Retro: Yuma, AZ, September 11, 1967

[Ultimajock]

I worked weekends once in a while at KYUM radio, which was a NBC station. We got the old Monitor program over there by ATT long lines.

Everything local was black and white, with one of those classic old film chains that consisted of two Bell and Howell projectors and a double slide carousel. The chains had this habit of deciding to toss a take-up belt every once in a while, and you'd have to stick a pencil in the take-up reel and turn it by hand between commercial breaks. We also had a pair of those screwball audio machines that were built around giant magnetic floppy discs. (RCA Audiomat comes to mind) The darn things never stayed in alignment, and you'd throw a disc in, hit the button, and get double voices.

...KFIZ-TV/34 Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, as I recall, was still all black&white on local origination at the time they went dark in November 1972. Even the AWA "All-Star Wrestling" and "Roller Game of the Week" were in black&white; this suggested to me that they were getting videotapes of the shows or an OTA tape-delay from WVTV/18 Milwaukee and had only a b&w VTR to use...and, regarding "Monitor," on a 1974 appearance on Tomorrow with Tom Snyder, "Monitor" contributor Jean Shepherd told Tom that one station in Kentucky had been bootlegging "Monitor" off the NBC line without 30 Rock knowing about it until the station called them to complain about NBC changing the timings on the newscasts during the show ;D ...

 

[ixnay]

I like this thread , for several reasons, mostly personal:

1) I remember it being discussed before on R-I that Arizona was something of a "black hole" as far as network TV transmission was concerned until the late '60s.

2) My stepfather, before he met my mother towards the end of the '70s, would sometimes be sent to Arizona (often, Yuma) from the East Coast on business.

2a) On a 1981 vacation I stayed in Yuma one night while making my way from Phoenix (I'd flown out there from Philly) before going on to San Diego.

3) Friends of my mother's who lived in the apartment on top of ours for a spell (when my mom was newly divorced) now spend their winters in Tuscon.

ixnay

 

[oldiesfan6479]

1) I remember it being discussed before on R-I that Arizona was something of a "black hole" as far as network TV transmission was concerned until the late '60s.

Setting Yuma aside, it having been dissected, sliced, and diced in this thread...

The Phoenix affils were Telco lined. Daytime pretty much live New York origination.
Prime time (oversimplified)--take the 7:30 ET hour and flip it (usually tape) to 9pm,
clear the rest live (CBS/NBC); run the whole schedule in pattern on 16mm film but
amazingly enough the same night, not a week late (ABC).

The Tucson affils were like Fort Worth compared to Dallas (apologies to Amon Carter,
and no JFK jokes please). NBC had a Telco line, but its VTR resources were limited
and unreliable (low-band color, breakup, scalloping, banding, no DOC), resulting in a
patchwork schedule of live net, one-week tape delay, two-week 16mm film delay,
some shows airing on odd days. Film chain (RCA TK-26?) looked horrible, included
the old RCA "back-flip" multiplexer. ABC/CBS affils were not fed by AT&T, but had
microwave links from their Phoenix counterparts for network delivery, hence their
schedules would be identical to what was airing up the road, unless the Tucson
station wanted to delay it even further, by tape machines also of dubious reliability
or by picking up the 16mm film print sent down on Greyhound the next morning.

2a) On a 1981 vacation I stayed in Yuma one night while making my way from Phoenix (I'd flown out there from Philly) before going on to San Diego.

I believe I-8 was finished through Cali by 1981, so you should have been able to
go straight through. Of course, there's the decision on how to get from Phoenix
to Gila Bend--do you take the "two lanes of terror" (AZ 85) or detour slightly using
the "I-10/I-8 two-step" via Casa Grande?

 

[TexasTuner]

The afternoon ABC stuff was off the microwave and I remember it being in color at some point before I left in spring of 68, so either the old Guide is wrong on that, or my memory is. We did have some ongoing issues with published program schedules not having correct info re: color. That Fugitive episode would have been on 16mm. We mixed 'em up. When we had a time conflict in "Prime Time" (such as that was down there) we usually resolved it by airing NBC live and taking the ABC show on film delay.

The interesting challenge was the SS KIVA show, which had cartoons, spots, live video, and audio. One of the spots was for a place called "Big Burger" whose jingle is still seared in my memory. The cotton picking thing had something like 15 slides in the spot and you had to change them by hand in time to the music. Lots of running around for a one-guy booth crew!

Do you recall if the films were shipped to KIVA as part of the affiliation (ie, no cost to station) or did KIVA have to pay for the privilege?

 

[JayElDee]

I don't know what the financial arrangement was, but we were a dual NBC/ABC affiliate, and we carried some ABC shows live, so it seems likely they were part of the affiliation. When I was at CBS TV City in the early 70's, we were still recording kinescopes for one affiliate, and shipping tapes of the newscasts to Hawaii and Alaska on a daily basis. We also bicycled TV City network delay tapes to one station, so it wouldn't have been out of character for the time period if ABC was 'networking' in part on film.

 

[JayElDee]

BTW, during network movies or specials that crossed the TOH sans station break,
how did KIVA cover the lower-third KNBC or KABC ID?

Now there's a good question. We had title slides for each show, so if we bothered to cover it at all, that's probably how. TBC's didn't exist, and our net switch was always non-sync composite. For killing the audio promos, we'd just pot down, listen to them in cue, then pot up again.

As far as SS KIVA goes, it varied. Sometimes the TD was a one man band, directing, loading, and audio, other times our weather guy or production guy would direct. For the news show, "Uncle Bob" Hardy would direct and run audio. We usually did both shows with one fast-movin camera guy.

 

[ixnay]

I believe I-8 was finished through Cali by 1981, so you should have been able to
go straight through. Of course, there's the decision on how to get from Phoenix
to Gila Bend--do you take the "two lanes of terror" (AZ 85) or detour slightly using
the "I-10/I-8 two-step" via Casa Grande?

Oldiesfan, you made we wish I'd kept the Rand-McNally AZ/NM map and the Gousha' Phoenix street map (with metro map on the other side) I purchased at our hotel in Scottsdale during that 1981 stay. ;D But I didn't so I must rely on my memory (and my 2009 R-McN atlas).

Yes, I-8 was complete across CA by mid-'81. I can still see the water tank in El Centro with the line marking "Sea Level" painted on it. We took AZ 85 out from PHX to Buckeye where 85 did a 90 degree turn to the south, accessing 8 in Gila Bend. Saw no snakes or gila monsters.

Around the Maricopa Co./Yuma Co. line, I-8 enters some mountains and due to the contours, its wb and eb roadways cross over one another, so that for several miles, it feels as though you are driving in the UK or Australia or Japan IYKWIM (I've never been those countries, but I've seen pictures/footage of their traffic). I-5 in the Tehachapis north of L.A., I've seen in online pictures, does the same thing.

Getting back to AZ 85 for a moment... nowadays 85 begins at I-10 in Buckeye, but in 1981, 85 began in Phoenix, I believe, because I-10 coming from Tuscon terminated near Sky Harbor and resumed somewhere around Goodyear, although I-17 was available for getting to points north of PHX.

Now, getting back closer to the topic... we didn't watch any TV our night in Yuma. Our motel (it might have been a Motel 6) charged extra for TV and as we were just passing through, we forewent it, though we did drive down to San Luis, AZ and walked through the gate to its counterpart in Mexico.

ixnay

 

[Ultimajock]

BTW, during network movies or specials that crossed the TOH sans station break,
how did KIVA cover the lower-third KNBC or KABC ID?

Now there's a good question. We had title slides for each show, so if we bothered to cover it at all, that's probably how. TBC's didn't exist, and our net switch was always non-sync composite. For killing the audio promos, we'd just pot down, listen to them in cue, then pot up again.

As far as SS KIVA goes, it varied. Sometimes the TD was a one man band, directing, loading, and audio, other times our weather guy or production guy would direct. For the news show, "Uncle Bob" Hardy would direct and run audio. We usually did both shows with one fast-movin camera guy.

...one more point of similarity with KFIZ-TV. When they microwaved shows from WVTV and the Milwaukee station superimposed their "Block 18" logo for ID purposes (mainly during The Merv Griffin Show and Irv Kupcinet's Kup's Show), KFIZ usually broke in with their own full-screen ID slide until WVTV dropped their super...

 

[ixnay]

11 KIVA
8AM: Today C
...
10AM: Linus B&W

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I've been meaning to ask...

crainbebo (or anybody), what was "Linus"?

ixnay

 

[Stanislav]

11 KIVA
8AM: Today C
...
10AM: Linus B&W

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I've been meaning to ask...

crainbebo (or anybody), what was "Linus"?

ixnay

Almost certainly that was the animated series Linus the Lionhearted. (I have seen many TVGs of the era that similarly abbreviated the title to just Linus.)

 

[ixnay]

11 KIVA
8AM: Today C
...
10AM: Linus B&W

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I've been meaning to ask...

crainbebo (or anybody), what was "Linus"?

ixnay

Almost certainly that was the animated series Linus the Lionhearted. (I have seen many TVGs of the era that similarly abbreviated the title to just Linus.)

I thought so, but since the listing said just "Linus", I thought it might be a Catholic-themed religious show. BTW this easterner actually remembers watching LtheL on ABC back then BION. Wasn't that lion on the box of a Post cereal (I forget the name)?

ixnay

 

[Stanislav]

11 KIVA
8AM: Today C
...
10AM: Linus B&W

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I've been meaning to ask...

crainbebo (or anybody), what was "Linus"?

ixnay

Almost certainly that was the animated series Linus the Lionhearted. (I have seen many TVGs of the era that similarly abbreviated the title to just Linus.)

I thought so, but since the listing said just "Linus", I thought it might be a Catholic-themed religious show. BTW this easterner actually remembers watching LtheL on ABC back then BION. Wasn't that lion on the box of a Post cereal (I forget the name)?

ixnay

Yup -- the cereal was "Crispy Critters." The Linus character started out as a advertising icon in animated commercials, then the series grew out of that. It was canceled when the FTC/PTA/FCC/etc. started getting antsy about Saturday morning commercialism. (Little did they anticipate all those 80's cartoons that were basically half-hour infomercials for toys...) :

Linus was voiced by the great Sheldon Leonard. Others in the cast were Carl Reiner, Ruth Buzzi, and Bob McFadden.

 

[Tim L]

11 KIVA
8AM: Today C
...
10AM: Linus B&W

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I've been meaning to ask...

crainbebo (or anybody), what was "Linus"?

ixnay

Almost certainly that was the animated series Linus the Lionhearted. (I have seen many TVGs of the era that similarly abbreviated the title to just Linus.)

I thought so, but since the listing said just "Linus", I thought it might be a Catholic-themed religious show. BTW this easterner actually remembers watching LtheL on ABC back then BION. Wasn't that lion on the box of a Post cereal (I forget the name)?

ixnay

Yup -- the cereal was "Crispy Critters." The Linus character started out as a advertising icon in animated commercials, then the series grew out of that. It was canceled when the FTC/PTA/FCC/etc. started getting antsy about Saturday morning commercialism. (Little did they anticipate all those 80's cartoons that were basically half-hour infomercials for toys...) :

Linus was voiced by the great Sheldon Leonard. Others in the cast were Carl Reiner, Ruth Buzzi, and Bob McFadden.

While I remember Linus on ABC, The latest it may have been in syndication was about 1970-72 or so..The old WJAN-TV 17 in Canton, Ohio showed Linus as part of kids show "Milton The Milkman" between 4-5PM weekdays during this time. I remember they had very bad looking prints of the show..