K29EC - History

History

KPHO is Arizona's oldest television station, signing on December 4, 1949. It was originally owned by a group of entrepreneurs – one of whom, John Mullins, would later launch KBTV (now KUSA-TV) in Denver. The original group also included shareholders of Phoenix Broadcasting, which operated KPHO radio (910 AM, now KFYI at 550 AM); the television station, originally known as KTLX, had its call letters changed to the current KPHO-TV shortly before it took to the air. It originally broadcast from studios at the Hotel Westward Ho in downtown Phoenix. The Meredith Corporation purchased the KPHO stations on June 25, 1952.

As the only television station in Phoenix during the first three-and-a-half years of operation, it carried programming from all four networks of the time: a primary CBS affiliation, and secondary affiliations with NBC, ABC and the now-defunct DuMont Television Network. NBC disappeared from KPHO-TV when KTYL-TV (channel 12, now KPNX) signed on April 1953, followed by CBS when KOOL-TV (channel 10, now KSAZ-TV) signed on in October. KPHO remained a dual ABC-DuMont affiliate (with ABC programming shared between KPHO-TV and KOOL-TV) until February 1955, when KTVK (channel 3) signed on and took the ABC affiliation full-time. Channel 5 became an independent station when DuMont ceased network operations in 1956. During the late 1950s, the station was briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network. KPHO-TV was separated from its sister station when Meredith sold KPHO radio in 1972. That same year, channel 5's operations moved to its current facility on Black Canyon Highway.

As an independent station, channel 5 programmed a schedule of movies, off-network series and a nightly newscast at 9 p.m. In April 1950, the Lew King Ranger children's show broadcast live on KPHO with a young Wayne Newton as announcer. It also produced The Wallace and Ladmo Show, a children's show which aired weekday mornings from 1954 until 1989 (when it was decided by the stars of the show that the program would end). During the 1970s, KPHO became a regional superstation that was available on cable television in much of Arizona and New Mexico, as well as parts of California, Utah and Nevada.

KPHO-TV was the sole independent English-language television station in Phoenix until 1979, when KNXV-TV (channel 15) signed on with general entertainment during the day and subscription-based service ONTV at night (KNXV became a full-time general entertainment station by 1983). Even though channel 5 was the leading independent station in the market, the upstart Fox Broadcasting Company opted to affiliate with channel 15 in 1986 after the E. W. Scripps Company purchased the station, promising to upgrade its syndicated programming and to launch a newscast. (KPHO's other sister stations, KVVU-TV in Las Vegas and WOFL in Orlando did land Fox upon its launch, with the latter now owned by the network.) Although it never did begin a newscast as an affiliate of that network, landing the Fox affiliation made KNXV a very strong competitor against KPHO. By the late 1980s, its news operation (with newscasts under the News 5 title) comprised two newscasts: a midday newscast at 11:30 a.m. on weekdays and Arizona's first primetime newscast at 9:30 p.m. (years before KSAZ became a Fox station with a 9 p.m. newscast).

In 1994, as part of a massive wave of affiliation switches throughout the country, KSAZ announced it was dropping CBS in favor of becoming a Fox station as a result of its pending sale to New World Communications. CBS briefly wooed KTVK, whose then locally-based ownership declined the proposed affiliation in hopes of renewing its agreement with ABC. CBS then approached KPHO, since it was the only station in town not affiliated with one of the Big Three television networks that had a functioning news department. On June 30, 1994, CBS agreed to a long-term contract with Meredith Corporation, allowing KPHO-TV to rejoin the network 42 years after CBS moved to channel 10. The centerpiece of the deal was a renewal of CBS' affiliation with Meredith's Kansas City station, KCTV; it also called for another of KPHO-TV's sister stations, NBC affiliate WNEM-TV in Bay City, Michigan, to join CBS. (The ABC affiliation eventually went to KNXV when Scripps cut an affiliation deal which called for four of that company's stations to switch to ABC from other networks; KTVK eventually replaced KPHO as the market's main independent station in September 1995, after an eight-month affiliation with the WB Television Network). Phoenix was one of just four television markets where the CBS affiliation moved from one VHF station to another during the 1994 affiliation switches.

KSAZ-TV evicted CBS on September 12, 1994 upon the finalization of that station's sale to New World Communications, with CBS then moving to KPHO-TV. Initially, channel 5 continued to run a couple cartoons and a moderate amount of sitcoms during non-network hours. By January 1995, the cartoons were removed from the schedule (outside of those provided by CBS), and then the station gradually added more newscasts, talk and reality shows, with the sitcoms being phased out and moved to KTVK, KUTP (channel 45), and upstart KASW (channel 61). KPHO has generally been one of CBS's weaker affiliates since the 1994 switch, due in large part to the station's lack of a strong syndicated programming inventory, although its 10 p.m. newscast led among Phoenix's English-language stations in total households during the November 2009 sweeps period. In stark contrast, channel 10 had been one of CBS's strongest affiliates and was in strong second at the time of the switch.