KCTS-TV
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KCTS-TV, virtual and VHF digital channel 9, is a Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) member television station licensed to Seattle, Washington, United States and also serving Tacoma. The station is owned by Cascade Public Media.[1][2][3][4] KCTS-TV's studios are located at the northeast corner of Seattle Center, and its transmitter is located on Capitol Hill in Seattle.
KYVE (virtual channel 47, UHF digital channel 21) in Yakima operates as a semi-satellite of KCTS-TV, serving as the PBS member station for the western portion of the Yakima/Tri-Cities market. KYVE maintains its own studios on Second Street in Yakima and transmitter on Ahtanum Ridge.
History
KCTS first went on the air on December 7, 1954, broadcasting from the campus of the University of Washington, the station's original licensee, and using equipment donated by KING-TV owner Dorothy Bullitt. Channel 9 was a sister station to KUOW-FM, which the University of Washington put on the air two years earlier.
During the 1950s and 1960s, KCTS primarily supplied classroom instructional programs used in Washington State's K–12 schools, plus National Educational Television (NET) programs. Outside of schoolrooms, KCTS' audience among the general public was somewhat limited, and most programming was in black-and-white until the mid-1970s (although the station did install color capability in 1967).
In 1970, NET was absorbed into the newly-created Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), which commenced broadcasting on October 5. As a PBS member station, KCTS began offering a vastly enhanced scope of programming for the general public, including British programming.
Thanks to a major fundraiser drive during the mid-1980s, KCTS moved to its present location on the Seattle Center campus in October 1986; shortly after, in 1987, the University of Washington spun off KCTS, and the station became a community licensee, thus separating it from KUOW-FM.[5]
KCTS is seen throughout southwestern British Columbia on local cable systems, as well as across Canada on the Bell TV and Shaw Direct satellite providers, as well as on many other Canadian cable TV systems. According to KCTS, around 2 million viewers from Canada tune in each week. KCTS receives substantial financial support from its far-flung Canadian audience as well as from viewers in Washington State.[citation needed]
In January 2016, as part of a broader strategy redefine itself as a content provider for various other platforms other than television, the name of the licensee, KCTS Television became Cascade Public Media; its properties included KCTS-TV, Crosscut, a non-profit daily news site, and Spark Public. Cascade Public Media currently consists of KCTS, Crosscut and Piranha Partners.
KYVE history
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In 1994, KCTS merged with KYVE, which has served central Washington since November 1, 1962. However, this wasn't the first time that the two stations had partnered together; during the early 1960s KYVE's engineers switched to and from KCTS' signal until the station's owners, the Yakima Board of Education, got enough funding for the station to be self-supporting. The station became a community licensee in 1984, but found the going difficult until its merger with KCTS.
During the mid-1990s to the early 2000s, some programs included a combined KCTS/KYVE visual bug in the lower-right corner of the screen, indicating they were simulcast to both markets. However, since the early 2000s, KYVE has largely been a straight simulcast of KCTS. Combined, the two stations serve 2.4 million people, accounting for almost two-thirds of Washington state's population.
Digital television
Digital channels
The stations' digital signals are multiplexed:
| Channel | Video | Aspect | PSIP Short Name | Programming[6][7] |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9.1 47.1 |
1080i | 16:9 | KCTS-HD KYVE-HD |
Main KCTS-TV programming / PBS Main KYVE programming / PBS |
| 9.2 | 480i | KIDS | PBS Kids | |
| 47.2 | 4:3 | |||
| 9.3 | 16:9 | Create | Create | |
| 47.3 | 4:3 | |||
| 9.4 | 16:9 | WORLD | World |
Analog-to-digital conversion
KCTS-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 9, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.[8] The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 41 to VHF channel 9.
Programming
KCTS is perhaps best known for producing/distributing the popular PBS Kids show Bill Nye the Science Guy, as well as other programs such as Students by Nature (not a PBS-distributed program), The Miracle Planet, cooking shows by Nick Stellino, Chefs A' Field, and the annual televised high school academic competition KYVE Apple Bowl, among other shows.
References
- ^ Hanscom, Greg; Power-Drutis, Tamara (December 2, 2015). "An Exciting New Chapter for Northwest Public Media". Crosscut.com. Retrieved December 2, 2015.
- ^ Cullen, Hilda (December 2, 2015). "News Website Crosscut Merging into KCTS 9" (PDF) (Press release). KCTS-TV. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 2, 2015. Retrieved December 2, 2015.
- ^ Tu, Janet I. (December 2, 2015). "KCTS-TV to absorb Crosscut and another local website". The Seattle Times. Retrieved December 2, 2015.
- ^ Connelly, Joel (December 2, 2015). "KCTS-TV will merge with Crosscut". Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Retrieved December 2, 2015.
- ^ http://depts.washington.edu/sthp/files/original/6c8c6ba3ae7a18f8927f6ba821867408.htm
- ^ RabbitEars TV Query for KCTS
- ^ RabbitEars TV Query for KYVE
- ^ List of Digital Full-Power Stations Archived 2013-08-29 at the Wayback Machine
External links
- KCTS 9
- KYVE
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- History KCTS from 1954 through 2003 (Seattle Times)
- Richard J. Meyer papers, at the University of Maryland libraries. He was a manger of KCTS from 1972-1982 and helped in updating equipment, securing a larger budget for the station, and increasing community representation in the show with new employees from the local community.