 Tonight Show
Mid. Tomorrow

* WSIU 8-PBS *
3:00 Sesame Street
4:00 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
4:30 Electric Company
5:00 News
5:30 Over Easy
6:00 Dick Cavett
6:30 MacNeil-Lehrer Report
7:00 Great Performances
8:30 Chinese Americans: The Second Century
9:00 Yakutat
10:00 Bill Moyers' Journal

* KFVS 12-CBS *
5:30 Summer Semester
6:00 Breakfast Show
7:00 Wednesday Morning
8:00 Captain Kangaroo
9:00 Jeffersons
9:30 Alice
10:00 Price is Right
11:00 Young & the Restless
Noon News
12:30 Search for Tomorrow
1:00 As the World Turns
2:00 Guiding Light
3:00 One Day at a Time
3:30 I Love Lucy
4:00 Gomer Pyle, USMC
4:30 Happy Days Again
5:00 Adam-12
6:00 CBS News
6:30 Family Feud
7:00 Movie "Charlotte's Web" (pt 1)
8:00 Movie "The Last Giraffe"
10:00 News
10:30 Black Sheep Squadron
11:40 Medical Story
1:35 News

* KET 21/23/35/53-PBS *
(TVG didn't list calls or locations of the KET stations)
2:30 Over Easy
3:00 Sesame Street
4:00 Mister Rogers' Neighborhood
4:30 Electric Company
5:00 Zoom
5:30 Cookin' Cajun
6:00 MacNeil-Lehrer Report
6:30 Dick Cavett
7:00 Great Performances
8:30 Chinese Americans: The Second Century
9:00 Yakutat

WTBS Atlanta
5:05 World at Large
5:30 News
6:00 Funtime
7:00 Hazel
7:30 Lucy Show
8:00 Family Affair
8:30 Green Acres
9:00 Movie "The Spy in Black"
10:55 News
11:00 Love, American Style
11:30 Movie "Flaxy Martin"
1:25 News
1:30 Father Knows Best
2:00 Funtime
3:00 Flintstones
3:30 Gilligan's Island
4:00 My Three Sons
4:30 I Dream of Jeannie
5:00 Andy Griffith
5:30 I Love Lucy
6:00 Hogan's Heroes
6:30 All in the Family
7:00 Baseball: Atlanta-Cincinnati
9:30 Rat Patrol
10:00 Last of the Wild
10:30 Movie "The Hard Way"
12:40 News
12:45 Baseball (replay of 7pm)
3:15 Movie "Charlie Chan in Rio"
4:25 Love, American Style
4:55 World at Large
 
> from TV Guide: Evansville-Paducah edition
> Paducah/Cape Girardeau/Harrisburg/Carbondale

I lived in Cape Girardeau 1978-82, so this takes me back.

In case you didn't notice, viewers in the Paducah-Cape Girardeau-Harrisburg market could watch all three network newscasts without timeshifting. WPSD (NBC) ran it in pattern at 530, KFVS (CBS) aired Cronkite at 600, and WSIL ran "World News Tonight" at 630.

> * WSIL 3-ABC *

Harrisburg, Illinois. Pop. barely 15,000, if that many.

Out of all the places I've lived, WSIL in 1978-82 was by far the most amateurish, hokey, low-budget operation I'd ever seen. But in a good way - WSIL's folks looked like they were having fun "playing television."

"YORE WATCHIN' CHANNEL TH-RAY. AND *WE APPRECIATE IT!!!*"

> 5:00 America's Top 10
> 5:30 Cactus Pete (The Funny Company)

WSIL still listed the show as "Cactus Pete" although that host had long gone.

"The Funny Company" was a surreal production. It was hosted by station Sports Director Briggs Gordon in the guise of alter-ego UNCLE BRIGGS, who defied any logical or rational description. Polka-dot cap, red plaid flannel shirt, overalls. Sat behind a desk, with a wall behind him containing a single framed picture of Dick Clark -- his virtual 'director', i.e. "Dick over here on the wall says it's time to go to Bugs Bunny."

TFC was your basic latter-day "kiddie show" -- a WB toon, Deputy Dawg and a "Three Stooges" short. Briggs had a number of little gimmicks, such as throwing a frisbee toward the camera, as if to throw it toward a given city in the viewing area. He pushed the envelope with some double-entendres ... heck, the guy was a cult hero in the area (and said to have been a Belushi-grade party animal ... died in his late 30s of liver failure).

