Trinity Broadcasting Network - History

History

The Trinity Broadcasting Network was co-founded by Paul Crouch, Jan Crouch, Jim Bakker and Tammy Faye Bakker in 1973 as Trinity Broadcasting Systems; the Bakkers would leave by 1975 to start their own ministry, The PTL Club. TBN began national distribution through cable systems in 1978. The network was a member of the National Religious Broadcasters association until 1990.

The Crouches began their broadcasting activities by renting time on KBSA (now KFTR-DT) in Ontario, California. After that station was sold, he began buying two hours a day on KLXA-TV in Fontana, California in early 1974. That station was put up for sale shortly after. Paul Crouch then put in a bid to buy it for a million dollars and raised $100,000 for a down payment. After many struggles, the Crouches managed to raise the down payment and took over the station outright, with the station becoming KTBN-TV in 1977 and its city of license changed to TBN's original home base, Santa Ana, in 1983. Initially, the station ran Christian programs about six hours a day. They continued to expand to 12 hours a day by 1975 and began selling time to outside Christian organizations to supplement their local programming, with the station instituting a 24-hour schedule in 1978.

The fledgling network was so weak in its first days, that, according to Crouch in his autobiography, Hello World!, it almost went bankrupt after just two days on the air. TBN, then known as the Trinity Broadcasting Systems, spread from UHF stations to cable outlets and then to satellite distribution. Over the years, TBN has been purchasing independent television stations to gain cable carriage, due to FCC must-carry rules. As a result, TBN is available to 95% of American households, as of early 2005.