History
Channel 7 was intended to be the last VHF TV channel allocation in the Puget Sound area, and many broadcasting companies wanted it. Ultimately, it went to Saul Haas, owner of KIRO radio (AM 710 and the original KIRO-FM at 100.7, now KKWF), and the station signed on as KIRO-TV on February 8, 1958. The first program shown was the explosion of Ripple Rock, a hazard to navigation in Seymour Narrows, British Columbia. The second program was the first broadcast of longtime Seattle children's show, J. P. Patches. Popular Seattle City Light Home Economist Mary Norris hosted one of the region's first programs home & lifestyle programs, and was a regular on the station for many years.
KIRO subsequently became a CBS affiliate, and competed heavily against KTNT-TV (now KSTW), another CBS affiliate licensed to Tacoma. KIRO eventually won out, becoming the sole CBS affiliate for the Puget Sound area in 1962.
In 1964, KIRO-AM-FM-TV came under the ownership of Bonneville International Corporation, part of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Bonneville executives Lloyd Cooney and Ken Hatch arrived in Seattle to lead the combined broadcast group in 1964. Upon Cooney's departure to run for US Senate in 1980, Hatch became President, CEO and Chairman - a position he held until 1995. Under Hatch's leadership, KIRO Inc. (which included KIRO-AM-FM-TV, KING AM, and Third Avenue Productions) became one of the nation's premier regional broadcast groups. During this period, KIRO's corporate board included many notable leaders including Mary Gates, mother of Bill Gates, M. Lamont Bean, Pay 'N Save Chairman, Tony Eyring, Washington Mutual CEO and Gordon B. Hinckley, former president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s, KIRO still faced competition in some Western Washington households from Bellingham's KVOS-TV, which at the time was also a CBS affiliate. After years of legal challenges and negotiations with CBS and KIRO, KVOS phased out most CBS programming but retained a nominal CBS affiliation until 1987, during which it would run all of the CBS shows that were preempted by KIRO.
KIRO-TV was also the flagship station for pre-season game broadcasts of the Seattle Seahawks from 1975 to 1985. Play-by-play announcers were Ron Barr (1975-76), the late Pete Gross (1976-78) and the late Wayne Cody (1978-85), who was also the station's sports anchor. For years, KIRO also was the flagship station for Seattle SuperSonics broadcasts, coinciding with the NBA's deal with CBS.
In 1986, KIRO debuted Point Counterpoint featuring conservative John Carlson and liberal Walt Crowley. Airing on what was then KIRO's most popular newscast, The Sunday Newshour with Brian Wood anchor and Monica Hart anchor, Crowley and Carlson became well known for their pointed and bombastic debates.
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Famous quotes containing the word history:
“What has history to do with me? Mine is the first and only world! I want to report how I find the world. What others have told me about the world is a very small and incidental part of my experience. I have to judge the world, to measure things.”
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)
“A poet’s object is not to tell what actually happened but what could or would happen either probably or inevitably.... For this reason poetry is something more scientific and serious than history, because poetry tends to give general truths while history gives particular facts.”
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“... all big changes in human history have been arrived at slowly and through many compromises.”
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