Briggs' intros for the Stooges were one-of-a-kind .... wiggling his fingers over his eyes as he ran toward the camera imitating Curly's "WOO-woowoowoowoo!!!"

It was terrible. And I loved it - I faithfully watched every afternoon.

A picture of the good Unc' can be found here:
http://www.leonardsview.com/cooltvpeeps.html ...scroll down, you can't miss him!

> 6:15 News

And Briggs had less than five minutes to change into civvies to do the sports.

*********

> * WPSD 6-NBC *

Paducah, Kentucky. The polar opposite of WSIL, channel 6 had very high production values for a city its size (~25,000 population). Newscast was first-rate.

> 9:00 Phil Donahue
> 10:00 Pastor Speaks
> 10:05 Romper Room

But 6 also had major-market values when it came to preemptions. Especially during basketball season, when entire primetime lineups would be preempted at whim by Kentucky Wildcat games. True, Ky. people love their roundball; however, Kentucky made up only a fraction of WPSD's coverage (look for Paducah on a road map and you'll see what I mean). Tennessee, Missouri and Illinois together make up the bulk of its coverage.

You gotta love the name of the Kentucky town where 6's tower is located: Monkey's Eyebrow.

> * KFVS 12-CBS *

A class act. Very staid, not exciting or flashy, but 12 served its area well, and with a tower that was the world's tallest when erected in 1961.

KFVS had a local production arm which specialized in animation -- producing a number of IDs and commercials for other markets nationwide.

And with rare one-time exceptions, they cleared all network shows in pattern. Even Sunday morning.

Thanks for posting this ... memories of a one-of-a-kind TV market.
 
> > from TV Guide: Evansville-Paducah edition
> > Paducah/Cape Girardeau/Harrisburg/Carbondale
>
> I lived in Cape Girardeau 1978-82, so this takes me back.
>
> In case you didn't notice, viewers in the Paducah-Cape
> Girardeau-Harrisburg market could watch all three network
> newscasts without timeshifting. WPSD (NBC) ran it in
> pattern at 530, KFVS (CBS) aired Cronkite at 600, and WSIL
> ran "World News Tonight" at 630.
>
Given that at the time ABC had three feeds of World News
Tonight--5, 5:30, and 6 (CT), I'm surprised ABC let WSIL
get away with this.

BTW, I once knew a girl from Cape Girardeau and we got
to talking about television there. She mentioned Chs.
6, 12, and 23 but made a face when I asked her about
Ch. 3.
> >
>
> > * WPSD 6-NBC *
>
> Paducah, Kentucky. The polar opposite of WSIL, channel 6
> had very high production values for a city its size (~25,000
> population). Newscast was first-rate.
>
> GM Fred Paxton served for many years on the NBC Affiliates'
Board of Governors and was long considered an industry statesman.
>
>
> > * KFVS 12-CBS *
>
> A class act. Very staid, not exciting or flashy, but 12
> served its area well, and with a tower that was the world's
> tallest when erected in 1961.
>
>Of course, this is in Cape Girardeau, MO, west of the Mississippi,
which explains why its call letters start with K instead of W.

Was their tower taller than that of Ch. 11 in Fargo, ND?
 
> > 5:00 America's Top 10
> > 5:30 Cactus Pete (The Funny Company)
>
> WSIL still listed the show as "Cactus Pete" although that
> host had long gone.
>
> "The Funny Company" was a surreal production. It was hosted
> by station Sports Director Briggs Gordon in the guise of
> alter-ego UNCLE BRIGGS, who defied any logical or rational
> description. Polka-dot cap, red plaid flannel shirt,
> overalls. Sat behind a desk, with a wall behind him
> containing a single framed picture of Dick Clark -- his
> virtual 'director', i.e. "Dick over here on the wall says
> it's time to go to Bugs Bunny."
>
> TFC was your basic latter-day "kiddie show" -- a WB toon,
> Deputy Dawg and a "Three Stooges" short. Briggs had a
> number of little gimmicks, such as throwing a frisbee toward
> the camera, as if to throw it toward a given city in the
> viewing area. He pushed the envelope with some
> double-entendres ... heck, the guy was a cult hero in the
> area (and said to have been a Belushi-grade party animal ...
> died in his late 30s of liver failure).
>
> Briggs' intros for the Stooges were one-of-a-kind ....
> wiggling his fingers over his eyes as he ran toward the
> camera imitating Curly's "WOO-woowoowoowoo!!!"
>
> It was terrible. And I loved it - I faithfully watched
> every afternoon.
>

Ya gotta love small-market TV LOL!!
 
Paducah actually had an independent station over thrity years ago. WDXR radio signed on WDXR-TV Channel 29. It signed on in the early seventies and lasted until the mid-seventies. Channel 29 was unable to compete in a spread out TV market with strong VHF signals. As a last attempt at life the owners of WDXR tried for an ABC affilation, but ABC was happy with its relationship with Channel 3. WDXR-TV left the air.

Channel 29 returned to the air a few years later as Paducah's KET affilate.
 
Its pretty interesting how much this market has grown over the years. I grew up in the next-adjacent market, Evansville IN (grew up in Southeast Illinois along the Wabash River).

Back in the late 1980s, WSIL moved out of its downtown Harrisburg studio and into a building designed for TV in Cartersville, IL. At the time, the station - literally - was in the middle of a cornfield between Marion and Carbondale. Over the years, the growth of SIU-C has turned those cornfields into strip centers, apartment complexes and tract houses. You almost cannot tell where Marion ends and Carbondale begins (much less Cartersville).

WSIL, in some ways, is still kind of low budget. The owner, Mel Wheeler, Inc., also owns some car dealerships (I believe) and doesn't put much money into the operations. I read, somewhere (maybe the original newsblues.com) that they didn't even have a ENG truck until the late 1990s.
 
> BTW, I once knew a girl from Cape Girardeau and we got
> to talking about television there. She mentioned Chs.
> 6, 12, and 23 but made a face when I asked her about
> Ch. 3.

She's not the only one who did, I'm sure.

Answering an above question about independents, the short-lived WDXR-TV aside, the first one in the market was Cape Girardeau's KBSI-TV 23, hitting the air in the fall of '83.

> > > * WPSD 6-NBC *

> GM Fred Paxton served for many years on the NBC Affiliates'
> Board of Governors and was long considered an industry statesman.

I recall reading that a long time ago. That he was so involved in network issues makes it all the more surprising that he'd be one of those preempt-happy affils.

Here's one: WPSD initially didn't carry SNL. A "mailbag" segment of their newscast once dealt with a viewer question to that effect, and their answer was along the lines of "it's too risque." *snort* Early in 1979, they began clearing it ... on a one-hour delay. This was still the case a decade later!

During those days I thanked my Creator for our house atop a hill, with its tall antenna and rotor. Aim that puppy north, and I could decently pull in KSD-TV 5 in St. Louis. They weren't so uptight. (and if KSD's picture wasn't too good, I'd point the stick southbound and hope for a watchable image of channel 5 out of Memphis (WMC - also NBC).


> > > * KFVS 12-CBS *

>> A class act. Very staid, not exciting or flashy, but 12
>> served its area well, and with a tower that was the world's
>> tallest when erected in 1961.
>
> Of course, this is in Cape Girardeau, MO, west of the Mississippi,
> which explains why its call letters start with K instead of W.

Yeah, I guess I omitted that info.

And their building is the one "skyscraper" on the Cape skyline. Built in 1968, and doubles as their microwave STL tower.

> Was their tower taller than that of Ch. 11 in Fargo, ND?

No, it wasn't. In 1961, when KFVS' tower went up, it was the world's tallest. It wouldn't be the case for long, as 11 in Fargo built its tower soon thereafter.

Like WPSD's GM, KFVS founder/longtime owner Oscar Hirsch also had network involvement, serving on some CBS boards over the years. Hirsch spun off KFVS-TV to AFLAC in April 1979 (today, 12 is a Raycom station), and kept KFVS radio (renamed KGIR) until 1985.

On a side note, Hirsch's CBS credentials beg the question of why KFVS radio (AM 960 - 5 kW day/500 W night) was never affiliated with CBS. Format was MOR with a heavy news/sports/feature schedule, not exactly a clash with "CBS RAD)))|(((O."
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom