WWUpdate

The first hour of CNN -- June 1, 1980: The second hour, part 1: The second hour, part 2 -- a behind-the-scenes tour of the new channel: The third hour: ***** CNN's live coverage of the Challenger liftoff and explosion -- January 28, 1986 -- (the first half hour consists of a regular newscast): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rDg7S46ijM

A rare open from the now-defunct news operation at KNAZ in Flagstaff, Arizona; 4:30 p.m., 1999: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9AviilIGZQ

This KPNX clip may have been posted before, but it doesn't come up when I search this thread, so here goes: KPNX, Phoenix; 6 a.m., early '90s: https://archive.org/details/tobacco_rwx27a00 The theme is Gari's "News Station," KPNX's response to KTVK's .

And here's a WLIG news promo from 1985, the first year of the station's existence:

Here's a pre-launch sales presentation for CNN:

KCOP, Los Angeles, 1993; Wikipedia describes the early "Real News"-era newscasts as resembling CityTV in Toronto, and that is indeed the case: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPsOROH4oVQ

This tobacco archive clip has been online for quite awhile, but I don't think it has been posted in this thread... Fragments of KTVK and KNXV from 1996, a little more than a year after the affiliation switch, including parts of news opens: https://archive.org/details/tobacco_hny27a00 This 1988 compilation contains fragments from several Phoenix and Tucson stations, but no opens: https://archive.org/details/tobacco_www27a00 (And pardon my obsession with the Phoenix TV market; I used to live there.)

BTW, Ron Bergamo, the long-time KTSP/KSAZ general manager seen in that behind-the-scenes segment went on to serve as GM of KWBA in Tucson and KAZT in Phoenix; he died in a car crash in 2007.

The same YouTube channel includes a 1990 KTSP open and a behind-the-scenes tour of the station -- does anyone know what the theme is? BTW, note how similar KTSP (top) and KTVK (bottom) looked in the early 1990s, when both stations were "big 3" affiliates. This is especially interesting considering that they looked completely different a few years later, when the former became a Fox O&O, and the latter an independent:

The early days of CNN -- a feature from CNN's 20th anniversary special:

CBS-era KTSP (now KSAZ), Phoenix; news update, 1992: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bm6zUE3sMCE Same station, same year; topical news promo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIQ2UGLNmPs WOR (now WWOR), New York; news promo, 1984: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDSvRulanDQ

KGW, Portland, Oregon; anchored by Ann Curry, 1984: KOIN, Portland, Oregon; noon news, 1989:

WFLD, Chicago; Newscope with blizzard coverage, 1967: Part 2: Part 3: Part 4:

And here's the 8 p.m. news from Antenne 2 in France on today's date 36 years ago: (The set reminds me a bit of the one used by KABC at the time.)

I stumbled upon an old demo reel for former KTVK anchor Liz Habib, who left the station in 2003 -- it gives you some idea of what KTVK looked like during the first decade of its existence as an independent station:

Here are a couple of YouTube oldies relevant to our discussion of mid-1990s Phoenix TV... ...two promos for KTVK's "Good Evening Arizona," the 90-minute evening newscast that launched after KTVK became an independent: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nc-hPw_YRzQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKXd27AFjWg Note how heavily KTVK promoted its link with CNN at this time (presumably to compensate for the loss ABC News programming). Live reports from CNN correspondents were a common feature on KTVK's newscasts. In fact, KTVK was among the nation's top users of satellite air time in the 1990s.

One of my favorite pieces of production music! I really like their "newsroom" shot with the anchors in the background: (Note that KNXV used ABC News L3s at the time. This was to remind viewers that KNXV was the new ABC affiliate in Phoenix. KPHO did the same with CBS News L3s for a while.) KNXV was a really innovative station at the time, but became far more conventional by 1997. Here's an interesting -- but long -- article from that year explaining how the station had changed: http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/1997-04-03/news/chit-happens/ And this is how KNXV's station manager assessed the news operations of the five English-language Phoenix stations in 1997: http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/1997-04-03/news/the-market-is-ripe-for-the-taking/full/

This has been mentioned before, but the tobacco archive also includes a portion of KTVK's then-brand-new "Good Morning Arizona" with Jodi Applegate from an interesting period in 1994 when the station was still an ABC affiliate but already preparing for its independence. (KTVK passed ABC's "Good Morning America" on to KNXV a few months early in order to build up its own morning show): https://archive.org/details/tobacco_iny27a00 The 8 A.M. portion of "Good Morning Arizona" with the news (but without the 8 A.M. open) begins at 4:28 into the clip. The rest of the clip contains ABC soap operas with some promos and updates from KTVK.

And a longer clip of the news tease (text only) and open from the station in Ljubljana, Slovenia, then also a part of Yugoslavia: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n4MLCoa90jk

A few '70s and '80s clips from Europe: From 1978, here's the open of TV Aktua, produced by TROS in the Netherlands -- this has to be one of the first newsroom sets in Europe -- and can a news theme get any more '70s than that? Here's a master version of the 1975 news open from the station in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, when that country was still a part of Yugoslavia:

Nice catch! When I listened to it, I didn't even hear there was a music bed under the tease.

The following clip -- of KTVK from 1982 -- contains neither an open nor a close, but I thought it might still be interesting since KTVK material from the early '80s is so rare: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RzcvwbNrVo The title of the clip mentions "NewsChannel 3," but this was, of course, the station's "Eyewitness News" era, as is obvious from the video itself. Also note that KTVK was apparently transitioning between two "circle 3" logos at the time, having just introduced the version still in use by the station (albeit in a slightly modified form). (Compare the OTS graphics with the anchor's lapel pin and the reporter's mic flag, which still have the version seen in the 1980 clip posted here a few weeks ago.)

Here are some print ads for Phoenix TV news operations from roughly the same period. (These are taken from current eBay auctions, but I also have quite a few -- mostly later ones, from the late '70s and '80s -- in my own collection of old Phoenix-edition TV Guides. Unfortunately, they are a few thousand miles away, so they'll have to wait until April):

Interesting! Bill Close is perhaps best known outside Phoenix for being held hostage on the air in 1982:

Below is another interesting clip from earlier in 1978 -- "ABC Evening News" before the launch of "World News Tonight," but after Roone Arledge had taken over ABC News. Barbara Matusow describes that transition period in her 1983 book The Evening Stars: The Making of the Network News Anchor: "[Arledge's] most immediate problem was what to do the incompatible team of Barbara Walters and Harry Reasoner. Arledge's initial move was to buy time by making format changes designed to minimize their impact on the Evening News while he was working on a replacement formula. "Two-shots" were eliminated, meaning that Walters and Reasoner were not shown together on the screen, and something called a "whip-around" was introduced -- correspondents handing off their reports directly to each other instead of going back to the anchor for introductions. Subanchors began to appear: Frank Reynolds was featured prominently in Washington, as was Peter Jennings from various European capitals." In other words, the final reincarnation of the "ABC Evening News" already looked a bit like "World News Tonight," which launched a few months later. (As the following clip for two years earlier illustrates, "ABC Evening News" before Arledge was very different: )