Worst local TV Newscast ever.

[FreddyE1977]

In the 70's, Channel 11 in Pittsburgh, then WIIC-TV, would get my vote. They always finished a distant third. Pretentious, overly-dramatic theme music. Weatherman Pat Shingleton with a giant arrow taped to his finger, cracking horrible jokes and hopping around like a madman. Anchor Beverly Byer announcing that "Groucho Marx took a turn for the worse today......in fact, he died!" A spostscaster summarizing the Pirates performance as "a shi**y way to lose a ballgame!" Adam Lynch throwing a fit because somebody messed with his chair. A rubbery Willie the Duck puppet offering editorial commentary on the day's news. It was a real three-ring circus.

Second place would go to KDKA's noon news during the same era, featuring Bill Burns and his daughter Patti. Bill always looked slightly oblivious. Patti would gaze over at him and say something like "Well, Dad, today in the Middle East...". Made me want to gag every time! But the Babushka Grandma crowd here that watched KD's noon news just ate it up.

 

[LKellerIII]

KPIX San Francisco's Eyewitness News,an otherwise decent news program over the years - definitely had the world's worst sportscaster for a few months in the mid 70s. Milt Kahn was a nerdy "super-fan" type who made a name for himself on Bay Area sports-talk radio. For some reason, he couldn't read a tele-prompter, and would rarely finish a sentence without stumbling. He often seemed confused, and looked like the proverbial "deer caught in the headlights" on camera.

The climax was in spring of 1974, the day Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth's home-run record with #715. A very excited Kahn opened his sportscast by saying:

"Babe Ruth hit his 715th home run today, breaking the record Hank Aaron set in 1935."

Kahn was gone the next day.

Disclaimer: Sorry: my stats may be off - I'm not a big baseball fan.

 

[oldiesfan6479]

The climax was in spring of 1974, the day Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth's home-run record with #715. A very excited Kahn opened his sportscast by saying:
"Babe Ruth hit his 715th home run today, breaking the record Hank Aaron set in 1935."
Kahn was gone the next day.

Makes you wonder if this exchange ever took place during a toss to sports...

News anchor: "Sports is next--hey Milt, who was the Yankee player that made
the famous speech years ago, the one with all the echo in it--
'today...today...'?"

Milt Kahn: "Oh yeah, Gary Cooper." ;D

 

[wrsg915fm]

You MUST check out WOAY (worst on air yet) from Oak Hill, West Virginia. The set hasn't been changed in almost twenty years, with fake flowers just inches behind the anchors. They broadcast in glorious mono. How they are going to survive the digital changeover is beyond me.

 

[azumanga]

You MUST check out WOAY (worst on air yet) from Oak Hill, West Virginia. The set hasn't been changed in almost twenty years, with fake flowers just inches behind the anchors. They broadcast in glorious mono. How they are going to survive the digital changeover is beyond me.

Let me guess -- after the switchover, they'll be in standard-def only, and still with mono sound. If new digital equipment has stereo included, they'll find a way to keep it mono.

 

[wrsg915fm]

It gets better. They've stated that, because so many of their viewers couldn't get converter boxes or didn't know about the conversion (which is unbelievable), they're going to go until August on analog. I'm way too far north to be a regular viewer. If you can watch them on the internet, do so. You won't believe your eyes.

The story goes that the call-letter part of their application to broadcast allegedly stated WOAK, but the handwritten 'k' looked like a 'y,' and...you know. A GREAT sitcom could be built on this station-the TV version of "WKRP in Cincinnati.' Again, it must be viewed to be believed.

 

[Tim L]

John Hambrick, who spent 1967-75 at WEWS-TV 5 in Cleveland. as part of a long career in TV News..said on the News/Talk show Morning Exchange when Channel 5 had its 50th anniversary that if there was anything wrong with TV news, it was in the writing..and this was in 1997..Newsmen arent trained to "write well"..

 

[azumanga]

It gets better. They've stated that, because so many of their viewers couldn't get converter boxes or didn't know about the conversion (which is unbelievable), they're going to go until August on analog.

Even though they now have until 6/12 to go digital only.

In other words, they're willing to be fined and sued, just so its viewers could get their programming.

Incredible.

