They preempted that for this?

Network affiliates, of course, sometimes refuse to carry the network offering in a particular time slot. Sometimes this is done in the case of a particularly low-rated show that is bumped by syndicated programming that management feels will garner a better rating. And sometimes it's done just on a one-shot basis because of some local telethon or other special event, or a paid special (like a Billy Graham crusade).But I'm not asking about those understandable pre-emptions. Can you think of a case where a local has bumped a decently-rated network program on a regular basis in favor of something that just didn't seem to make much sense?

Re: Most Inexplicable Network Program Pre-Emption

WSYR-TV3 In Syracuse (now WSTM) did not carry Saturday Night Live for the first year and a half. Syracuse viewers lost out on the Chevy Chase era -- at least, the LIVE Chevy Chase era. I got to watch it when I babysat for neighbors -- who had cable ( a real rarity in metro areas in 1975), and I watched it on WKTV ch. 2 in Utica. At the age of 15, watching what seemed to be the remotest program on network TV - late Saturday nights -- it seemed like an odd program -- even weird at times. Plus, I watched it on a console B & W TV -- then when I would be at home on Saturday nights' I'd try desparately to watch it on my little Panasonic portable on rabbit ears, but all I could get was a snowy picture. WSYR used to say they preempted it for "morality" reasons. I wonder if there was an "off the record" reason -- if they thought they could make more money with their own local movie?...But I remember watching the MASH movie in that time slot one night, before channel 3 cleared SNL, and I distinctly rememebr seeing two -- count 'em, *two* ten second commercials in the whole movie. That's it. Even then, I knew -- that's not a whole lotta commercials. So money must not have been the reason -- maybe they really were worried their viewers would be offended by the bassomatic and the dead string quartet.

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WTNH New Haven, CT occasionally preempts primetime ABC programming with "Cheers". Why? I don't know...

Re: Most Inexplicable Network Program Pre-Emption

My vote would go to the late 70's interruption (I think it was in '78) of the heavily, heavily promoted premiere ofBattlestar Galactica on ABC. Attempting to catch the coat tails of the Star Wars phenomenon, they promoted theheck out of this show for weeks, and all of us sci-fi geeks could not wait to see it. About halfway through the premiere episode they interrupted to go to a live feed from the White House, where Jimmy Carter was annoucing a breakthrough in the Camp David Accords. Basically just a lot of platitudes, and shots of him shaking hands with Begin and Sadat.I'm all for peace, but a much shorter announcement would have sufficed!It unfortunately did not result in "peace in our time"......and I did not get to see how the premiere episode endeduntil many years later.

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oldschooler1 said:

WSYR-TV3 In Syracuse (now WSTM) did not carry Saturday Night Live for the first year and a half. Syracuse viewers lost out on the Chevy Chase era -- at least, the LIVE Chevy Chase era. WSYR used to say they preempted it for "morality" reasons.

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I recently read a great book about the early SNL era, and there were quite a few stations that refused to carry the show because of its envelope-pushing edgy humor. But I think most of them were in the South and Midwest -- traditionally areas that are a little more "uptight" about such things. It kind of surprises me that a Syracuse affiliate would pre-empt it for "moral" reasons, unless maybe the station manager at the time had a personal problem with the show?

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FreddyE1977 said:

About halfway through the premiere episode they interrupted to go to a live feed from the White House, where Jimmy Carter was annoucing a breakthrough in the Camp David Accords. Basically just a lot of platitudes, and shots of him shaking hands with Begin and Sadat.

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Of course, that was a breaking news event, and it was the network that interrupted. Again, I was asking about local affiliates regularly pre-empting a decently-rated network show for the sake of showing something else that the average viewer would think quite inferior to the network offering.

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Here are some examples involving several CBS affiliates in Illinois in Missouri:WMBD-TV in Peoria pre-empted most, if not all, of the "The Incredible Hulk"'s first short season (the show premiered in March of '78). They aired "Rich Man, Poor Man" in its place, and I believe they also aired "The Streets of San Francisco" in the slot for awhile. Sister station WCIA-TV in Springfield also did the same thing...not sure if their replacement programming was identical to that of WMBD. I believe both stations began clearing "Hulk" either later in the summer, or maybe at the start of the second season in the fall.WHBF-TV in Rock Island also blew out a season or so of "The Incredible Hulk," although the station carried the series initially. WHBF substituted "Hee Haw" Fridays at 7PM. WHBF did resume airing "Hulk" before its cancellation.KRCG-TV in Jefferson City pre-empted the first CBS season of "Wonder Woman," and like WHBF, substituted "Hee Haw" in its place. Midway or so through the season, "Wonder Woman" was picked up by local NBC affiliate, KOMU-TV. KOMU aired the show Saturdays at 6PM, but on a one-week delay (CBS aired the show Fridays at 7). KOMU probably did not have a direct link to CBS and maybe the network sent them a tape of the show. KRCG picked up "Wonder Woman" in its second CBS season, but then aired "Hee Haw" Saturdays at 7, blowing out "The Bob Newhart Show" and another CBS sitcom. KOMU also aired the pre-empted CBS shows, delayed till the next Saturday at 6PM.For a period of time in 1978, KHQA-TV in Quincy apparently decided to use the Monday 7PM slot for paid religious programming. KHQA used this hour for such paid shows as Billy Graham crusades, World Vision specials, and other similar shows. CBS was airing "Good Times" and "Baby, I'm Back" at this time. It should be noted that KHQA usually tape-delayed "Good Times" to Tuesday at 6:30 and "Baby, I'm Back" to Wednesday at 6:30, so it wasn't a complete pre-emption, just not a "live" clearance. I believe this went on for the entire duration of "Baby, I'm Back," which aired 12 or 13 episodes. If CBS aired a special program in the timeslot, KHQA usually went ahead and cleared it.

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davect said:

WTNH New Haven, CT occasionally preempts primetime ABC programming with "Cheers". Why? I don't know...

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Or sister station WCTX-TV (UPN...MY) channel 59 of New Haven will run an episode of "The Drew Carey Show".Speaking of "Cheers", George Wendt appeared on Conan O'Brien's first Chicago special last night. Boy does he look terrible.

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Re the pre-emptions of "Saturday Night Live" in the early days,WFBC (now WYFF) Greenville, SC, pre-empted for movies forabout two years, while WRCB Chattanooga pre-empted for(are you ready?) "The 700 Club"!One pre-emption which might have been necessary but angeredviewers in Greensboro/Winston-Salem/High Point happened onKentucky Derby day a couple of years ago. That afternoon,a tornado touched down in Asheboro, NC and did some damageto a shopping center. This was about 2:30, with NBC's Derbycoverage scheduled to start at 5. There were tornado watchesand warnings through the southern part of the market, but by5 PM, there was little or nothing new to report. WFMY (CBS)and WGHP (Fox) stayed on the air, however, and so did WXII (NBC)--rightthrough the Derby. WXII did show the race on tape about 7:45that evening, but most people felt the station could have shownthe race live and run crawls at the bottom of the screen updatingthe weather conditions.

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What about KYW-TV 3 from 1965 until 1995 when they was an NBC station, they pre-empted a lot of NBC daytime programs including the game shows and some low rated prime-time NBC shows to run local programming

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Julius May said:

What about KYW-TV 3 from 1965 until 1995 when they was an NBC station, they pre-empted a lot of NBC daytime programs including the game shows and some low rated prime-time NBC shows to run local programming

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Many NBC game shows were hard to find in Philadelphia, that's for sure. But KYW deserves significant credit for "The Bulletin," a great local newsmagazine that primarily bumped "Unsolved Mysteries" to the weekends. Proving that prime time can be a good place for local programming that matters, it was a well-done show that died prematurely once CBS got its hands on KYW.

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During the '60's and the '70's, WBRC in Birmingham pre-empted numerous ABC prime-time programs. During the '60's, "Bewitched" was delayed so that Channel 6 could show reruns of "The Rifleman". During the '70's, "Three's Company" and "Soap" were delayed from Tuesday until the following Monday night after "Monday Night Football" in order to air reruns of "Gunsmoke".From the time it became an exclusive NBC affiliate in 1970 until 1995, crosstown rival WAPI, later WVTM, delayed the Tonight Show from 10:30 until 11:30 in order to show off network reruns of such shows as "The Streets of San Francisco", "M*A*S*H", "Carol Burnett and Friends", "The Jeffersons", "Taxi", and "All in the Family". Channel 13 was another station that did not clear the early days of "Saturday Night Live", and it was some two to three years after its debut before they carried "Late Night with David Letterman".

