channel 7 is the
FOX owned-and-operated
Television Station in
Austin, Texas . Its studios are located in downtown Austin at the corner of Tenth and Brazos Streets (a block away from the
Texas State Capitol Building ), and its transmitter is located in the city.
KTBC signed on the air on ,
CBS ,
NBC and the now-defunct
DuMont Network. Due to the fact that the station was owned by the Johnsons, their political and financial clout allowed station programmers to pick and choose from the best programs available on all affiliated networks, and to
Tape Delay others for later rebroadcast without contractual interference or penalty. KTBC was primarily a
CBS affiliate until 1995, with roughly 65% of its programming being carried by the station in its early history.
NBC and
ABC roughly split the remaining coverage in half. When more stations signed on the air in Austin, KTBC lost the NBC affiliation to KHFI (now-
KXAN ) in 1965 first, then finally lost the ABC affiliation to
KVUE in 1971.
The shared affiliation between all three networks had unforeseen benefits with regards to news and events. After Lyndon Johnson became President following the assassination of President
John F. Kennedy in
1963 , the networks established direct feed lines between KTBC and affiliates in
New York ,
Dallas and
Chicago to facilitate news report relaying while the President was either in Austin or at his ranch in
Johnson City . The Johnsons maintained a penthouse apartment on the fifth floor of the station, which was wired for camera and sound equipment, and used on occasion for local programming on occasions when the Johnsons were away.
This multi-network capability was first demonstrated live on
August 1 ,
1966 , following the
UT Tower sniper incident. After
Charles Whitman 's sniper rampage had been stopped, the primary newsman on the scene,
Neal Spelce , presented a concise, complete wrap-up of the event that was carried on all three networks live later that evening. Although the connections were later replaced by satellite uplink technology, the lines were maintained for contingency usage for several years.
The Johnsons sold KTBC to
Times Mirror in
1973 , making it a sister station to
KDFW in
Dallas . They kept the KTBC radio properties, and under FCC guidelines back then, changed calls to KLBJ-
AM -
FM . Times Mirror dropped the direct-feed facility in
1992 as a cost-cutting measure. In
1994 , Times Mirror sold KTBC to Argyle.
In 1994,
New World Communications signed a long-term affiliation deal with Fox, which was establishing itself as a major network and was looking for more VHF stations. In late 1994, most New World-owned stations (except for two) dropped their longtime "Big Three" affiliations and switched to Fox. The year after, New World merged with Argyle, owners of KTBC. As a result, KTBC dropped CBS on
July 1 ,
1995 and switched affiliations to the FOX network, while CBS moved to former Fox affiliate
KEYE (which changed calls from KBVO that same day). As the new Fox affiliate, KTBC was able to continue as Austin's unofficial "home" of the
Dallas Cowboys , since Fox had won the rights to the
National Football Conference a few months earlier. KTBC had carried most Cowboys games since the team's inception in
1960 by virtue of CBS winning television rights to the
NFL in
1956 . For many years, it also carried Cowboys pre-season games, though as of 2006 these have moved to KEYE. FOX7 also carries
Big 12 Conference college sports games in the fall. The station became the first network O&O in the market when New World merged with Fox Television Stations Group in 1996. Distinctively, Austin (along with
Evansville, Indiana ) has the rare distinction of having Fox on VHF and the other "Big Three" affiliations all on the UHF dial.
Currently, KTBC is one of two network-owned stations in the Austin DMA. However, with
CBS -owned
KEYE being divested to
Cerberus Capital Management , KTBC will once again become the only network O&O in the market upon that sale's closing and regulatory approvals.
Albeit KTBC is on channel 7 over-the-air, it airs on cable channel 2 on most cable systems in Austin. This is due to the fact that when the Johnson family established the first cable system in Austin, interference from the strong KTBC broadcast signal overpowered the signal carried on the analog cable channel 7.
In September 2006, KTBC launched ''
MyFoxAustin.com '', a website that is part of a re-imaging campaign currently conducted by Fox owned and operated stations nationwide.
There has been some debate over the years as to whether the Johnsons used their political influence to keep KTBC as Austin's only
VHF TV station. However, according to industry historians it is unlikely that any other
VHF stations would have been allocated to Austin, given its close proximity to
San Antonio . Nonetheless, being the only
VHF station in town enabled channel 7 to gain a tremendous advantage in latter years over KXAN and KVUE, whose signals were usually marginal in some areas of the Hill Country. In the
1970s and
1980s , before
Cable coverage came, many viewers in those areas tuned instead to VHF ABC and NBC outlets in San Antonio or
Waco /
Killeen .
For the first two decades of its existence, KTBC was a leader in children's programming, most notably with the long-running
Uncle Jay Show . Starting in
1953 , host
Jay Hodgson entertained local children each weekday afternoon with the assistance of the "crusty, hunnert-year-old trader" known as
Packer Jack Wallace, and both were later joined by
Francis "Piper" Dyer in 1961 as the show's organist. The show also featured an on-screen studio audience of local children, ranging from 30 to 50 in number depending on the set design at the time.
The
Uncle Jay Show featured the typical fare of cartoons, including many of the classic
Warner Brothers cartoons as distributed by
Associated Artists Productions or AAP. During 1965, the show also hosted the
King Features Syndicate series of cartoon shorts featuring
Beetle Bailey ,
Snuffy Smith and
Krazy Kat , and in
1967 expanded to an hour-long show to facilitate airing of
Gerry Anderson 's
Supercar , which had just been syndicated to US markets. Both Hodgson and Wallace provided humor in the form of skits and jokes, as well as minor educational material such as guest appearances by local naturalists, botanists and even movie stars and sports figures. Children in the audience were called on to participate in games, and received prizes for successful participation. Among the show's primary sponsors whose products were promoted live on-air by either Hodgson or Wallace, were the legendary Villa Capri restaurant, local shoe emporium Kara-Vel Shoes, Mrs. Johnson's Bakery, and Superior Dairies products. The latter of these was promoted by Wallace in a very fondly remembered commercial where Wallace extols the benefits of authentic wild west cooking out on the range, where the deer and the antelope play, and the secret ingredient being Superior Dairies Chocolate Milk.
Hodgson, who was the voice of KTBC from the station's original broadcast, was with the show throughout its run. Wallace, a local morning air personality who appeared with
Richard "Cactus" Pryor as part of the ''Cack and Jack Morning Show'' on
KTBC-AM during the 60's and 70's, co-hosted the show with Hodgson until Wallace's death from cardiopulminary failure in late
1973 , while Dyer left the show the following year to pursue other interests. Hodgson continued the show as solo host until the show's cancellation in the fall of 1977. By then, the decline in the live children's show was in full effect, and the show was moved from a weekly afternoon schedule to a Saturday morning time slot in the fall of 1975. Dropping all cartoon programming, the show concentrated more on local informational and educational issues that would be of interest to children. Gone also was the "live" element of the show; while groups of children were still part of the on-screen, shows were taped during the week for later broadcast on Saturdays. By the fall of 1977 ratings had dropped to the point where it was decided to put the show to rest once and for all.
Hodgson continued to work for KTBC as a public affairs journalist after
The Uncle Jay Show was cancelled, appearing in such shows as ''The Eyes of Central Texas'', and ''This Is Central Texas''. The latter was his final show, and was retired after Hodgson himself retired in 1991. The final episode was an hour-long tribute to the long-time host, with testimonials by many of Austin's media personalities, including former KTBC and then-current
KVUE news anchor
Dick Ellis , who'd barely made it to the show on time and appeared dressed in
Hunting gear, having only heard about the show a few hours earlier while on a
Dove hunting trip. Hodgson passed away in May 2007.
In the early years as a Fox station, rather than carry Fox Kids programming, of which
KVC would air instead, KTBC filled the daytime lineup with more talk shows and the nighttime lineup with off-network sitcoms such as
The Simpsons ,
Seinfeld and
King Of The Hill . However as of late, the station's daytime lineup leaned away from talk show format and added more courtroom dramas such as
Judge Judy ,
Judge Joe Brown , and the syndicated Fox produced shows notably such as
Judge Alex and
Divorce Court .
KVC 13 (officially K13VC) was an independent low-powered television station co-owned alongside KTBC which was on the air until March of 2003. Like most independents, KVC ran sitcoms, dramas, cartoons and several shows shared with KTBC. Upon KTBC's network switch to Fox,
Fox Kids , which originally aired on then-KBVO, did not air on KTBC (like most New World stations then), with the exception of the Saturday morning lineup that aired in simulcast on KVC and KTBC. (KTBC would later drop the Fox Kids Saturday lineup in 1997.) KVC aired the block on weekdays and Saturdays until Fox ended the weekday lineup in 2002. When KVC became a UPN affiliate, it also picked up the
UPN Kids lineup which later rebranded to Disney's One Too. (At the present,
4Kids TV does not air at all in Austin.)
KVC inherited the UPN affiliation from
LIN TV 's
Hill Country Paramount Network in 1998. That move saw the loss of UPN coverage in much of Central Texas outside the immediate Austin area for a short time because KVC was a ''low-powered'' station that could be barely picked up by antenna or not at all in those regional parts. But UPN saw increased viewership by way of Austin area cable systems. The station continued to air UPN programming until August of 2000, when new Fredericksburg station
KCWX (then KBEJ) went on the air on channel 2. KVC remained on the air as an independent station, showing typical independent programming as well as
University Of Texas sports and other college sporting events.
KVC was forced off the air on March 29, 2003
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KAKW-DT , the digital signal of a
Univision affiliate in
Killeen (also serving Austin).
The is a 1,258 foot (383.7 m) high guyed mast for
Television transmission in Austin. It is currently the tallest tower on the area commonly referred to as Mount Bonnell, although the tower itself stands on Mount Larson, and is the only tower on that particular mount. The site is also distinguished by the largest private commercial satellite dish in
Travis County , and was erected in
1972 in order to receive satellite feeds from
CBS .
In the days as a CBS affiliate, KTBC had the highest ranking newscast in Austin consistently for years, backed up by the network's programming. Now as a Fox station, it has suffered a minor setback of rotating between third and fourth place with KEYE since the mid-1990's after the "Big Switch," even ranking behind UHF stations KXAN (at #1) and KVUE (at #2).
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Even after KTBC joined the Fox network, it continued its 10 p.m. newscast, with the 9 p.m. hour time slot filled by
Syndicated programming, unusual for that network's affiliates. This changed in
2000 when the station launched a 9 p.m. newscast which is Austin's first primetime newscast; channel 7 then discontinued the 10 p.m. news.
KTBC's newscasts have been renamed to ''FOX7 News Edge'' since 2006. The ''News Edge'' brand is a reference to sister station
WTVT in
Tampa when that station was the first to overhaul its look to a
Fox News Channel influenced theme, with more network-owned stations picking up on it months later.
KTBC is one of seven Fox O&Os with a 5 p.m. newscast, but no 6 p.m. newscast (along with
WTTG in
Washington, D.C. ,
WHBQ in
Memphis ,
KSTU in
Salt Lake City ,
WFXT in
Boston ,
WTXF in
Philadelphia and
WOFL in
Orlando ). Only was that way since 2000 when the 6 p.m. newscast was discontinued for expansion of the 5 p.m. newscast to a full hour.
- , "FOX 7 News in the Morning" Anchor/Noon Anchor/Reporter
- , Weekday Evening Anchor/Reporter
- , Weekend Evening Anchor/Reporter
- , "FOX 7 News in the Morning" Anchor (5-9AM)/Reporter
- , Weekend Eveing Anchor/Reporter
- , Weekday Evening Anchor/Reporter
- , General Assignment Reporter
- , "7 On Your Side" Investigative Reporter
- , City Hall Reporter
- , General Assignment Reporter
- , General Assignment Reporter
- , Political Reporter
- , Chief Meteorologist
- : Weekday Morning Meteorologist
- : Weekend Meteorologist
- , Sports Director/Weeknight Sports Anchor
- , Weekend Sports Anchor
- , Sports Reporter
-
- (deceased)
- (apparently dissatisfied with the affiliation switch, left for upstart KEYE )http://www.austintvnews.com/forum
- (deceased)
- (now at WTVR in Richmond, Virginia )
- (now does weather for Austin's Clear Channel Radio cluster)
- , Sports Anchor
- , Meteorologist (now at WOAI-TV in San Antonio)
- reporter, (now at KCNC in Denver)
- , anchor and host of "Central Texas"
- ''Channel 7 News'' (used when they were a CBS affiliate, and for their first two years with Fox)
- ''FOX7 News'' (1997-2006)
- ''FOX7 News Edge'' (2006-present)
- ''Just You Watch'' (2006-present)
:
