KICU-TV - History

History

The channel 36 allocation was originally based in Stockton, California with the callsign KTVU (not related to the Oakland station) in the mid-1950s as a short-lived UHF station. It has since been reallocated to the Bay Area television market, and Stockton became part of the Sacramento television market.

The current incarnation of channel 36 signed on as KGSC-TV on October 9, 1967. It is the Bay Area's longest continuously running commercial UHF television station. In the 1970s, the station promoted itself as "The Perfect 36" and employed as spokesmodel busty San Francisco stripper/entertainer Carol Doda. The ID was a breathy, husky voiceover: "I see you, San Francisco. You're watching the perfect 36 ... KICU, San Jose." In addition to breathing the station IDs, Doda would also do the station's editorials, which like the IDs were laced with double entendres. The first take was always broadcast, mistakes and all. KGSC was also notable for the all-night movies, hosted for a long time by the Old Sourdough and Chief Wachikanoka. While there were several sets of hosts for the all-night movies, most versions were known as Movies 'Til Dawn, and sponsored by MMM Carpets, a local retailer. KGSC was purchased by Ralph Wilson in 1981 and changed its call letters to KICU.

From 1995 to 2000, KICU broadcast several Golden State Warriors basketball games each season. The station also was a longtime broadcaster of San Jose Sharks games. Over the years, the station ran a number of drama shows and older movies. It added more classic sitcoms and children's shows by the mid-1990s. However, the station gradually phased out children's programming between 1998 and 2002.

The station was sold to Cox Enterprises in 2000, becoming the first television duopoly in the San Francisco Bay Area; KICU subsequently moved its operations from its original San Jose studios to KTVU's facilities at Oakland's Jack London Square. Due to being co-owned alongside KTVU, KICU airs any Fox primetime programs that KTVU preempts due to local programming (this was also the case when the station aired San Francisco Giants baseball games that ran into or aired during primetime hours, until it lost the rights to the Giants to KNTV in 2007). With NBC owned-and-operated station KNTV becoming the broadcast home of the Giants in 2008, KICU took on the role of airing preempted NBC programming in lieu of KNTV. In 2010, KRON-TV (NBC's original Bay Area affiliate until the network's programming moved to KNTV in January 2002) took over the duties of running NBC programming preempted by KNTV in the event that the station cannot broadcast them. The duty of being NBC's backup affiliate in the Bay Area in the event that the station broadcasts Giants games and breaking news coverage was turned back over to KICU in 2012.

KICU was the broadcast television flagship for Oakland Athletics games until 2009, when the A's signed an exclusive TV deal with CSN California. Since KTVU had the Giants, the Cox duopoly essentially had exclusive control of the local broadcast television rights for a short while until the end of the 2007 season. The station aired High School Sports Focus on Friday nights at 11 p.m. with a 4 p.m. Sunday rebroadcast; the show also won regional Emmy awards. It was canceled in 2008.