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KYW-TV
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KYW-TV channel 3 is the CBS owned and operated station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. KYW-TV shares a studio facility with its sister CW station WPSG (channel 57) just north of Center City Philadelphia and its transmitter is located in the Roxborough section of Philadelphia.
channel 3 facility in Philadelphia is one of the world's oldest television stations. It began in 1932 as W3XE, an experimental station owned by the Philco Corporation, a local company known for manufacturing early radio and television sets.
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Encyclopedia
KYW-TV channel 3 is the CBS owned and operated station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. KYW-TV shares a studio facility with its sister CW station WPSG (channel 57) just north of Center City Philadelphia and its transmitter is located in the Roxborough section of Philadelphia.
History
As WPTZ-TV
The channel 3 facility in Philadelphia is one of the world's oldest television stations. It began in 1932 as W3XE, an experimental station owned by the Philco Corporation, a local company known for manufacturing early radio and television sets. Philco engineers created much of the station's equipment, including cameras. In 1941, it began sharing programs with W2XBS (later WNBT and now WNBC-TV) in New York City, becoming NBC's second television affiliate, and creating a link between the station and the network that would last for 54 years.
On July 1, 1941, W3XE received a commercial license -- the third in the United States, and the first outside New York City -- as WPTZ-TV. The station signed on for the first time on September 1. The station originally broadcast from a tower in the Philadelphia suburb of Wyndmoor. It significantly cut back operations after the U.S. entered World War II, but returned to a full schedule 1945. It then became one of three stations (along with WNBT and WRGB in Schenectady, New York) that premiered NBC's regular television service in 1946. The Westinghouse Electric Corporation, owner of Philadelphia's NBC radio affiliate KYW (1060 AM), purchased WPTZ-TV in 1952.
As an NBC-owned station
In late 1955, Westinghouse traded WPTZ-TV and KYW radio to NBC in exchange for Cleveland's WNBK television and WTAM-AM-FM. NBC had long sought an owned-and-operated station in Philadelphia, the largest market where it didn't own a station. It had made several offers over the years for the Philadelphia stations, but Westinghouse said no each time. After being rebuffed by Westinghouse on several occasions, NBC threatened to drop its affiliation from WPTZ-TV and Westinghouse's other NBC television affiliate, WBZ-TV in Boston, unless Westinghouse agreed to the trade. According to many sources, another factor in NBC's changed attitude was Westinghouse's decision to affiliate recently-purchased KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh with CBS, even though KDKA radio had been an NBC affiliate for over 30 years. When NBC took over in February 1956, channel 3's call letters were changed to WRCV-TV (for the RCA-Victor record label; KYW radio adopted the WRCV calls as well). The WPTZ calls are now in use for an NBC affiliate in Plattsburgh, New York.
Shortly after NBC took control of channel 3, the Federal Communications Commission collapsed the Lehigh Valley, most of northern Delaware, and most of southern New Jersey (including Atlantic City) into the Philadelphia market. NBC realized WRCV-TV's existing tower was inadequate for this enlarged market. In 1957, channel 3 moved to a new 1100-foot tower in Roxborough. The tower was co-owned with WFIL-TV (channel 6, now WPVI-TV) and added much of Delaware, the Lehigh Valley and southern New Jersey to the station's city-grade coverage. Along with the transmitter move, NBC upgraded channel 3 from black-and-white to color transmissions.
However, almost immediately after the trade was finalized, Westinghouse complained to the FCC and the United States Department of Justice about NBC's extortion. After a thorough investigation and a protracted legal battle lasting nine years, the FCC ordered the swap reversed and didn't allow NBC to realize any profit on the deal. Westinghouse had moved the KYW call letters to Cleveland after the swap, and upon regaining control of WRCV-AM-TV on June 19, 1965, channel 3 became KYW-TV. Group W as Westinghouse's broadcasting division was known by this time, took over a transmitter facility far superior to the one it relinquished in 1956. To this day, KYW-TV insists that it "moved" to Cleveland in 1956 and "returned" to Philadelphia in 1965 -- in fact, some staffers who worked at KYW-TV in Cleveland (talk show host Mike Douglas and news anchor Tom Snyder among them) moved to Philadelphia along with the call letters. The Cleveland station that formerly had the KYW calls is now WKYC-TV.
As KYW-TV
Despite its status as NBC's largest affiliate, KYW-TV spent much of the next thirty years pre-empting many NBC programs, choosing to air local or syndicated programming instead. The production arm of Westinghouse Broadcasting was partially responsible for the pre-emptions, as channel 3 aired shows produced and syndicated by Group W, such as The Mike Douglas Show, The David Frost Show and Hour Magazine. Pre-empted network programming was usually lower-rated daytime game shows, soap operas or reruns of primetime programs with an average of two hours per day. At one point, in the fall of 1980, KYW-TV preempted NBC's entire morning schedule after the Today Show. Over the years, NBC contracted independent stations WPHL-TV, WTAF-TV/WTXF-TV, WKBS-TV and WGTW-TV to air programs pre-empted by channel 3. NBC has been far less tolerant of pre-emptions than the other networks and was rather perturbed at losing valuable advertising in the nation's fourth-largest market.
Like most affiliates that pre-empt poorer performing network programs, KYW-TV used the pre-emptions in order to gain an increase in local advertising rates which potentially come with ratings increases. This proved to be a very profitable decision at first, as KYW-TV was either first or second in the Philadelphia television ratings for most of the 1960s and 1970s. However, the station (and NBC) faltered in the late 1970s, and by 1980 KYW-TV was the lowest-rated network affiliate in Philadelphia. By 1985, NBC had recovered, but channel 3 hadn't. For the rest of its NBC affiliation, KYW-TV was NBC's lowest-rated major-market affiliate during a very successful period for the network as a whole. It continued to heavily pre-empt NBC programming, much to NBC's chagrin.
In 1994, sister station WJZ-TV in Baltimore lost its affiliation with ABC after that network announced a deal with the E.W. Scripps Company to switch all but two of Scripps' television stations to ABC. One of the Scripps-owned stations joining ABC was Baltimore's NBC affiliate, WMAR-TV. This did not sit well with Westinghouse, who felt betrayed by ABC after nearly half a century of loyalty. As a safeguard, Group W began shopping for affiliation deals of their own. Group W eventually struck an agreement to switch KYW-TV, WBZ-TV, and WJZ-TV to CBS (Westinghouse's two other stations, Pittsburgh's KDKA-TV and San Francisco's KPIX-TV, were already CBS affiliates). CBS was initially skeptical about including KYW-TV in the deal. While KYW-TV was a poor third, CBS' longtime O&O in Philadelphia, WCAU-TV, was a solid runner-up to dominant WPVI-TV. However, after Westinghouse offered to sell CBS a minority stake in KYW-TV, CBS agreed to move its affiliation to channel 3.
As a CBS-owned station
On September 10, 1995, KYW-TV and WCAU-TV swapped network affiliations, part of a more complex affiliation/ownership deal involving NBC, CBS and Westinghouse. Group W and CBS formed a joint venture which assumed ownership of channel 3, with Group W retaining majority interest. NBC then traded its stations in Denver and Salt Lake City to the Group W/CBS partnership in return for WCAU. Group W/CBS and NBC also traded broadcasting facilities in Miami to compensate each other for the loss of stations. While channel 3's Group W stablemates had aligned with CBS in January, the switch had been delayed in Philadelphia after NBC discovered it couldn't buy WCAU outright without going over the FCC's ownership limit of the time.
Under the terms of Westinghouse's deal with CBS, KYW-TV began carrying the entire CBS schedule in pattern with no pre-emptions except for local news emergencies. Westinghouse bought CBS in early 1996, making KYW-TV a CBS owned-and-operated station.
In 2000, the combined company was purchased by Viacom. The Viacom deal brought KYW-TV under common ownership with Philadelphia's UPN station, WPSG, and that station moved into the KYW-AM-TV facility on Independence Mall. On January 1, 2003, KYW-TV went into compliance with the CBS Mandate and officially rebranded itself as CBS 3. When Viacom spun off CBS Corporation in 2006, KYW-AM-TV and WPSG, along with the rest of Viacom's broadcasting interests, became a part of the new company.
Digital television
After the analog television shutdown and digital conversion, which is tentatively scheduled to take place on June 12, 2009 , KYW-TV will continue digital broadcasts on its current pre-transition channel number, 26.
Office locations
On April 2, 2007, KYW-TV and WPSG moved to a new broadcast complex located at 1555 Hamilton Street near Center City Philadelphia, across from the Community College of Philadelphia and near Fairmount Park. The new building, which is wired for high definition newscasts, was the fourth studio in the station's 75-year history. Channel 3 had been broadcasting from Independence Mall East since July 1972.
When the station began operations as W3XE in 1932, it was based within Philco's production plant, at C and East Tioga streets in North Philadelphia, complete with a small studio and transmitter. After receiving the commercial license from the FCC in 1941, Philco moved WPTZ-TV's studios to the penthouse suite of the Architect's Building, at Sansom and North 17th streets in downtown Philadelphia, while retaining master control facilities at the Philco plant.
Channel 3 relocated its entire operation to the Wyndmoor transmitter facility during World War II, when the station aired little programming. When full broadcasting was resumed, the station reactivated its studio in the Architect's Building, remaining there until 1950, when WPTZ-TV moved into unused space at 1619 Walnut Street in Center City, where KYW radio was housed. What is now KYW-TV has been based in Center City ever since.
The Mike Douglas Show, which moved from Cleveland to Philadelphia in 1965, was taped at the Walnut Street studio until 1972, then moved to Independence Mall East until production of that show was moved to Los Angeles in 1978.
Logos
From 1965 to 2003, KYW-TV's logo was a distinct "Stylized 3" in the font made famous by Group W. KYW-TV first introduced the logo in 1963, when the station was based in Cleveland. It was the longest continuously-used logo in Philadelphia television history until 2006, when WPVI-TV's simple "6" logo passed it. The only major change came in February 1998, when the CBS Eye was placed in front of the "3". The logo was finally retired after KYW-TV rebranded itself as CBS 3.
News operation
Shortly after Westinghouse regained control of KYW-TV in 1965, news director Al Primo popularized the Eyewitness News format and branding. This format has the reporters actually presenting their stories instead of having an anchor read them. Primo used the cue "007" from the film From Russia with Love as the theme. Within a few years, Group W's other television stations had adopted the format. Around this same time, sister station KYW radio became one of the first all-news radio stations in the country.
Channel 3's newscasts, anchored by Vince Leonard starting in 1958 (during its stint as NBC-owned WRCV-TV), had long been second behind WCAU-TV, but the new format catapulted KYW-TV to first place. Also seen on the air during that time were future talk show host Tom Snyder and Marciarose Shestack. Primo took the concept with him to WABC-TV in New York in 1968, albeit an improved version which introduced the concept of chatter among the anchors ("happy talk"). It was this modified format that was emulated throughout the United States.
Channel 3 dominated the ratings for the rest of the 1960s, but faced a new challenger after WFIL-TV introduced Action News to Philadelphia. For most of the 1970s, KYW-TV traded first place with WFIL/WPVI. In 1972, KYW-TV hired Philadelphia-area native Jessica Savitch as a reporter, and later co-anchor alongside Leonard. Mort Crim also joined as an anchor during that period, forming what native Philadelphians called the "Camelot of television news." However, in 1977, WPVI beat KYW-TV in most timeslots by a wide margin during a sweeps period. In a case of especially bad timing, Savitch left for NBC News later that year. Crim left for WDIV in Detroit in 1978. Channel 3's ratings went into rapid decline. The station tried to stop the decline by adopting a new format called "Direct Connection", with reporters assigned to "beats" such as medical, consumer, entertainment, and gossip, among others. It didn't work, and by the time Leonard left for KPNX in Phoenix in 1980, Eyewitness News had crashed into last place. For most of the next 20 years, KYW-TV was a very distant third behind WPVI-TV and WCAU-TV. Despite the presence of personalities such as Maria Shriver and Maury Povich (who anchored briefly in the early 1980s), Eyewitness News stayed in the ratings basement.
In 1991, KYW-TV rebranded itself as KYW 3 after being known on-air as simply "channel 3" for most of its history (except for the "Direct Connection" era, when it was known as "3 for All"). It also abandoned the longstanding Eyewitness News name after 26 years and experimented with giving each newscast a different name. The morning and noon news became "Newsday," the 6 p.m. news "Newsbeat," and the 11 p.m. news "The News Tonight." It also started using a theme based on the musical signature of its radio sister, one of the top all-news stations in the country and the highest-rated radio station in Philadelphia for most of the last 40 years. Group W hoped to gain the trust of viewers who already associated KYW radio with high-quality news. However, neither of these fixes worked, and channel 3 stayed in the ratings basement. The experiment with different newscast names ended in 1994, just before it became a CBS station, when the station began calling its news operation "News 3". The Eyewitness News name was restored in early 1998.
KYW-TV used music packages based on KYW radio's musical signature until 2003. That year it adopted "News in Focus", by composer John Hegner as its theme song. This package, like the majority of themes for CBS' owned and operated stations, is based on "Channel 2 News," written in 1975 for WBBM-TV in Chicago. Channel 3 used an updated version written in 2003 for sister station WCBS-TV in New York. The change to "News In Focus" came just after KYW began calling itself CBS 3. Ironically, WCAU-TV used music based on this theme for its last decade as a CBS-owned station. In 2005, KYW-TV ditched "News In Focus" in favor of another "Channel 2 News"-based tune, "The Enforcer" by Frank Gari.
Also in 2003, KYW-TV became a factor in the Philadelphia news race for the first time in over 20 years. The previous summer, it persuaded WPVI-TV's longtime 5 p.m. anchor, Marc Howard, to jump ship to anchor its 11 p.m. news. Kathy Orr, weekend weathercaster at WCAU, also moved to channel 3. In September 2003 the station added Larry Mendte (from WCAU) and Alycia Lane (from WTVJ in Miami), and they became the station's new top anchor team, anchoring the 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. news. The 5 p.m. news was moved to 4 p.m., anchored by Marc Howard and Denise Saunders. The change proved successful, and for the last two years KYW-TV has waged a spirited battle with WCAU for second place behind longtime leader WPVI. Saunders left the station in 2004 and was replaced by Lane until January 16, 2006, when Lane in turn was replaced by Angela Russell. Russell left the station on December 26, 2008.
In 2005, it introduced a customized graphics package created by Emmy Award winner Randy Pyburn of Pyburn Films. Interestingly, the Pyburn graphics package is quite similar to the one it created for WNBC-TV in 2003, which some of NBC's owned and operated stations are currently standardizing around.
KYW-TV cooperates with sister station WCBS-TV in the production and broadcast of statewide New Jersey political debates. When the two stations broadcast a statewide office debate, such as Governor or U. S. Senate, they will pool resources and have anchors or reporters from both stations participate in the debate. Additionally, the two stations cooperate in the gathering of news in New Jersey where their markets overlap; sharing reporters, live trucks, and helicopters. Like other CBS-owned stations, KYW-TV offers a web only newscast called "CBS 3 At Your Desk", shown daily.
In April 2007, KYW-TV began broadcasting its newscasts in High-definition, becoming the third Philadelphia television station to do so. The switch coincided with the station's move from its former Independence Mall studios to its new facility on Hamilton Street.
On February 2, 2009, CBS 3 Eyewitness News began broadcasting a 10pm newscast on their sister station, the CW Philly. This newscast is broadcast in High Definition like all CBS 3 newscasts.
Newscast titles
- (Channel 3/KYW 3/CBS 3) Eyewitness News - (1965 - 1991, 1998 - present)
- Newsday - (1991 - 1994, Morning and Noon News)
- Newsbeat - (1991 - 1994, 6 P.M. News)
- The News Tonight - (1991 - 1994, 11 P.M. News)
- The News Saturday - (1991 - 1994, Saturday News)
- The News Sunday - (1991 - 1994, Sunday News)
- News 3 - (1994 - 1998)
Current personalities
Anchors
Weather
- Carol Erickson - Saturday evenings and Sunday mornings
- Doug Kammerer - weeknights 10 PM (on CW Philly) and Sunday evenings
- Maria LaRosa - weekday mornings & Noon
- Kathy Orr - chief meteorologist/weeknights
Sports
Reporters
Notable alumni
Controversy
In June 2008, former 6 & 11pm news anchor Larry Mendte was fired after police raided his home and seized his computers. He was accused of secretly reading thousands of emails of fellow co-anchor Alycia Lane, from March 2006 to May 2008, and passing them on to gossip columnists. Mendte claimed that his actions were rooted in a feud that ended what was according to him a "flirtatious and improper" relationship with Lane. Mendte pleaded guilty. In September 2008, Lane filed a lawsuit against Mendte and KYW-TV. She accused the station of defaming her before and after she was fired; she was fired after being arrested in December 2007 following a scuffle with New York police.
Cable, Telephone Company & Satellite Carriage
Outside of the Philadelphia market in central New Jersey, KYW is carried in southern Middlesex County on Comcast Digital Cable channel 256 in the municipalities of Plainsboro, South Brunswick, Monroe, Cranbury, Jamesburg, Helmetta, Spotswood and East Brunswick. Up until the early 1990s when KYW was an NBC affiliate, it used to be carried on Cable Channel 3 until WNBC was not happy with southern Middlesex County having a secondary NBC affiliate. Verizon FioS carries KYW in South Brunswick Township, Middlesex County and it is the only Philadelphia station carried.
All of Ocean County carries KYW on Comcast and Cablevision outlets.
Currently, DirecTV and DishNetwork do not carry any Philadelphia stations out of the Philadelphia market in New Jersey.
External links
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