Lexington, KY (December 7, 1981)

[Gravel Switch]

Telecable was about satellite delivery than OTA. It was possible, they chose not to utilize it. Channel 19 was a challenge with Channel 18 as a local but Channel 41 was quite possible. Before cable a large number of homes had high gain log periodic VHF and high gain UHF antennas atop 40 foot towers. The really blossomed in the late seventies and disappeared by the late eighties.

The cable systems around Lexington, except Winchester, were co-owned. Signals were microwaved from best reception locations within the system. Richmond had Lexington, Cincinnati and Louisville with the later two markets via their network.

Speaking of Richmond, I had friends who lived there in the early 1980s, and WLWT-TV (Cincinnati) was always low-band VHF "mush" on their CATV. It was so bad given the OTA distance involved, not sure why the system carried it.

 

[Gravel Switch]

I wouldn't have thought WCET, but if it could have gotten past WKLE-46 on those lousy radio-dial-like tuners that existed before they started putting detent UHF tuners on sets, it was probably possible with a little doing. I even heard of people being able to get Dayton 2 and 7, but that would have been a real hat trick.

Those antenna towers on people's houses were glorious. I have to imagine that Pieratt's could have done a land-office business if they did antenna installations (don't know if they did or not). I remember their commercials with the Barnstable twins (the Doublemint girls). They were quintessential 1970s. I guess I'm really showing my age there.

Yes, Pieratt's did antenna installations throughout their existence -- even had a truck in the late 1940s equipped with an antenna they could mount on a pole and demonstrate TV at a potential customer's house. Can you imagine how snowy the picture was with that smaller antenna struggling to pull in Louisville and Cincinnati? Of course it was a different time back then when ANY picture, regardless of quality, was awe-inspiring to first-time TV owners.

 

[IM42A]

Speaking of Richmond, I had friends who lived there in the early 1980s, and WLWT-TV (Cincinnati) was always low-band VHF "mush" on their CATV. It was so bad given the OTA distance involved, not sure why the system carried it.

Back in the day, cable signals were often far from perfect. People back then tended to be more forgiving of less-than-stellar reception than in later years, and you can only relay as good a signal as you can get in the first place.

I know that some distant stations suffered from signal degradation over microwave as well. The effect was something like watching TV with wax paper over the screen. I'm assuming that WLWT was a straight catch from Cincinnati, and not relayed in any way.

 

[Gravel Switch]

Back in the day, cable signals were often far from perfect. People back then tended to be more forgiving of less-than-stellar reception than in later years, and you can only relay as good a signal as you can get in the first place.

I know that some distant stations suffered from signal degradation over microwave as well. The effect was something like watching TV with wax paper over the screen. I'm assuming that WLWT was a straight catch from Cincinnati, and not relayed in any way.

Totally agree that CATV viewers, particularly in smaller towns, were much more forgiving of and used to living with long-distance OTA signal degradation. But what I'm referring to was truly unwatchable in the instance of WLWT on the Richmond CATV -- at times it was hard to make out a picture.

 

[IM42A]

Totally agree that CATV viewers, particularly in smaller towns, were much more forgiving of and used to living with long-distance OTA signal degradation. But what I'm referring to was truly unwatchable in the instance of WLWT on the Richmond CATV -- at times it was hard to make out a picture.

I once saw WTRF-7 Wheeling WV on hotel cable in Grantsville MD (Garrett County). The signal had issues. I know one morning it started getting overridden by WHIO from Dayton. Up in those mountains, anything can happen with TV signals.

I also saw WPSD-6 Paducah on cable in Mount Vernon IL, not that far, but it had the "watching TV through wax paper" effect, not sure whether it was OTA or microwave. WTTV on cable in Huntington WV was also sort of muddy, it came via microwave (too far for OTA).

 

[ohdxer]

I remember seeing WDBR-41 Louisville, KY on the tv sets while visiting a family member at the University of Kentucky Hospital in Lexington, Kentucky during the late 1970's and the early 1990's. I also recall that the picture and sound of WDRB-41 was very good.

 

[KD4YQR]

But they did take WGN from the big dish. No regional station from Cincinnati which I'm sure would have had an audience in Lexington, but at least children got to wake up with Bozo.

