KGET-TV

KGET-TV


Bakersfield, California
United States
Branding
  • KGET-TV 17
  • 17 News
  • Bakersfield's CW
Slogan In the Spirit of the Golden Empire
Channels Digital: 25 (UHF)
Virtual: 17 (PSIP)
Subchannels
Owner Nexstar Broadcasting Group
(Nexstar Broadcasting, Inc.)
First air date November 8, 1959 (1959-11-08)
Call letters' meaning Kern
Golden
Empire
Television
Sister station(s) KKEY-LP, KGPE, KSEE
Former callsigns KLYD-TV (1959–1969)
KJTV (1969–1978)
KPWR-TV (1978–1984)
Former channel number(s) Analog:
17 (UHF, 1959–2009)
Former affiliations ABC (1959–1974)
CBS (1974–1984)
Transmitter power 135 kW
Height 405 m
Facility ID 34459
Transmitter coordinates 35°26′17″N 118°44′26.1″W / 35.43806°N 118.740583°W / 35.43806; -118.740583
Licensing authority FCC
Public license information: Profile
CDBS
Website www.kerngoldenempire.com

KGET-TV is a television station serving Bakersfield, California, owned by Nexstar Broadcasting Group. It is an NBC affiliate, and transmits on UHF channel 25 (using its former analog channel 17 as its virtual channel via PSIP). KGET also has a digital-only/cable CW outlet called KWFB, one of The CW Plus stations. It was originally part of The WB 100+ Station Group for the WB network when it was still in operation. The network ended in September 2006 along with UPN to form The CW and KWFB affiliated with the new network. The station's studios are located on L Street in downtown Bakersfield, and the transmitter site is west of Breckenridge Mountain.

History

Logo used from 2012 until 2014.
KGET building

Founded by businessman Ed Urner, channel 17 first broadcast on November 8, 1959 as KLYD, an ABC affiliate.[1] The station originally operated from studios located on Eye Street in Bakersfield. It was co-owned with KLYD-AM 1350 (now KLHC), and is one of very few TV stations to be started by a daytime-only radio station. The call letters changed to KJTV in 1969. In October of that year, Urner sold the station to Atlantic States Industries.[2] In 1974, KJTV swapped affiliations with KBAK-TV, becoming a CBS affiliate.

George N. Gillett Jr.'s Gillett Broadcasting bought the station from ASI Communications in 1978. The station's call letters changed again to KPWR-TV on September 27, 1978, when it increased its power to 5,000,000 watts. The Ackerley Group purchased the station in 1983. On February 1, 1984, the station changed its calls to the present day "KGET-TV", coinciding with an affiliation swap with KERO-TV to become Bakersfield's NBC affiliate a month later, an affiliation which continues to the present day. It is one of a handful of stations in the United States to have held a primary affiliation with all three of the "Big Three" television networks. It was sold to Clear Channel Communications in 2001.

KGET stands for "Kern Golden Empire Television," a moniker coined by the station's longtime vice president and general manager, Ray Watson, who was elected to the Kern County Board of Supervisors in 2002. The current KGET Manager is Derek Jeffery.

On April 20, 2007, Clear Channel entered into an agreement to sell its entire television stations group to Newport Television, a broadcasting holding company controlled by Providence Equity Partners.[3] However, Providence Equity Partners owns a 19 percent share of the Spanish-language media company Univision, the owner of MyNetworkTV affiliate KUVI-TV. In addition, with only five full-power stations, Bakersfield does not have enough to legally support a co-owned duopoly operation. As a result, the Federal Communications Commission granted conditional approval of the sale, provided that Providence Equity Partners divest either KGET or its stake in Univision as soon as the deal was finalized. That happened on March 14, 2008.

In May 2008, Newport Television agreed to sell KGET and five other stations to High Plains Broadcasting, Inc. due to the aforementioned ownership conflict.[4] The sale closed on September 15, 2008;[5] Newport continued to operate KGET under a shared services agreement.[4] Newport agreed to sell KGET and sister Telemundo affiliate KKEY-LP, as well as KGPE in Fresno, California, to Nexstar Broadcasting Group on November 5, 2012.[6] The FCC approved the sale on January 23, 2013; and the sale was completed on February 19.[7][8]

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming[9]
17.1 1080i 16:9 KGET-DT Main KGET-TV programming / NBC
17.2 720p CW CW 12
17.3 480i 4:3 TELM Telemundo

Analog-to-digital conversion

KGET-TV discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over UHF channel 17, on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 25.[10] Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former UHF analog channel 17.

References

  1. ↑ "Central California Edition". mcsittel.com. Retrieved May 30, 2006.
  2. ↑ "Central California Edition". geocities.com. Archived from the original on 2009-08-03. Retrieved July 10, 2006.
  3. ↑ "Clear Channel Agrees to Sell Television Station Group to Providence Equity Partners" (Press release). Clear Channel Communications. 2007-04-20. Retrieved 2007-04-20.
  4. 1 2 "Newport stations drift to High Plains". Television Business Report. 2008-05-21. Retrieved 2008-09-28.
  5. ↑ "Application Search Details". CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved 2008-09-28.
  6. ↑ "Nexstar Adding Stations In CA, VT". TVNewsCheck. November 5, 2012. Retrieved November 5, 2012.
  7. ↑ http://licensing.fcc.gov/prod/cdbs/pubacc/Auth_Files/1523190.pdf
  8. ↑ http://www.tvnewscheck.com/article/65597/nexstar-closes-on-three-calif-stations
  9. ↑ RabbitEars TV Query for KGET
  10. ↑ "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and the Second Rounds" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-03-24.

External links

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