CIII-TV

Encyclopedia : C : CI : CII : CIII-TV

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CIII-TV is a television station owned by CanWest Global that serves most of the Canadian province of Ontario. This flagship station of the Global Television Network is licenced at Paris, Ontario but its headquarters and studios are in Toronto. Most cable television systems in Ontario carry the station, normally on channel 3.

History

The station was launched on January 6 1974 under the CKGN-TV call letters, but has always been known on-air as Global. Early on, its flagship news program Global News developed, and in the beginning it was anchored by Peter Trueman in Toronto and Peter Desbarats in Ottawa. During the 1980s, Global greatly expanded its news operation, with an hour-and-a-half of news starting at 5:30 PM, plus news at noon and at 11 PM. By the end of the 1980s, the noon news was simply called News at Noon, the 5:30 news was called First News, the 6:00 news was called The Six O'Clock Report, and the 11:00 news was called The World Tonight. Anchors over the years have included Mike Anscombe, Beverly Thomson, John Dawe, Jane Gilbert, Peter Kent, Loretta Sullivan, Bob McAdorey, Thalia Assuras, and others.

The callsign CKGN-TV was changed to CIII-TV in January 1984, to mark the 10th anniversary of the station. The Windsor/Cottam transmitter would be an exception for a few years as it continued to be identified in CRTC documents as CKGN-TV-1.

From 1994 to 2001, CIII also produced First National, which was anchored by Peter Kent and seen at 6:30 p.m. weeknights. In 2001, the program was replaced by Global National, anchored by Kevin Newman and originating from Global BC in Vancouver.

CIII has evolved into a much more Toronto-centric station in recent years, despite being licensed to a town a fair distance away from the Greater Toronto Area. Previously, it employed a number of freelance journalists from across the province who filed reports for Global News. This, along with extensive province-wide weather coverage, gave the station a distinctive Ontario feel for many years. While the main studio was always located in Don Mills, it was not a distinctly Toronto station until it began to rebrand itself in the late 1990s.

CIII was originally owned by Global Communications, which was fully acquired by Izzy Asper in 1989. Asper's stations, including UTV in Vancouver, STV (CFRE-TV/CFSK-TV) in Saskatchewan, CKND in Winnipeg, and MITV in the Maritimes, formed a mini-network for a number of years, which evolved into the Global that Canadians know today. All of these stations began using the "Global" brand, in addition to CIII, in 1997.

Unlike most Global stations, CIII presently uses "Global News", as opposed to a regional name such as "Global Ontario", as its main news brand. Individual newscasts are titled News Hour, News Final, et cetera.

Logos

Image:Global original.PNG|Original Global Television Network logo (1974-1997) Image:GlobalOntarioLogo.png|The second "Global Ontario" logo (1997-2006) Image:GlobalToronto2006.png|Alternate "Global Toronto" station logo (since 2006)

Transmitters and facilities

CIII's main and original transmitter broadcasts on channel 6, from a tower near Paris, which is located between London and Hamilton, at 475 Ayr Road.

Studios and offices are located in the Toronto suburb of Don Mills at 81 Barber Greene Road, the same address from which broadcasts began in 1974. Secondary studio and news bureau facilities are located at the National Press Centre in Ottawa.

A series of rebroadcast transmitters relay the Paris signal to much of Ontario. Most of these use the call sign CIII followed by a number to denote their status as rebroadcasters, except in Sudbury and North Bay where the CFGC call sign is assigned. The most likely explanation for using CFGC is that the close resemblance between the number 1 and the letter I would make CIII-TV-11 an undesirable call sign for Sudbury, while North Bay couldn't use CIII-TV-2 as that call sign is already in use in Bancroft.

These six transmitters formed the original 1974 service:

• CKGN-TV Channel 6 from Paris
• CKGN-TV-1 from Cottam (near Windsor)
• CKGN-TV-2 Channel 2 from Bancroft
• CKGN-TV-6 Channel 6 from Hull, Quebec (Camp Fortune site, near Ottawa)
• CKGN-TV-22 Channel 22 from Uxbridge
• CKGN-TV-29 Channel 29 from Oil Springs (near Sarnia)

In 1986, [Decision CRTC 86-678] approved the relocation of the Cottam transmitter from Cottam to Stevenson. This transmitter (then CIII-TV-1) was silent for several years. Some time after this, the CIII-TV-22 call letters from the now-defunct Uxbridge transmitter were re-assigned to the Stevenson transmitter.

The Uxbridge transmitter was deleted in 1988, replaced by CIII-TV-41, broadcasting from the CN Tower in Toronto.

Other transmitters were gradually introduced, including (launch dates in parenthesis):

• CIII-TV-7 Channel 7 from Midland (November 1987)
• CIII-TV-4 Channel 4 from Owen Sound (June 1988)
• CIII-TV-27 Channel 27 from Peterborough (October 1988)
• CFGC-TV Channel 11 from Sudbury (December 1992)
• CFGC-TV-2 Channel 2 from North Bay (December 1992)
• CIII-TV-13 Channel 13 from Timmins (December 1992)
• CIII-TV-12 Channel 12 from Sault Ste. Marie (December 1992)
• CIII-TV-55 Channel 55 from Fort Erie (early 1993)

CIII is not available in Thunder Bay; instead, Thunder Bay Television stations CKPR and CHFD broadcast a large amount of Global programming.

Slogans

• Early 1974: Your New Point of View
• Late 1974 - Mid-1975: Global's Looking Good
• Late 1975 - 2005: Global's Got It!

References

• [Nelson Media]
• [The Bill Dulmage Radio & Television Archive]

External links

• [Global Ontario]
• [GlobalTV.com]
• [Complete list of Global's Ontario transmitters]
• [Canadian Communications Foundation profile on Global]

 

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