History
The station commenced broadcasting on May 25, 1953 from the Ezekiel W. Cullen Building on the University of Houston campus as the first public television station in the United States, and one of the earliest stations of National Educational Television (NET), which eventually merged into PBS. Its dedication ceremonies were broadcast on June 8 of that year. The station's initial cost was an investment of $350,000 USD, and had an annual operating budget of about $110,000 USD. Originally licensed to both University of Houston ("UH") and the Houston Independent School District, UH became its sole licensee in 1959.
The station also offered the university's first televised college credit classes. Running 13 to 15 hours weekly, these telecasts accounted for 38 percent of the program schedule. Most courses aired at night so that students who worked during the day could watch them. By the mid-1960s, with about one-third of the station's programming devoted to Education television, more than 100,000 semester hours had been taught on KUHT.
In 1964, KUHT moved into new studios on Cullen Boulevard, which were previously occupied in order by KTRK-TV and later KNUZ-TV (now occupied by KIAH). It purchased a new transmitter that not only enabled the station to broadcast beyond Harris County into its surrounding areas, but also to begin broadcasting in color. Five years later, in 1969, the Association for Community Television (ACT) was formed to fund KUHT.
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