Marvin Dillweed

 

In its entirety, here's the legendarily disastrous launch edition of 20/20 -- so poorly received that both anchors, as well as the show's executive producer (Bob Shanks), were fired within the week:

 

 

Never knew an aircheck of this existed. Amazing find.

WYEA-TV (now WLTZ) news open from 1980.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ1EE3GMgtc

Part of a 1992 newscast from WOWL-TV, which was the 'other' NBC affiliate in the Huntsville, AL market at the time. Today's it's CW affiliate WHDF.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWMvUnYZS-k

If you couldn't get enough of a certain TV station in Terre Haute, here's more:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NwVYb6hGs4

 

Boston cable news "Neighborhood Network News", 1985:

 

WTWO 6pm newscast on the day of the Challenger explosion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6xuxXOvo08&spfreload=10

WTWO in Terre Haute, IN has started a 50th anniversary YouTube channel.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClECSz2imSa8cb6ZO8U7frg

Two from Springfield, MA. A WWLP 6pm newscast from 1987:

And a WGGB 6pm newscast from late '94:

There are some airchecks from other markets as well.

A WTHI 10pm newscast from 1986.

Hearst will be selling KITV/Honolulu and their satellites to one-time KHON owner SJL.

http://www.staradvertiser.com/news/breaking/20150513_Local_TV_station_sold.html

 

...and Match Game '90 host Ross Shafer in the second half. What a fall he took.

 

If it hasn't been posted before, here's a pretty clear video clip which inlcudes an open from the era:

 

OK, so they were using that name for something. I kinda got that sense too. Probably helped them keep the trademark.

 

And unfortunately, it was dropped in the early '90s for the more generic-sounding "2 On Your Side", before the franchise was dropped altogether.

 

WTHR 10pm (!!) open, 1991 (We Know What Matters). I had to look this one up — it turns out WTHR did an early prime experiment of its own!

 

 

You can thank a majority of the state of Indiana for not observing Daylight Saving Time until just a few years ago.

By not "springing forward", the Indianapolis TV market, along with Fort Wayne, South Bend, Terre Haute, and Lafayette, would end up with network primetime beginning at 7pm, ala Central Time, instead of 8pm Eastern Time. All of the markets would juggle their schedules around when they lost the 7pm-8pm 'prime access', and syndicated programming, like Jeopardy!, would be moved to an afternoon slot from the usual 7pm or 7:30pm spot.

Of course this affected the scheduling of news in Indianapolis. Obviously 11pm newscasts would move back an hour to 10pm, and even "The Ten O'Clock News" on WTTV (during their first go-around of local news) would become "The Nine O'Clock News". (I think WXIN-then WPDS's short-lived "59 Headline News" also did this). When it came to evenings, and depending on the station, the network newscasts would either just move back an hour to 5:30pm (in the case of WTHR after it became an NBC affiliate), or delayed until 6pm (as was the case for a few years on both WRTV and WISH which had news for an hour at 5pm). Network morning shows (Today, GMA, whatever CBS was doing) would be an hour behind, and would be tape-delayed to 7am "Indiana" time (as opposed to airing live at 6am central).

Someone decided to end the insanity, at least as far as television programming in the late '80s, and *most* of the Indianapolis stations decided to standardize their schedules year-round to an 8pm-11pm (for Fox, 8pm-10pm) schedule. WTHR, then in the ratings basement, tried to buck the trend for a while, by following the 'old' springtime schedule and airing primetime an hour earlier, and thus having news at 10pm. They expanded the show to an hour, with news competition coming from WTTV, which had also standardized to an all-Eastern time schedule. In the Fall, WTHR would switch back to an 8pm-11pm primetime and 11pm half hour newscast.

WTHR finally gave in and standardized their schedule with the other stations. Not long after, the other markets followed suit (in Terre Haute, WTWO was the first to do so, while WFFT in Fort Wayne had been airing Fox programming from 8pm-10pm for a number of years).

Evansville, on the other hand, always followed central time year-round.

Morning meteorologist Patrick Crawford of KCEN-TV/Waco was confonted and shot multiple times outside of the TV station this morning. A manhunt is underway for the suspect.

http://www.kcentv.com/story/27651086/suspect-sought-after-shooting-near-kcen-studio

Second half of a KOSA-TV/Odessa, TX evening newscast from 1978. The close features Neil Diamond's "Crunchy Granola Suite".

From 1975...WFLA legend Bob Hite...on WPVI:

Another from the Sean Mc channel...a 1989 WMAZ 11pm open:

First few minutes of a 1985 newscast from WRCB:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8a8FiGmIOdY

Late '70s clips of WJBK newscasts (including three opens), unfortunately all covered by a director's track:

Two newscast segments from Des Moines:

WOI (1988):

WHO (1989):

Clips from WPDS (now WXIN)'s first newscast effort in 1984. This started as a 10pm primetime newscast, then whittled down to 5 minute updates throughout the broadcast day.

WPIX has posted an open from 1975.

It could just be me, but it looks like they had some technical problems that night.

 

Was this the same Jim who ran tvnewsthemes.net about a decade or so ago?

 

I believe it's a different person. That Jim was a one-time employee of NASA (they may still be).

A 1974 documentary going behind the scenes at then-WLAC-TV in Nashville.

A very vintage WAGA clip from 1964:

WSB from 1980 (previously unknown news theme?):

Many other great clips on this guy's channel.

Clips from KTVN/Reno in 1993: