RETRO: Memphis, TN - Week Of March 20 - 26, 1977 (Sun 3/20 and Sat 3/26)

[Tim-In-Houston]

Source: Memphis Commercial Appeal

Weekday listings for this period to appear in seperate topic

Stations Listed (as appears in grid)
WMC-TV 5 (NBC)
WREG-TV 3 (CBS)
WHBQ-TV 13 (ABC)
WKNO-TV 10 (PBS)

SUNDAY 3/20/1977
7:00a
5 - TV Chapel (listed as a :05 start)
3 - Day of Discovery
13 - Treehouse Club
10 - Off air until 1pm

7:30a
5 - Nashville On The Road
3 - What Is Faith?
13 - Lewis Davis CME

8:00a
5 - Florida Boys
3 - Leave It To Beaver
13 - Ridgeway Baptist Church

8:30a
3 - Superman (New Adventures of Superman?)
13 - Chris Is

9:00a
5 - Oris Mays
3 - Above The Clouds
13 - Herald Of Truth

9:30a
5 - Cartoon Carnival
3 - Songs Of Praise
13 - Oral Roberts

10:00a
5 - Magicland
3 - Camera 3
13 - Insight

10:30a
5 - Film Funnies
3 - Face The Nation
13 - Bellevue Baptist Churh (listed as starting at 10:45)

11:00a
5 - V. Ward Fishing
3 - Black Forum

11:30a
5 - Meet The Press
3 - American Angler

12:00p
5 - Special: "NBC Forum - The American Election Process"
3 - Movie: "Bad Day at Black Rock"
13 - Firing Line

1:00p
13 - PGA Tournament: Players Championship
10 - La Boheme

1:30p
3 - World Evangelism Crusade

2:00p
5 - Grandstand

3:00p
13 - Championship Auto Racing

4:00p
5 - Champions Survival
13 - Wide World Of Sports
10 - Grand Prix Tennis: Volvo Tennis Classic (sports? on PBS?)

5:00p
5 - Close Up
3 - CBS News
13 - Lawrence Welk

5:30p
5 - Face To Face
3 - Mutual Of Omaha's Wild Kingdom

6:00p
5 - Action News 5
3 - Movie: The Wizard Of Oz
13 - Six Million Dollar Man
10 - Microbes and Men

6:30p
5 - Candid Camera

7:00p
5 - McMillan
10 - Andre Previn and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

8:00p
3 - Special: "Bing!"
13 - Movie: "Murder at the World Series"
10 - Masterpiece Theatre: The Pallisers

8:30p
5 - Lanigan's Rabbi

9:30p
3 - Loves Me...

10:00p
5 - Action News 5
3 - Newswatch 3
13 - Eyewitness News

10:30p
5 - Bill Dance
3 - Movie: "The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz"
13 - Movie: "The Woman Who Cried Murder"

11:00p
5 - Space: 1999

12:00p
5 - Final News

1:00a
3 - Movie: "Denver and..."

SATURDAY 3/26/1977

6:30a
5 - TV Chapel (listed as a 6:45 start) / Farmer (listed as a 6:50 start)
3 - Leave It To Beaver

7:00a
5 - Woody Woodpecker
3 - Sylvester and Tweety Show
13 - Tom & Jerry

7:30a
5 - Pink Panther Show
3 - Clue Club
13 - Jabberjaw

8:00a
3 - Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner Show
13 - Scooby Doo/Dynamutt Show
10 - Seasame Street

9:00a
5 - Speed Buggy
3 - Tarzan
10 - Once Upon a Classic

9:30a
5 - Monster Squad
3 - Batman
13 - Krofft Super Show

10:00a
5 - Space Ghost
3 - Shazzam/Isis Hour
10 - Inf. Factory

10:30a
5 - Big, Little John
13 - Super Friends
10 - Rebop

11:00a
5 - Land of the Lost
3 - Fat Albert
13 - Saturday Showcase
10 - Carrascolendas

11:30a
5 - Wrestling (Word Championship Wrestling produced by WMC)
3 - Arlk II
10 - Victory Garden

12:00p
3 - Way Out Games
10 - Grand Prix Tennis: La Costa International Tennis Championship

12:30p
3 - What's It About?
13 - Maverick

1:00p
5 - NCAA Basketball Doubleheader
3 - Movie: "Bad Bascomb"

1:30p
13 - Bonanza

2:30p
13 - Star Trek

3:00p
3 - Heritage Golf Classic

3:30p
13 - In Search Of...

4:00p
3 - Perry Mason
13 - Wide World Of Sports
10 - Nova

5:00p
5 - Pop Goes the Country
3 - Channel 3 Reports
10 - Studio See

5:30p
5 - Nashville Music
3 - CBS Evening News
13 - ABC News
10 - Zoom

6:00p
5 - Action News 5
3 - Hee Haw
13 - Dialogue
10 - Rebop

6:30p
5 - Gong Show
13 - Press Conference
10 - Once Upon a Classic

7:00p
5 - Emergency
3 - Mary Tyler Moore
13 - Blansky's Beauties

7:30p
3 - The Bob Newhart Show
13 - Fish
10 - Way It Was

8:00p
5 - Movie: "The Stone Killer"
3 - All In The Family
13 - Starsky & Hutch
10 - An Evening of Championship Skating (Ice Skating I assume)

8:30p
3 - Alice

9:00p
3 - The Carol Burnett Show
10 - Dear Love

10:00p
5 - Action News 5
3 - Newswatch 3
13 - Eyewitness News

10:30p
5 - Saturday Night Live
3 - Movie: "Les Girls"
13 - Soul Train

11:30p
13 - Sammy & Co.

12:00a
5 - Late Show: "Once Before..."
3 - Award Theatre

 

[Braves2005]

Sunday 3/20/1977

8:30 AM 3 - Superman(New Adventures Of Superman?)

More than likely the 50's version of Superman starring George Reeves

4:00 PM 10 - Grand Prix Tennis: Volvo Tennis Classic(sports on PBS?)

Quite possibly since Channel 3 was carrying the World Evangelism Crusade,Channel 10 carried the tennis game which was on CBS. It was common but not unusual that another network carried sports or other programs that another station couldn't carry.

 

[azumanga]

4:00 PM 10 - Grand Prix Tennis: Volvo Tennis Classic(sports on PBS?)

Quite possibly since Channel 3 was carrying the World Evangelism Crusade,Channel 10 carried the tennis game which was on CBS. It was common but not unusual that another network carried sports or other programs that another station couldn't carry.

However:

1. All the commercials would have to be blanked out, since the station is a PBS member station broadcasting very likely on an educational license.

2. It's not uncommon for PBS to carry sports in the 1970s -- in past retro schedules, we have seen other sports specials carried by PBS stations, usually tennis.

 

[DoctorBear]

The Wisconsin ETV network carries University of Wisconsin home basketball, hockey and football games on tape delay (usually at 10:30 p.m.)

 

[bpatrick]

Atlanta's Channel 30, also a PBS affiliate, carried
tennis tournaments in 1977 as well, so I'd be willing
to bet that the tennis on Channel 10 was indeed
a PBS offering.

I'm surprised to see "The Wonderful World Of
Disney" pre-empted on Channel 5; it would have
been on NBC at 6 PM (Central).

And I'm almost certain that "Superman" on
Channel 3 is the George Reeves version; I
seem to recall Channel 3 running those shows
in the late 1970s, when there was a lot of
interest in the character because of the
Christopher Reeve movies.

 

[anotherguyTN]

On Channel 5 nothing pre-empted rasslin'. When NBC had Major League Baseball starting at noon, they would come into the game in progress after rasslin' was over. Along with that, if there was a doubleheader, Channel 5 wouldn't carry the second game because nothing would pre-empt the country music shows in the late afternoon. :-\ They were notorious for this from the late 70's until the early 90's, when the station was sold by Scripps to Raycom.

Also, WLJT 11, the PBS station in Lexington, TN (Jackson area) shows tape delayed games of area college and high school football and basketball.

 

[rwells2265]

I'm surprised to see "The Wonderful World Of
Disney" pre-empted on Channel 5; it would have
been on NBC at 6 PM (Central).

And I'm almost certain that "Superman" on
Channel 3 is the George Reeves version; I
seem to recall Channel 3 running those shows
in the late 1970s, when there was a lot of
interest in the character because of the
Christopher Reeve movies.

WMC-5 preempted Disney during much of the '70s. It didn't faze me as a kid in Tupelo, as we had local NBC WTWV-9 (now WTVA), which did clear WWOD. But Memphians had to pull antenna muscles straining toward Little Rock, Paducah or Tupelo if they wanted their Mouse Fix.

And the Superman that WREG-3 ran was indeed the '50s syndie original. I believe they had prints of the complete series in their massive film vault, ditto for Perry Mason. Its airing wasn't connected with the Christopher Reeve film version -- but didn't the first one come out in '79?

Tim, thanks for posting these. I always enjoy seeing the Memphis retros.

--Russell

 

[bpatrick]

The first Superman movie came out in 1978. It was either in
1978 or '79 that I first noticed that WREG carried the George
Reeves version; at the time it was getting a wider-than-usual
syndication because of the movie, so I suppose I should have
been more date-specific, rather than saying simply "late '70s,"
since other stations were carrying it in '77 (and before) as well.

 

[anotherguyTN]

WMC-5 preempted Disney during much of the '70s. It didn't faze me as a kid in Tupelo, as we had local NBC WTWV-9 (now WTVA), which did clear WWOD. But Memphians had to pull antenna muscles straining toward Little Rock, Paducah or Tupelo if they wanted their Mouse Fix.

And the Superman that WREG-3 ran was indeed the '50s syndie original. I believe they had prints of the complete series in their massive film vault, ditto for Perry Mason. Its airing wasn't connected with the Christopher Reeve film version -- but didn't the first one come out in '79?

Tim, thanks for posting these. I always enjoy seeing the Memphis retros.

--Russell

WMC was notorious about pre-empting a large part of NBC's programming, especially daytime, late nights, and weekends from the late 70's to the early 90's. It seemed almost like the more viewers and even the newspapers complained the worse it got, as if it was an effort to spite them.

Even now I believe WREG still shows Perry Mason reruns late nights and weekends.

 

[rwells2265]

The first Superman movie came out in 1978. It was either in
1978 or '79 that I first noticed that WREG carried the George
Reeves version; at the time it was getting a wider-than-usual
syndication because of the movie, so I suppose I should have
been more date-specific, rather than saying simply "late '70s,"
since other stations were carrying it in '77 (and before) as well.

I'm sure WREG played up the original series when the movie first came out .... of course, we'd left Tupelo by then.

WREG aired Superman for a long time. I remember seeing it as far back as 1974, possibly in the 8:00 timeslot replacing part of that one hour of CBS toons on Sunday morning.

WMC was notorious about pre-empting a large part of NBC's programming, especially daytime, late nights, and weekends from the late 70's to the early 90's. It seemed almost like the more viewers and even the newspapers complained the worse it got, as if it was an effort to spite them.

Back in the '70s, 5 wasn't that big on preemptions, Disney notwithstanding. Then again, the granddaddy of non-clearance was WHBQ-13 (then ABC).

But when I returned to the area in 1984 (Jonesboro, Ark.), I was stunned ... NBC still had a full daytime lineup, but WMC took less than half of it, if that much! KARK-4 in Little Rock, by contrast, knocked out just the 9:00 hour (CT).

Meanwhile, channel 13 was much more faithful to the network by then, preempting only (I think) "Bandstand" and one daytime show (moving All My Children to 11:00 to make room for their nooncast, and moving the 11:00 show to 12:30. AB would be back on 13's schedule in 1985.

Come to think of it, Lance Russell was over at WMC in the '80s doing wrestling. Maybe HE had a hand in WMC's swiss-cheese network lineup???

But dammit, I can't stay mad at a TV station that had such a cool ID signature (riverboat whistle).

--Russell