Mystery Photo Reveals…THE FIRST WNBC TV Was NOT In New York!?!
Mystery Photo Reveals…THE FIRST WNBC TV Was NOT In New York!?!
Believe it or not, there was another WNBC TV, before there was WNBC New York!
Yesterday, our friend Barry Mitchell sent this to me and I was as bewildered as he was, so I started digging. How could these famous call letters be on the side of this TK11 with a Channel 30 designation? WNBC New York is Channel 4.
Well, as it turns out, before NBC’s flagship station took the WNBC calls in 1960, the network bought its first, and only UHF station in New Britain, Connecticut and named it…WNBC. Who knew?
That was 1956, and at the time New York was WRCA (’54-’60), and of course, had started as WNBT (’41-’54). Today, that first WNBC TV is WVIT, but when NBC bought it, it was WKNB, which went on the air in 1954 on UHF Channel 30.
UFH was barely receivable back then, but with RCA as a maker of all things television, I suppose they bought it more to play with and test than anything else, but it was not a very successful venture. NBC was out by 1959, and fortunately, took these glorious calls with them and plugged them in the next year in the Big Apple.
I had no idea this had ever happened, and you never know where opportunities to find out these kind of things will pop up. If you have some mystery photos like this, share them with us and let’s see what we can find out. Below is a link to more on the WVIT history. Thanks Barry! Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee
New Britain, CT… one town over from ESPN’s headquarters in Bristol.
NBC actually reaquired channel 30 in 1997, when the station was owned by Viacom, shortly after Viacom’s acquisition of Paramount Pictures and the establishment of UPN (which was seen on Paramount-owned WTXX). The WVIT calls stood for “Viacom International Television”. Viacom acquired WVIT from Plains Television (when it was WHNB) in 1978; Plains, in turn, got channel 30 from NBC in 1959.
Very interesting comments. Is this a live commercial for Atlantic Imperial Gasoline? I still remember the jingle for Atlantic Imperial – they used to sponsor the Phillies games along with other products like Ballantine Beer, Phillies Cigars, and my favorite TASTYCAKE (so much fun to put in your tummy). I listened to too many commercials when I was a kid…
The chap in the photo bears a certain resemblance to the late actor Tom Poston. I cannot discern if the studio “prop” is an ice box/refrigerator or a petrol/gas pump. Oy veh.
As my late father would have said: “All NBC had to do was change their flagship station to channel 3, and they wouldn’t have had to change the signs on all their cameras.” (I hope he approves of my quote.)
It wasn’t the only UHF station NBC was toying with in the 1950’s. There was WBUF-TV, Channel 17 in Buffalo.
http://www.uhftelevision.com/articles/wbuf.html
WNBC-TV logo:
I am striving toward a doctoral degree, albeit on a lengthy medical leave, with a dissertation on the history of radio and television space and astronomy coverage from 1923 to the present. One of the best rewards of doing research like mine is finding true gems of history, or correcting the common conventional story, as you have nicely done here. In some instances, things are way beyond half-forgotten, alas. They are what I like to call more like Ivory Soap pure level forgotten: 99-44/100%.
A case in point: WGN was the logo of the Chicago Tribune–“World’s Greatest Newspaper.” But when Colonel McCormick wanted to name his radio station WGN, he had to buy the call letters from a ship-to-shore guy.
Excuse the gaffe-of course, WLBZ was NBC!
When NBC sold it in 1960, the calls were changed to WHNB, and its “branding,” if you will, changed from “The LEADERSHIP Station” (sic) to TV/30. I wonder if WLBZ -2, the BBC affiliate in Bangor, ME, did some imitating around that time by calling themselves “The Prestige Station”?
These days WVIT/NBC30 is O&O once again. 🙂