 

[charlestondxman]

WOAY is one of the worst TV stations I've seen. There was a video on YouTube of them from 1989, and it was embarrassing, as they had a trivia question every morning on the news, and they spelled trivia "triva"!

Another bad station is WMDT in Salisbury, MD. WMDT looks like bad public access now, with their poor graphics, and here is some of their video from last year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L10t647RTY4&feature=related

 

[jfc40ts]

WUHF 31 in Rochester featured a former actress turned newscaster. One story she was reporting on was a coup in some country. Unfortunately, for her, she pronounced it coop, like in chicken coop.

Needless the say she made numerous other mistakes which eventually ended with her leaving broadcasting to " pursue other career opportunities."

One such memorable mistake happened while doing a story on the $100 bill. She referred to the gentleman on the front of the bill as "former President Franklin".

As far as Buffalo goes, the worst had to have been when a reporter was doing a live shot and actually admitted that he didn't know where he was. At least Wes Small was "all over it"...

 

[mjlarochelle]

Another bad station is WMDT in Salisbury, MD. WMDT looks like bad public access now, with their poor graphics, and here is some of their video from last year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L10t647RTY4&feature=related

That's not too bad actually. Some of the small market stations in Canada are even worse than that.

 

[gooberksk]

Poster djj recently provided this link on the California board - a 1972 newscast at sleepy KFTY (Channel 50) in Santa Rosa - about 60 miles north of San Francisco. It was a bit amateurish, but definitely a cut above the Virgin Islands newscast.

Actually - the anchor - Stan Atkinson, went on to a very distinguished career as a news anchor and reporter in Sacramento, until his retirement a year or two ago

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNvw2GzDF_w

And that newscast contains what has to be the first sportscasting job for ESPN's Jon Miller. But is that Gene Shalit doing the weather under another name? ;D

That's not Gene Shalit, that's the Cheeto's guy.

 

[rch66]

Another bad station is WMDT in Salisbury, MD. WMDT looks like bad public access now, with their poor graphics, and here is some of their video from last year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L10t647RTY4&feature=related

That's not too bad actually. Some of the small market stations in Canada are even worse than that.

Another bad station newscast is from WHAG in Hagerstown MD "NBC 25".

The strange thing is the owner Nexstar expected retrans payment for the station on certain cable systems, in 2005, however, these cable systems already had access to Washington's WRC 4 (NBC) for NBC programming, and WJLA 7 for the common syndicated shows.
http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/news/display.htm?storyid=45113
http://www.herald-mail.com/?module=displaystory&story_id=127313&format=html

Apparently the cable companies did settle, thus cable companies are paying for WHAG for access, yet the station IS spending money to pay for sending the signal down to the DC area, to be on Dish Network for the DC market customers

 

[mleach]

Another bad station is WMDT in Salisbury, MD. WMDT looks like bad public access now, with their poor graphics, and here is some of their video from last year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L10t647RTY4&feature=related

That's not too bad actually. Some of the small market stations in Canada are even worse than that.

Another bad station newscast is from WHAG in Hagerstown MD "NBC 25".

The strange thing is the owner Nexstar expected retrans payment for the station on certain cable systems, in 2005, however, these cable systems already had access to Washington's WRC 4 (NBC) for NBC programming, and WJLA 7 for the common syndicated shows.
http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/news/display.htm?storyid=45113
http://www.herald-mail.com/?module=displaystory&story_id=127313&format=html

Apparently the cable companies did settle, thus cable companies are paying for WHAG for access, yet the station IS spending money to pay for sending the signal down to the DC area, to be on Dish Network for the DC market customers

You are so right about WHAG and the sad thing is many of their employees would agree with you too.

If there is such a thing as a TV station being between a rock and a hard place..that would fit WHAG. The county to the north of Hagerstown ( Franklin County, PA ) was moved into the Harrisburg-York-Lancaster market some years back and with that being the case WGAL could if they really wanted too force the cable systems in Franklin County to drop WHAG but I guess WGAL has a "heart" knowing that such a move and considering how many Pennsylvania businesses advertise on WHAG, the move would KILL them.

With Hagerstown/Washington County being in the DC market, WHAG can't even touch WRC as far as getting them taken off the cable right there in their hometown.

Frederick, MD and the Eastern West Virginia Panhandle is more of a bedroom community for Washington DC ( and Baltimore ) commuters so most of the people who live there would rather watch those channels than WHAG.

Plus on top of that Baltimore's WBAL is available on a few systems in the region so for many people the question is..why bother with WHAG?

Of course thats not to say WHAG never had any good talent. Philadelphia's Pat Ciarrocchi ( kYW-TV ) got her start at WHAG-TV.

 

[ixnay]

one night [Larry Kane] pronounced Houston Street (HOUSE-ton in New York) like the city
in Texas (HEWS-ton). He was soon given a one-way ticket back
to Philadelphia.

There's a Houston St. in Chester, PA. My first home (as a child, with my parents, before they divorced and my mom and I moved into an apartment near the Delaware state line) was a couple of blocks off *that* Houston St. I always pronounced it like the Texas city. Speaking of which, there's a Texas City, TX, down near Galveston.

ixnay

 

[JeeperOne]

Hi everyone:

Their schedule is even worse:

http://titantvguide.titantv.com/apg/basic.aspx?siteid=51480

Did you get a load of their weekday daytime lineup at the URL above. Just enter any day from Monday thru Friday from 6:00 AM on. NO station I know of has that kind of lineup for their daytime. Not even NBC affiliates have this TRIPE of a lineup (And they only have Today & Days Of Our Lives for network programs during the day!).

Cheers

Pat

 

[JeeperOne]

I remember when 11 Alive (Atlanta) made the debute. For a month they kept teasing us on the air about the big change coming. It was definately better than Pro News which was their previous name.

Speaking of the worst newscasts & newscast titles, let's also not forget the worst newscast news MONIKIERS either.

My vote doesn't have to travel very far. It only has to go 123 Speer Blvd. here in Denver where KMGH 7 is located. Anyone remember the REAL LIFE.....REAL NEWS moniker they had? That was back when they also had THE WORST news anchor this town had ever seen. Anyone here in Denver remember NATALIE PUJO?????

On top of that, their logo didn't look very impressive either.

I mean, not even then-NBC affiliate KOA-TV 4 (Now CBS O&O KCNC 4) was that bad. The problem that KOA, which later became KCNC 4 & a NBC O&O, had was the rise of KBTV (Now KUSA) 9 as a major player in news and viewers liking of Bob Palmer & John Lindsey on KMGH. KCNC knew it had to land Bob Palmer (Who BTW once worked at KOA-TV as a photographer back in the early days of Denver TV) if they stood a chance of improving their own ratings. If they hadn't made that move, who knows where they'd be now.

That's my contribution (Not to mention the free Denver TV History lesson ).

Cheers

Pat

 

[jh]

Did you get a load of their weekday daytime lineup at the URL above. Just enter any day from Monday thru Friday from 6:00 AM on. NO station I know of has that kind of lineup for their daytime. Not even NBC affiliates have this TRIPE of a lineup (And they only have Today & Days Of Our Lives for network programs during the day!).

He's referring to WSVI, St. Croix USVI. You should realize the territory only has a population of 108,000 with a median income about half that of the mainland. Not a huge advertising market to begin with, and there are several other stations to compete for those dollars.

Besides, if you lived in a tropical paradise, would you spend all day in the house watching TV?

 

[JeeperOne]

Hi everyone:

The recently-defunct Independent News Network was another example.

That's funny. I saw a recent Independent Network News newscast which featured SECRETARY OF STATE Hillary Clinton's trip to Asia as its top story on a new America One affiliate that just signed on here in Denver.

Perhaps America One revived Independent Network News?

It's cheaply produced & it looks like they exchange local news clips like local TV stations do (They cut off the reporter as they close & the anchor reiterates who did the reporting after each clip), but at least it's a newscast. If I can find a video somewhere, I'll post a link to it.

Cheers

Pat

 

[JeeperOne]

Hi everyone:

I thought Sarah doing sports at KTUU was bad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hc7LBtRGCd8

Actually sarah wasn't too bad in that video clip.

Too bad she didn't STAY in sports though. If she had, she might've made the networks LONG ago (I could actually see her on FOX Sports as a sideline reporter for their NFL coverage during the 1990s. I really could).

JMHO though....

Cheers

Pat