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Speaking of "Saturday Night Live", while living in Great Barrington, MA (1977-1979), local NBC affiliate WRGB (Channel 6, Schenectady, NY) pre-empted SNL until late 1978 (or early '79), for a "Late Movie". This was a major surprise for me because, here was a major charter NBC affiliate and it was not running a very HOT show. Fortunately, we also had WWLP/22 in Springfield, MA who was running SNL. WRGB relented and started running SNL in the winter of '78.I always wondered why did 'RGB not run SNL.

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Same thing in Pittsburgh....the first few seasons of SNL did not run on the local affiliate,WIIC (later WPXI). You could pick it up from Steubenville or Johnstown, and eventually WPGH 53 (now Fox) started to carry it. Main reason was the long-standing popularityof the Chiller Theatre horror movie that had run in this time slot for 20 yrs. prior. Therewas some rumbling that Pittsburgh in 1975 was not ready for the Not Ready for PrimeTime Players (....though obviously Steubenville was!)

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Also WPVI-TV 6 didn't air some ABC shows in the daytime for years to air local programs like AM Philadelphia, and more, true?

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The first year that NBC had Nascar, KPRC in Houston pre-empted the Pepsi 400 (July night race at Daytona) in favor of the Miss Texas Pageant. The race was shown on independent KNWS on tape delay, after that night's Astros game. KPRC also pre-empted David Letterman for a couple of years in the 80s, and delayed Conan O'Brien till 3am for several years.Both KTRK-Houston and WFAA-Dallas pre-empted Dick Clark's American Bandstand for public affairs programs.WSMV-Nashville and WTMJ-Milwaukee pre-empted the Tonight Show at some point in the 80s.

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Julius May said:

Also WPVI-TV 6 didn't air some ABC shows in the daytime for years to air local programs like AM Philadelphia, and more, true?

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Absolutely true. It wasn't until The View (gag) came along that they fully cleared the 11-noon slot. Game shows, off-net reruns, Edge Of Night...they all were bumped. In the early stages, AM Philadelphia was a great local talk show. Once it became the wretched AM Live and was nothing more than a video version of the National Enquirer, it wasn't a great loss to see it go. They couldn't quite let it go--Philly After Midnight and the much better Sunday Live kept on the tradition, until GMA reclaimed the Sunday morning slot.

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Buddy Hayes said:

The first year that NBC had Nascar, KPRC in Houston pre-empted the Pepsi 400 (July night race at Daytona) in favor of the Miss Texas Pageant. The race was shown on independent KNWS on tape delay, after that night's Astros game. IIRC, didn't KPRC take quite a bit of flack for not carrying the race. I remember even hearing about it on Healine News. Which brings to mind a related question, What staions after pre empting a network program later admitted it was a mistake?

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Re: Most Inexplicable Network Program Pre-Emption

imhomerjay said:

Absolutely true. It wasn't until The View (gag) came along that they fully cleared the 11-noon slot. Game shows, off-net reruns, Edge Of Night...they all were bumped. In the early stages, AM Philadelphia was a great local talk show. Once it became the wretched AM Live and was nothing more than a video version of the National Enquirer, it wasn't a great loss to see it go. They couldn't quite let it go--Philly After Midnight and the much better Sunday Live kept on the tradition, until GMA reclaimed the Sunday morning slot.

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But WPVI did air the daytime ABC Family Feud correct and some other ABC game shows?

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WKRG-TV in Mobile, AL was legendary for its network pre-emptions during the '70s.As an example, they delayed "All in the Family" during the 1971-72 season from its scheduled 7 pm CT Saturday airing to 9:30 pm CT on Tuesdays. WKRG's "shell game" with the CBS schedule got so bad that a columnist for the Mobile Register wrote an article about it, adding at the end, "You are missing much, Mobilians, you are missing much."The article used a lot of ink, comparing WKRG's clearance pattern with that of WTVY in Dothan, AL, which apparently was much more faithful to the CBS lineup.