The franchise agreement between the city of Lexington and Telecable was very restrictive.
It allowed initially, only ONE independent station (Lexington did not have a local independent at that time, 1980).
The franchise agreement can be found, yet today, on the 3rd floor at the Lexington Public Library in a large 3 ring binder.
Originally WDRB Louisville was to be THAT independent. Somewhere along the line, WTBS was the final choice.
WGN and WOR were carried late-night only, Midnight to 5 AM. A year later WGN was added full time and moved to cable channel 36. WOR was allowed clearance from 11PM to 7 AM but was dropped a year later.
No full time carriage of the Cincinnati and Louisville stations was permitted.
I'm a Lexington native and was a Telecable customer from 1980 to 1993.

 

[KD4YQR]

I remember seeing WDBR-41 Louisville, KY on the tv sets while visiting a family member at the University of Kentucky Hospital in Lexington, Kentucky during the late 1970's and the early 1990's. I also recall that the picture and sound of WDRB-41 was very good.

Funny you mentioned that. I was over there last week inspecting sterilizers. I looked up to the roof of the original building, and the MATV array is still there, 8 stories up.
Several cut to channel UHF yagi's and one of them distinctly aimed west.
They don't use that system anymore as Spectrum Cable supplies TV and internet to the entire campus.

 

[IM42A]

The franchise agreement between the city of Lexington and Telecable was very restrictive.
It allowed initially, only ONE independent station (Lexington did not have a local independent at that time, 1980).
The franchise agreement can be found, yet today, on the 3rd floor at the Lexington Public Library in a large 3 ring binder.
Originally WDRB Louisville was to be THAT independent. Somewhere along the line, WTBS was the final choice.
WGN and WOR were carried late-night only, Midnight to 5 AM. A year later WGN was added full time and moved to cable channel 36. WOR was allowed clearance from 11PM to 7 AM but was dropped a year later.
No full time carriage of the Cincinnati and Louisville stations was permitted.
I'm a Lexington native and was a Telecable customer from 1980 to 1993.

Did you have one of those 30-foot towers? If so, what did you get, and how good was the signal quality?

 

[KD4YQR]

Did you have one of those 30-foot towers? If so, what did you get, and how good was the signal quality?

Yes.
I grew up near Southland Dr. off of Nicholasville Rd

We had the 30 ft tower with one of the famous Finco 400 A, "Bedspring" antennas with an "Alliance" rotor box. Two corner reflector "bowtie" antennas for then WLEX and WKYT, about halfway up the tower. Installed by Barney Miller's around 1960.

The Finco was a DX monster and provided excellent reception of the Louisville and Cincinnati VHF's.
Chs 2 and 7 from Dayton were watchable the majority of the time. This was with a black & white TV, of course. Tropo was fun.

We mainly watched the Cincinnati stations as my Dad was a huge Reds fan, so during baseball season our TV stayed on WLWT (5).

It would be safe to say that due to Lexington being a two station market up to 1968, that 8 of every 10 homes had some sort of outdoor antenna set up. Towers. Roof mounts. Chimney mounts. Telescoping masts.

Mainly to get full clearance for CBS programs then.

Our next door neighbor had a less elaborate set up, consisting of the two bowties for Lexington and a simple VHF aimed at Louisville for getting CBS from WHAS. Mounted to their chimney.

 

[KD4YQR]

No. Goes back to Telecable being more about satellite than OTA.

More so due to the restrictions of the Telecable franchise agreement with Lexington.
Kentucky Central Life Insurance, owner of WKYT, fought hard to keep cable TV out of Lexington proper. At the time, when the franchise agreement was written, it banned importing of distant signals, except for one independent, WTBS.

The network preemption replacement channel called "The Network Wildcard Channel" was even the subject of negotiation, since it relied on the Cincinnati and Louisville stations.

 

[IM42A]

Yes.
I grew up near Southland Dr. off of Nicholasville Rd

We had the 30 ft tower with one of the famous Finco 400 A, "Bedspring" antennas with an "Alliance" rotor box. Two corner reflector "bowtie" antennas for then WLEX and WKYT, about halfway up the tower. Installed by Barney Miller's around 1960.

The Finco was a DX monster and provided excellent reception of the Louisville and Cincinnati VHF's.
Chs 2 and 7 from Dayton were watchable the majority of the time. This was with a black & white TV, of course. Tropo was fun.

We mainly watched the Cincinnati stations as my Dad was a huge Reds fan, so during baseball season our TV stayed on WLWT (5).

It would be safe to say that due to Lexington being a two station market up to 1968, that 8 of every 10 homes had some sort of outdoor antenna set up. Towers. Roof mounts. Chimney mounts. Telescoping masts.

Mainly to get full clearance for CBS programs then.

Our next door neighbor had a less elaborate set up, consisting of the two bowties for Lexington and a simple VHF aimed at Louisville for getting CBS from WHAS. Mounted to their chimney.

Ah, yes, Barney Miller's. I imagine between them and Pieratt's, they put up almost all of the towers in Lexington.

I'm assuming that WHAS was more or less the default CBS affiliate for Lexington when WKYT was primarily ABC. Am I correct in assuming that WLEX and WKYT pretty much split out CBS, while being primarily NBC and ABC respectively?

I've heard of Dayton 2 and 7 being available in Lexington at that time, though that would have been kind of a hat trick.

 

[IM42A]

Kentucky Central Life Insurance, owner of WKYT, fought hard to keep cable TV out of Lexington proper. At the time, when the franchise agreement was written, it banned importing of distant signals, except for one independent, WTBS.

Evidently Garvice Kincaid didn't want any sort of competition, besides what he had to accept from WLEX and WTVQ.

WTBS might have been more acceptable, in that it wouldn't bring in advertising from Louisville and Cincinnati, keeping "Lexington eyes on Lexington ads". Nobody's going to hop in their car in Lexington to go to the malls and major retailers in Atlanta.

 

[ftballfan]

Ah, yes, Barney Miller's. I imagine between them and Pieratt's, they put up almost all of the towers in Lexington.

I'm assuming that WHAS was more or less the default CBS affiliate for Lexington when WKYT was primarily ABC. Am I correct in assuming that WLEX and WKYT pretty much split out CBS, while being primarily NBC and ABC respectively?

I've heard of Dayton 2 and 7 being available in Lexington at that time, though that would have been kind of a hat trick.

In the 70s, WHIO had 25-49% share at least once in Mason County, KY (Maysville). Did WCPO and WKYT pre-empt a lot of CBS programs?

 

[IM42A]

In the 70s, WHIO had 25-49% share at least once in Mason County, KY (Maysville). Did WCPO and WKYT pre-empt a lot of CBS programs?

Mason County is about 60 miles NNE of Lexington, and Dayton stations could easily be received in many parts of the county, depending on topography. Without taking the effort to look at the various Television Factbooks, I seem to recall that WHIO was carried on cable there for some time.

Before they went full-time with CBS, WKYT only carried some CBS programs. I don't know what they did after they went full-time with CBS. I don't recall WCPO pre-empting CBS any more than any other station would have at that time. In the 1960s and 1970s, it was common for network affiliates to air a movie at least one night a week, in lieu of network programming.

Before the advent of satellite, just stating the obvious, carrying network affiliates from different markets was the only way you could have much diversity on a cable system. That, coupled with the tendency to pre-empt network offerings more often than today, lent more variety to cable lineups, as well as time-shifting. The networks started cracking down, and now pre-emption for local programming is relatively rare. Fox in particular has a very low tolerance for it.

 

[KD4YQR]

Mason County is about 60 miles NNE of Lexington, and Dayton stations could easily be received in many parts of the county, depending on topography. Without taking the effort to look at the various Television Factbooks, I seem to recall that WHIO was carried on cable there for some time.

Before they went full-time with CBS, WKYT only carried some CBS programs. I don't know what they did after they went full-time with CBS. I don't recall WCPO pre-empting CBS any more than any other station would have at that time. In the 1960s and 1970s, it was common for network affiliates to air a movie at least one night a week, in lieu of network programming.

Before the advent of satellite, just stating the obvious, carrying network affiliates from different markets was the only way you could have much diversity on a cable system. That, coupled with the tendency to pre-empt network offerings more often than today, lent more variety to cable lineups, as well as time-shifting. The networks started cracking down, and now pre-emption for local programming is relatively rare. Fox in particular has a very low tolerance for it.

When Lexington was a 2 station market, WKYT only carried Captain Kangaroo and the mid morning sitcom block ( Beverly Hillbillies ect.) from CBS.

Primetime during the Taft and ABC years was solidly ABC.
WLEX carried some CBS soaps, and cherry-picked the most popular shows at the time (Think Andy Griffith, Gomer Pyle and so on). Full clearance CBS for those of us in Lexington came from Cincinnati or Louisville.

After WKYT returned to CBS under Garvice Kincaid's ownership, he was all about localism.

Preemptions were common on WKYT then.

Kincaid was a business man first and foremost and realized he could make more money selling local ad time. Plus he dumped a bundle into the new studio/transmitter site there on Winchester Rd. that had to be paid for.

WBLG (WTVQ) ran a close second even being the new ABC affiliate.

WLEX seemed to be the least preemption happy of the three.
Those of us that still had our outdoor antennas were greatful for that.
Then I was a kid in elementary school and some of my favorite shows then were on CBS, Lost in Space, Wild, Wild, West, My Favorite Martian none of which had clearance in Lexington.

FWIW, WLEX received CBS OTA from WCPO.
WKYT received ABC OTA from WKRC and CBS from WCPO, during the Taft years. It showed, too. Shoestring budget and operations.

 

[IM42A]

When Lexington was a 2 station market, WKYT only carried Captain Kangaroo and the mid morning sitcom block ( Beverly Hillbillies ect.) from CBS.

Primetime during the Taft and ABC years was solidly ABC.
WLEX carried some CBS soaps, and cherry-picked the most popular shows at the time (Think Andy Griffith, Gomer Pyle and so on). Full clearance CBS for those of us in Lexington came from Cincinnati or Louisville.

After WKYT returned to CBS under Garvice Kincaid's ownership, he was all about localism.

Preemptions were common on WKYT then.

Kincaid was a business man first and foremost and realized he could make more money selling local ad time. Plus he dumped a bundle into the new studio/transmitter site there on Winchester Rd. that had to be paid for.

WBLG (WTVQ) ran a close second even being the new ABC affiliate.

WLEX seemed to be the least preemption happy of the three.
Those of us that still had our outdoor antennas were greatful for that.
Then I was a kid in elementary school and some of my favorite shows then were on CBS, Lost in Space, Wild, Wild, West, My Favorite Martian none of which had clearance in Lexington.

FWIW, WLEX received CBS OTA from WCPO.
WKYT received ABC OTA from WKRC and CBS from WCPO, during the Taft years. It showed, too. Shoestring budget and operations.

I actually visited the WKYT studio (the faux mansion on Winchester Road) in the early 1970s, when I was 11 or 12 years old. My cousin knew someone there and took me one Saturday afternoon. I got to sit at the anchor desk.

Do you know if WLEX got NBC OTA from WLWT (or WAVE?), or did they get a feed straight from the network?

I may be having a false memory, but I think I remember either WKYT accidentally retransmitting the WCPO ID (that "Channel NINE!" jingle), or WBLG doing that with WKRC. I don't remember WKYT as an ABC affiliate.

 

[KD4YQR]

I actually visited the WKYT studio (the faux mansion on Winchester Road) in the early 1970s, when I was 11 or 12 years old. My cousin knew someone there and took me one Saturday afternoon. I got to sit at the anchor desk.

Do you know if WLEX got NBC OTA from WLWT (or WAVE?), or did they get a feed straight from the network?

I may be having a false memory, but I think I remember either WKYT accidentally retransmitting the WCPO ID (that "Channel NINE!" jingle), or WBLG doing that with WKRC. I don't remember WKYT as an ABC affiliate.

I visited the OLD WKYT studios (where the WBUL transmitter site is now, on New Circle Rd NE, by what is now Sam's Club.) when I was around 7 years old. School field trip I believe.

WLEX received NBC from an iffy microwave hop from Carew Tower in downtown Cincinnati to the WLEX transmitter site. It was vacuum tube technology and was unstable at times.

The hop consisted of microwave relay points at Walton, Williamstown and Sadieville. Summer heat thermals would sometimes obliterate the NBC signal and a " Please Stand By" card was displayed.

I don't believe that they ever switched to an OTA NBC back up from either WAVE or WLWT when that occurred.

During the two station era, CBS was delivered OTA for both.

WLEX and WKYT both, would air WCPOs and WKRCs I D cards when the station engineers couldn't react fast enough to cover them. And yes, the channel 9 jingle...

By 1970 I believe all 3 stations were getting network feeds via microwave.

Back then, TV stations usually had a staff of about 15 people. Now most stations employ at least 100 people. My how times have changed.

 

[itsTheRolyPoly]

Off-topic here but.... I miss these retro cable lineup threads on here.

 

[KD4YQR]

Off-topic here but.... I miss these retro cable lineup threads on here.

Sorry about that! I was worried we were straying iff- topic. My apologies.