TV station in Charlotte, NC

[VCarter]

Sometime a while back, I was reading the 1964 edition of Television Factbook
on random TV stations throughout the USA. I came upon the Charlotte, NC
listings for WBTV-3, WSOC-9, and an obscure UHF station known as WUTV
Channel 36. this station was apparently a non-commercial (but not educational)
station that was on the air from 1961 to 1963. the station signed off sometime
in 1963 and the license was sold later that year to a company that started
up WCCB in 1964. the station had been on the air previously in 1953-54 as
WAYS-TV.

 

[Matt]

> ...obscure UHF station known as WUTV Channel 36.

It's just another chapter in the storied story of UHF TV in Charlotte prior to 1965.

In the 1950's, the FCC allocated channel 18 to Fayetteville, and channel 36 to Charlotte. Stations were licensed and put on-air on both channels in the 50's, and quickly failed for the same reasons UHF stations were failing all over the country.

In Fayetteville, no one attempted to try television on Channel 18 after its initial failure, but in Charlotte the channel 36 application bounced around several applicants over the next few years as a CP, but no one actually put a signal on the air until 1961.

I don't know much about WUTV...I was only about 5 years old and we didn't get a UHF converter for several years after that. After the WUTV operation went belly-up, the licence was taken by businessman Cy Bahakel and given the calls WQMC.

Keenly aware of the past failures of UHF Television in Charlotte, and that stations on the lower channels seemed to do better overall, Bahakel petitioned the FCC to re-allocate channel 18 to Charlotte, which they did. Then, knowing that network affiliation would bring viewers, Bahakel joined an existing lawsuit which forced the networks to accept UHF stations as full-time affiliates if there were two VHF's in the market and a UHF was started up...

And thus was born WCCB on channel 18 as a fulltime ABC affiliate.

While this was going on, several groups petitioned the FCC for control of the newly-orphaned channel 36. A coalition of applicants was put together, and in 1967, WCTU-TV took to the air as an independent on channel 36.

I can't guarantee the accuracy of any of this. It was not the kind of news that was published in the Charlotte Observer, and WBTV and WSOC only reported about these stations if they were about to go belly-up. Therefore, the only real information about what stations did or did not air is the FCC...and the close connections between certain broadcasters and certain government officials often resulted in "mis-filed paperwork" with their would-be rivals in the market.

Some people in the market say that WAYS-TV was never on the air, and the same for WUTV. There was certainly some "valued interests" who never wanted the general public to be aware of the existence of UHF stations.

Later....
Matt Smith, Station Manager
WGSR-TV "Star-39"
A PROUD UHF Station

 

[moedog1]

WCCB did indeed come on the air in Charlotte in late 1964 on channel 36. WCCB joined WTVI, channel 42 as the second UHF in Charlotte. WTVI had come on about 1962 as the area's educational TV channel. WCCB's first transmitter site was on Independence Blvd, adjacent to the former Charlotte Coliseum. I believe it is true that WCCB/Bahakel Broadcasting did take over the former WUTV facilties there, but I don't know when or how much WUTV ever broadcasted from the facility. Interestingly, Bahakel had already put two other UHF stations on the air, in Columbia SC and Montgomery AL, but both of these markets were already UHF markets. From the beginning, WCCB was affiliated with all three major networks, airing programs rejected by WBTV and WSOC, both of which also aired programs from all three networks. By all accounts WCCB/36 was an immediate sucess, with UHF converters, antennas, and UHF ready TVs flying off the shelves. I remember the Charlotte Observer givng the new station a lot of publiciy, and 36 was immediately given parity with WBTV/WSOC in the daily and weekly listings in the paper. It had been a point of embarrassment for Charlotte, who already considered themselves to be a major city, that they only had 2 TV stations---WCCB/36 solved that problem. Even so, WCCB, with their 400-500 ft tower on Independence, did not have the range of its two competitors. As mentioned earlier, WCCB got permission to move to 18. In 1967, they moved to their 1300 ft tower in northeast Mecklenburg Co (near the WSOC tower) and became the first TV station in the US to broadcast with 5000000 watts. Soon after, WCCB got the exclusive ABC afiliation with WBTV going to CBS and WSOC going to NBC. I believe this was all voluntary on the part of the three stations---it happened years before the FCC mandated that upstart UHF stations be given exclusive network affiliations (as in nearby Raleigh Durham with WRDU/28 getting NBC).What surprises me is that WAYS/WUTV did not gain some foothold years earlier. WBTV had come on the air in 1949 and had been the only TV station in CHarlotte until 1957, when WSOC came on. By 1953, when WAYS_TV could have came on, it had to be common knowledge that Charlotte would never have but two VHF stations. WAYS-TV would have had several years to gain a toehold before having to compete with a third station (WSOC).

 

[bpatrick]

> WCCB did indeed come on the air in Charlotte in late 1964 on
> channel 36. WCCB joined WTVI, channel 42 as the second UHF
> in Charlotte. WTVI had come on about 1962 as the area's
> educational TV channel. WCCB's first transmitter site was
> on Independence Blvd, adjacent to the former Charlotte
> Coliseum. I believe it is true that WCCB/Bahakel
> Broadcasting did take over the former WUTV facilties there,
> but I don't know when or how much WUTV ever broadcasted from
> the facility. Interestingly, Bahakel had already put two
> other UHF stations on the air, in Columbia SC and Montgomery
> AL, but both of these markets were already UHF markets.
> From the beginning, WCCB was affiliated with all three major
> networks, airing programs rejected by WBTV and WSOC, both of
> which also aired programs from all three networks. By all
> accounts WCCB/36 was an immediate sucess, with UHF
> converters, antennas, and UHF ready TVs flying off the
> shelves. I remember the Charlotte Observer givng the new
> station a lot of publiciy, and 36 was immediately given
> parity with WBTV/WSOC in the daily and weekly listings in
> the paper. It had been a point of embarrassment for
> Charlotte, who already considered themselves to be a major
> city, that they only had 2 TV stations---WCCB/36 solved that
> problem. Even so, WCCB, with their 400-500 ft tower on
> Independence, did not have the range of its two competitors.
> As mentioned earlier, WCCB got permission to move to 18.
> In 1967, they moved to their 1300 ft tower in northeast
> Mecklenburg Co (near the WSOC tower) and became the first TV
> station in the US to broadcast with 5000000 watts. Soon
> after, WCCB got the exclusive ABC afiliation with WBTV going
> to CBS and WSOC going to NBC. I believe this was all
> voluntary on the part of the three stations---it happened
> years before the FCC mandated that upstart UHF stations be
> given exclusive network affiliations (as in nearby Raleigh
> Durham with WRDU/28 getting NBC).What surprises me is that
> WAYS/WUTV did not gain some foothold years earlier. WBTV
> had come on the air in 1949 and had been the only TV station
> in CHarlotte until 1957, when WSOC came on. By 1953, when
> WAYS_TV could have came on, it had to be common knowledge
> that Charlotte would never have but two VHF stations.
> WAYS-TV would have had several years to gain a toehold
> before having to compete with a third station (WSOC).
>
I know that WAYS-TV was on the air around 1954; it carried
ABC and NBC. I don't recall WUTV; the first time I ever
heard of a station on Channel 36 in Charlotte, it was WCCB,
and that was in '64. In late 1966, WCCB moved to 18, and
WCTU came on the air on 36 in the summer of '67, IIRC.

WCCB lost the ABC affiliation to WSOC in 1978, was independent
for eight years, then joined Fox. Ted Turner went after, and
got, the NBC affiliation for Channel 36 (WRET). That made the
station more valuable, and he sold it to Westinghouse to get
the seed money for CNN.

The only way a third VHF could even exist in Charlotte would
be a low-power Channel 6, which WCNC, the current call letters
of 36, would grab in an instant, since it's on cable channel 6
and calls itself "NBC6". I say it would have to be low-power
because there are stations on 6 in Wilmington, Knoxville,
and Augusta, GA. But with analog to be a thing of the past,
I doubt if this scenario will ever come to pass.

 

[moedog1]

More about WCCB/36/Charlotte

The original poster brought up the idea that anti-competive practices may have kept WAYS-TV/WUTV from from gaining a foothold in Charlotte. I believe that was a common problem with UHF Tv stations is the 1950s and 60s and may very well have been true in Charlotte as well. I do know that about the time WCCB hit the air, its two competors became very interested in cable tv. Both Jefferson Pilot (WBTV) and Cox (WSOC) obtained cable francises from the city of Charlotte and began wiring the city in the mid 60s. Both companies, Jeff Pilot's Cablevision, and Cox-Cosmo, carried the same line-up--the locals, including WCCB and WCTU when they came on, plus WSPA, WIS (owned by Cosmos), WGHP, and WSJS (now WXII). DC's WTTG and WDCA were added in the early 70s. I believe these early cable systems were intended to have a chilling effect on WCCB/WCTU. Actually, I believe the cable systems had the opposite effect. In the late 70s both systems, which still had not covered the entire city, were sold to the predecesor of Time Warner, who quickly expanded the system and converted from 12 to 36 channels. Jeff Pilot had also built systems in Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, High Point, and a number of smaller towns. Those systems also went to Time Warner. Ironically, it was the Raleigh system which proved to have the more detrimental effect on UHF. Cablevision carried WRDU from the start, on channel 13, but WITN-another NBC affil--was on channel 7, right between WRAL (cable 3) and WTVD (cable 9). Long after the other out-of-market channels (WFMY, WGHP, WNCT) were dropped from this system, WITN lived on, certainly drawing viewers from WRDU/WPTF.

 

[moedog1]

Top 40 Radio and the NC UHFs

When considering the death of NCs early UHF stations, I think the huge changes that were occuring in AM radio in the 1950s have to be considered. WNAO-TV28, owned by WNAO-AM850 was the first TV station in Raleigh-Durham, and by most accounts had a sucessful start. WTOB-TV26, owned by WTOB-AM1380 was also an early entrant in Winston Salem, and of course WAYS-TV36, owned by WAYS-AM610 in Charlotte. All three AM stations were sold in the late 1950s to enterprenuers who converted them from MOR also rans to the the three dominant top 40s in the state (WNAO-AM was renamed the unforgettable WKIX). WAYS-AM went to the legendary Stan Kaplan and both WTOB and WNAO went to a guy named Holden from Greensboro. It would seem that neither of these guys had much interest in TV. My theory is that 26, 28, and 36 were sold out to other companies at the same time the radios were sold who hoped to return the stations to the air as conditions permitted. I know that before WGHP came on the air, the licenses for 26 (still WTOB-TV) and 28 (WKIX-TV) were held by Southern Broadcasting, who had to give up those licenses before they could put WGHP/8 on the air. And remember, at about that same time Southern put WBMG/42 on the air in Birmingham, so they had an interest in UHF. I would guess that when WAYS-AM was sold to Kaplan, WAYS-TV was sold to another company who renamed the station WUTV. I expect that license lived on, whether on or off the air, until Bahakel bought it and put WCCB on the air. It would be great to know for sure.....

 

[bpatrick]

Re: More about WCCB/36/Charlotte

> The original poster brought up the idea that anti-competive
> practices may have kept WAYS-TV/WUTV from from gaining a
> foothold in Charlotte. I believe that was a common problem
> with UHF Tv stations is the 1950s and 60s and may very well
> have been true in Charlotte as well. I do know that about
> the time WCCB hit the air, its two competors became very
> interested in cable tv. Both Jefferson Pilot (WBTV) and Cox
> (WSOC) obtained cable francises from the city of Charlotte
> and began wiring the city in the mid 60s. Both companies,
> Jeff Pilot's Cablevision, and Cox-Cosmo, carried the same
> line-up--the locals, including WCCB and WCTU when they came
> on, plus WSPA, WIS (owned by Cosmos), WGHP, and WSJS (now
> WXII). DC's WTTG and WDCA were added in the early 70s. I
> believe these early cable systems were intended to have a
> chilling effect on WCCB/WCTU. Actually, I believe the cable
> systems had the opposite effect. In the late 70s both
> systems, which still had not covered the entire city, were
> sold to the predecesor of Time Warner, who quickly expanded
> the system and converted from 12 to 36 channels. Jeff Pilot
> had also built systems in Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, High
> Point, and a number of smaller towns. Those systems also
> went to Time Warner. Ironically, it was the Raleigh system
> which proved to have the more detrimental effect on UHF.
> Cablevision carried WRDU from the start, on channel 13, but
> WITN-another NBC affil--was on channel 7, right between WRAL
> (cable 3) and WTVD (cable 9). Long after the other
> out-of-market channels (WFMY, WGHP, WNCT) were dropped from
> this system, WITN lived on, certainly drawing viewers from
> WRDU/WPTF.
>
I don't know about WITN on cable in Raleigh per se, but I
know we used to get it in Garner in the pre-cable '60s; it's
where I watched whatever favorite shows came on NBC. My
cousins in Smithfield and Goldsboro got WITN (and the ones
in Goldsboro got WNCT as well) OTA. WITN had, and has, a
fairly extensive reach into the Raleigh/Durham market, and
there are places like Goldsboro where it's going to coexist
with WNCN/17 because people are in the habit of watching it.
Remember, WITN has been on since '55, WRDC since '68, and
WNCN since '89 (and has been with NBC only since '95).
WFMY and WNCT may not have been as heavily viewed, except in
(respectively) the western and eastern fringes of the market,
because the Triangle has had a decent CBS affiliate since the
late '50s, first WTVD, then WRAL. That would make channels
2 and 9 expendable.

We have the same situation in Chatham County. A few years
ago, Charter Communications wanted to drop WFMY and WGHP.
Well, people in Siler City were watching WFMY before there
was a television station in the Triangle (WFMY signed on
in '49, Raleigh/Durham didn't get a station until WNAO/28
in '53), and WGHP has been around since 1963. WFMY got
kicked upstairs to cable channel 18 (I believe), but I
also believe WGHP is still down on the lower channels
(I have DirecTV, not cable, which is why I'm not totally
sure of my ground here). Raleigh/Durham has a UHF Fox
affiliate (WRAZ/50), but a VHF CBS affiliate (WRAL/5).
If the idea is to hurt UHF, then Charter should bring
in WXII to compete with WNCN.

In Charlotte, WGHP was added to the cable system 'way
back when, as I understand it, because people couldn't
get, or didn't bother to look for, ABC on WCCB. I
also recall WIS and WXII being on cable there when
WSOC was still the NBC affiliate. In fact, WIS and WXII
(both went on the air in '53) predate WSOC ('57).

So to get to the point: I'm not sure the presence of
out-of-market stations on cable is to drive UHF off the
air, but rather a question of habits ingrained before
these UHFs ever came on the air.

Finally, the big problem with UHF in the '50s and '60s
was the fact that, until 1964, set manufacturers did not
have to include UHF. In Raleigh, WNAO (CBS/ABC) was doing
about as well as could be expected, but when WRAL came on
in December 1956, advertisers began to switch, simply
because WRAL, on channel 5, carried farther than WNAO,
on channel 28. WNAO went dark in 1958 and it was ten
years before another station appeared on 28.

 

[bpatrick]

Re: Top 40 Radio and the NC UHFs

> When considering the death of NCs early UHF stations, I
> think the huge changes that were occuring in AM radio in the
> 1950s have to be considered. WNAO-TV28, owned by WNAO-AM850
> was the first TV station in Raleigh-Durham, and by most
> accounts had a sucessful start. WTOB-TV26, owned by
> WTOB-AM1380 was also an early entrant in Winston Salem, and
> of course WAYS-TV36, owned by WAYS-AM610 in Charlotte. All
> three AM stations were sold in the late 1950s to
> enterprenuers who converted them from MOR also rans to the
> the three dominant top 40s in the state (WNAO-AM was renamed
> the unforgettable WKIX). WAYS-AM went to the legendary Stan
> Kaplan and both WTOB and WNAO went to a guy named Holden
> from Greensboro. It would seem that neither of these guys
> had much interest in TV. My theory is that 26, 28, and 36
> were sold out to other companies at the same time the radios
> were sold who hoped to return the stations to the air as
> conditions permitted. I know that before WGHP came on the
> air, the licenses for 26 (still WTOB-TV) and 28 (WKIX-TV)
> were held by Southern Broadcasting, who had to give up those
> licenses before they could put WGHP/8 on the air. And
> remember, at about that same time Southern put WBMG/42 on
> the air in Birmingham, so they had an interest in UHF. I
> would guess that when WAYS-AM was sold to Kaplan, WAYS-TV
> was sold to another company who renamed the station WUTV. I
> expect that license lived on, whether on or off the air,
> until Bahakel bought it and put WCCB on the air. It would
> be great to know for sure.....
>
Don't know, but I do know that Southern Broadcasting owned
WSGN/610, Birmingham's top-40 giant in the late '60s and
early '70s, as well as WBMG. WBMG, BTW, didn't come on
until 1965, by which time sets had to include UHF capability,
something not required in the days of WTOB-TV, WNAO-TV,
and WAYS-TV.

 

[Matt]

> The only way a third VHF could even exist in Charlotte would
> be a low-power Channel 6, which WCNC, the current call
> letters
> of 36, would grab in an instant, since it's on cable channel
> 6
> and calls itself "NBC6".

Actually, it would be almost impossible to put a VHF 6 on the air in Charlotte these days, because Non-Commercial FM's have been assigned to 89.9 in Davidson, 88.9 in Rock Hill and 88.1 in Hickory. There is some rule about the interaction of low-FM band stations with TV channel 6 that requires them to be co-located and/or phase coordinated in order to reduce or eliminate the interference of one to another.

I think about 15 years ago, someone managed to get a CP for an LPTV on 6 in Concord, but in testing the system found that WDAV (89.9) caused objectionable interference to it. The licensee went no further with the station and it was abandoned.

In more recent times, digital allocations for the full-power FM's had one of Charlotte's religious LPTV'ers applying for a move to 6. I don't know if that ever happened, but I remember seeing the application (and maybe a CP) about the time we moved our LPTV from 14 to 39.

Later...
Matt Smith, Station Manager
WGSR-TV "Star-39"
Reidsville, NC

 

[bpatrick]

> > The only way a third VHF could even exist in Charlotte
> would
> > be a low-power Channel 6, which WCNC, the current call
> > letters
> > of 36, would grab in an instant, since it's on cable
> channel
> > 6
> > and calls itself "NBC6".
>
> Actually, it would be almost impossible to put a VHF 6 on
> the air in Charlotte these days, because Non-Commercial FM's
> have been assigned to 89.9 in Davidson, 88.9 in Rock Hill
> and 88.1 in Hickory. There is some rule about the
> interaction of low-FM band stations with TV channel 6 that
> requires them to be co-located and/or phase coordinated in
> order to reduce or eliminate the interference of one to
> another.
>
> I think about 15 years ago, someone managed to get a CP for
> an LPTV on 6 in Concord, but in testing the system found
> that WDAV (89.9) caused objectionable interference to it.

I hadn't thought about the fact that Channel 6 is also
87.7 FM. It really doesn't matter, since analog is on
its way out.

For those who don't live in North Carolina, the reason
Charlotte has only two VHFs has to do with the location
of the other ten:

Ch. 2: Greensboro, Charleston, SC, Sneedville, TN
Ch. 4: Greenville, SC, Charleston, SC, Chapel Hill
Ch. 5: Raleigh, Charleston, SC, Bristol/Kingsport/Johnson
City
Ch. 6: Wilmington, Augusta, GA, Knoxville
Ch. 7: Spartanburg, SC, Charleston, SC
Ch. 8: High Point (8 was originally licensed to Florence, SC)
Ch. 10: Columbia, SC
Ch. 11: Durham, Johnson City, TN
Ch. 12: Winston-Salem
Ch. 13: Asheville, Florence, SC

> The licensee went no further with the station and it was
> abandoned.
>
> In more recent times, digital allocations for the full-power
> FM's had one of Charlotte's religious LPTV'ers applying for
> a move to 6. I don't know if that ever happened, but I
> remember seeing the application (and maybe a CP) about the
> time we moved our LPTV from 14 to 39.
>
> Later...
> Matt Smith, Station Manager
> WGSR-TV "Star-39"
> Reidsville, NC
>

 

[TimL]

Re: Top 40 Radio and the NC UHFs

> >
> Don't know, but I do know that Southern Broadcasting owned
> WSGN/610, Birmingham's top-40 giant in the late '60s and
> early '70s, as well as WBMG. WBMG, BTW, didn't come on
> until 1965, by which time sets had to include UHF
> capability,
> something not required in the days of WTOB-TV, WNAO-TV,
> and WAYS-TV.
>

Pure coincidence, but as I was running errands this evening, I had my XM Walkman style radio tuned to the 60's oldies channel and they were doing a salute, with classic liners, of WAYS-610 Charlotte