KCRG-TV - History

History

During the late 1940s, the Cedar Rapids Gazette, previous owners of KCRG-AM 1600, filed an application with the Federal Communications Commission for a TV station license. At the time, the FCC had a backlog of over 200 applications, and had decided not to proceed with action on further applications until the backlogged requests could be filled.

After the backlog was taken care of, many applications were filed for licenses. The Gazette Company didn't want to compete for a license, and decided to withdraw the initial application. It joined with a number of other investors as Cedar Rapids Television Company (CRTV), which was granted a license for channel 9. The station signed on October 15, 1953.

Initially, the station was known as KCRI because the other investors didn't want to have the new television station so closely identified with the Gazette. The radio station also took the KCRI calls because one of the television station's managers suggested that every mention of "KCRG" on air was a promotion for the newspaper—one for which the Gazette would have to pay each time. After about a year of operation, the Gazette bought out the remaining investors in CRTV and the station was renamed KCRG-TV in 1954.

Since that time the station has remained under the ownership of Gazette Communications, which was renamed the SourceMedia Group in mid-2010. After the 1996 sale of WHO-TV in Des Moines, KCRG-TV has been the only locally owned and operated television station left in Iowa. KCRG started broadcasting in high definition television in January 2003. The station also had the first news helicopter in Iowa, "NewsCopter 9".