KTBC

Encyclopedia : K : KT : KTB : KTBC

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KTBC (FOX 7) is the FOX owned-and-operated television station in Austin, Texas. Its transmitter is located in Austin.

History

KTBC signed on the air on November 27, 1952. It was originally owned by former president Lyndon B. Johnson and his wife Lady Bird Johnson, alongside radio station KTBC-AM (now KLBJ-AM). As the city's first television station, it carried all four major networks at the time: ABC, CBS, NBC and the now-defunct DuMont Network -- making it one of few stations to affiliate with all Big 3 Networks (Big 4 with Fox). As more stations signed on the air (notably NBC-affiliated KHFI, which is now KXAN, and ABC-affiliated KVUE) over the years, it became Austin's primary CBS affiliate for nearly 25 years.

In 1994, New World wanted to affiliate its stations with Fox between 1994 and 1995 upon the network winning the contract to carry NFC division football games as Fox was establishing itself as a "Big Four" network and was looking for more VHF stations. In late 1994, most New World-owned stations (except for two) dropped their longtime "Big Three" affiliations and switched to Fox. The year after, New World purchased the Argyle Television Group, which owned KTBC. As a result, KTBC was set for future Fox affiliation along with sister stations KTVI in St. Louis and KDFW-TV in Dallas-Fort Worth. It finally dropped CBS on July 1, 1995 and switched affiliations to the FOX network, and the CBS affiliation moved to KEYE (which changed calls from KBVO that same day). As the new Fox affiliate, KTBC has been the over-the-air broadcast home of the Dallas Cowboys football team with several games airing on Sundays in the fall by Fox, but as of April 2006 KEYE has picked up the over-the-air contract to air the Cowboys preseason games beginning August 2006. FOX7 also carries Big 12 Conference college sports games in the fall. The station became the first network O&O in the market when New World merged with Fox Television Stations Group in 1996. Distinctively, Austin has the rare distinction of having Fox on VHF and the other "Big Three" affiliations all on the UHF dial.

In the early years as a Fox station, rather than carry Fox Kids programming, of which K13VC would air instead, KTBC filled the daytime lineup with more talk shows and the nighttime lineup with off-network sitcoms such as The Simpsons, Seinfeld and King of the Hill. However as of late, the station's daytime lineup leaned away from talk show format and added more courtroom dramas such as Judge Judy, Judge Joe Brown, and the syndicated Fox produced shows notably such as Judge Alex and Divorce Court.

To this day KTBC is, and has always been Austin's only VHF TV station; that fact enabled channel 7 to gain a tremendous advantage over the later competitors, who had to cope with UHF signals that often carried an inferior signal into the hilly terrain of central Texas nearby the city. In the 1970s and 1980s, before cable coverage came, many viewers in those areas tuned instead to VHF ABC and NBC outlets in San Antonio or Waco/Killeen. KTBC came in clear on those same sets, and thus did not suffer audience defection to the other markets. Today, in the case of Austin area cable subscribers, the station is seen on cable channel 2.

KVC 13

KVC 13 (officially K13VC) was an independent low-powered television station co-owned alongside KTBC which was on the air until March of 2003. Like most independents, KVC ran sitcoms, dramas, cartoons and several shows shared with KTBC. Upon KTBC's network switch to Fox, Fox Kids, which originally aired on then-KBVO, did not air on KTBC (like most New World stations then), with the exception of the Saturday morning lineup that aired in simulcast on KVC and KTBC. (KTBC would later drop the Fox Kids Saturday lineup in 1997.) KVC aired the block on weekdays and Saturdays until Fox ended the weekday lineup in 2002. When KVC became a UPN affiliate, it also picked up the UPN Kids lineup which later rebranded to Disney's One Too. (At the present, 4Kids TV does not air at all in Austin.)

KVC inherited the UPN affiliation from LIN TV's Hill Country Paramount Network in 1998 and aired UPN programming until August of 2000, when new Fredricksburg station KCWX (then KBEJ) went on the air on channel 2. KVC remained on the air as an independent station, showing typical independent programming as well as University of Texas sports and other college sporting events.

KVC was forced off the air on March 29, 2003 [link] in order to make room for KAKW-DT, the digital signal of a Univision affiliate in Killeen.

Newscasts

Even after KTBC joined the Fox network, it continued its 10 p.m. newscast, with the 9 p.m. hour time slot filled by syndicated programming, unusual for that network's affiliates. This changed in 2000 when the station launched a 9 p.m. newscast which is Austin's first primetime newscast; channel 7 then discontinued the 10 p.m. news (Note: Fox is currently remodeling all of it Network O&Os and likes the idea of 2 latenight newscasts, one at 9 p.m./Central time, the other at 10 p.m. KDFW/Dallas, WTVT/Tampa Bay, and several other Fox O&Os either already have 2 latenight newscasts, or just have one presently and are in the process of developing the second. This remodeling could force Fox 7 to keep its 9 p.m. news AND bring back its 10 p.m. news. The way Fox is developing all of its O&Os, Fox Network may also force Fox 7 to keep its 5 p.m. news AND bring back its 6 p.m. news). This was also the case with the 5:30 p.m. time slot filled with syndicate programs with the 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. newscasts which both ran 30 minutes intact. That also changed when the 6 p.m. newscast was discontinuted and the 5 p.m. newscast expanded to an hour.

Weekdays

• FOX7 News in the Morning - 5 to 9 a.m.
• FOX7 News at Noon - noon to 12:30 p.m.
• FOX7 News at Five - 5 to 6 p.m.
• FOX7 News at Nine - 9 to 10 p.m.

Saturdays

• FOX7 News at Six - 6 to 6:30 p.m.
• FOX7 News at Nine - 9 to 10 p.m.

Sundays

• FOX7 News at Five - 5 to 5:30 p.m.
• FOX7 News at Nine - 9 to 10 p.m.

External links

• [Fox Austin]
• [Query the FCC's TV station database for KTBC]
• [AustinTVNews.com :: KTBC]

Terrestrial television>Broadcast television in the Austin market  [(Nielsen DMA #53)]
KCWX 2 (UPN/The CW) - KTBC 7 (Fox) - K09VR 9 (Ind/Bloomberg/Fuse) - KNIC 17 (TFU) - KLRU 18 (PBS) - KADF-LP 20 (AZA) - KVUE 24 (ABC) - KAKW-LP 31 (UNI)  KGBS-CA 32 (Ind) - KXAN 36 / KXAM 14 (NBC) - KEYE 42 (CBS) - KBVO-CA 51 (TFU) - KNVA 54 (The WB/The CW/MNTV)
Defunct Television Stations K13VC (Ind)

 

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