KMSP-TV

KMSP-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, serving the Twin Cities area. It is owned and operated by the Fox network through its Fox Television Stations division alongside WFTC (channel 9.2), which broadcasts MyNetworkTV. The two stations share studios on Viking Drive in Eden Prairie; KMSP-TV's transmitter is located in Shoreview, Minnesota.

KMSP-TV also serves the Mankato market (via K35KI-D in nearby St. James through the local municipal-operated Cooperative TV (CTV) network of translators), even though that area already has a Fox affiliate of its own. KMSP is also carried on the main channel of KFTC (channel 26), a satellite station of WFTC licensed to Bemidji which serves the northernmost reaches of the Minneapolis–St. Paul television market.

KMSP-TV is also carried in Canada on the Rogers Cable system in Thunder Bay, Ontario, on Tbaytel, and on Bell MTS Fibe TV in the province of Manitoba. Since October 2022, the station is also carried on Westman Communications, replacing Rochester, New York's WUHF.

The Family Broadcasting Corporation in Minneapolis, owner of radio station KEYD (1440 AM, now KYCR), filed an application with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a construction permit for a new commercial television station to be operated on Channel 9 on November 24, 1953. WLOL and WDGY (now KTLK) also expressed interest, but withdrew their applications in 1954, effectively handing the permit to Family Broadcasting. KEYD-TV began broadcasting on January 9, 1955, and was affiliated with the DuMont Television Network. During this time, Harry Reasoner, a graduate of Minneapolis West High School and the University of Minnesota, was hired as the station's first news anchor and news director. However, DuMont shut down in August 1956, leaving the station as an independent outlet; on June 3, 1956, the KEYD stations were sold to United Television, whose principals at the time included several stockholders of Pittsburgh station WENS, for $1.5 million. The new owners immediately sold off KEYD radio, refocused KEYD-TV's programming on films and sports, and shut down the news department; Reasoner was hired by CBS News a few months later. Reasoner became a host for CBS's 60 Minutes when it launched in 1968.

Channel 9 changed its call letters to KMGM-TV on May 23, 1956. At the time, the station was in negotiations with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to acquire the Twin Cities television rights to the company's films, along with selling a 25 percent stake in KMGM-TV to the studio. Negotiations broke down later that month over the cost of the films; additionally, Loew's, MGM's parent company at the time, filed a petition with the FCC against the call sign change, claiming that the use of KMGM was unauthorized and a violation of MGM's trademark. The FCC ruled against Loew's that October, saying that its call sign assignment policies were limited to preventing confusion between stations in a given area. The agreements to lease MGM's pre-1949 films and sell 25 percent of the station to Loew's were both completed that November; KMGM was the third station, after future sister station KTTV in Los Angeles and KTVR in Denver, to enter into such an arrangement.

National Telefilm Associates, which later purchased WNTA-TV in the New York City area, purchased the 75 percent of United Television not owned by MGM for $650,000 in November 1957, joining it to the NTA Film Network until it ended in 1961. After taking control, NTA expanded KMGM-TV's hours of operation as part of an overhaul of channel 9's schedule that also included the addition of newscasts. A few months later, on February 10, 1958, NTA bought MGM's stake for $130,000 and announced that it would change channel 9's calls to KMSP-TV; the call sign change took effect that March over the objections of KSTP-TV (channel 5). National Theatres, a theater chain whose broadcast holdings already included WDAF AM-TV in Kansas City, began the process of acquiring NTA in November 1958; in April 1959, it purchased 88 percent of the company. 20th Century-Fox, the former parent company of National Theatres, bought KMSP-TV for $4.1 million on November 9, 1959, retaining the United Television corporate name. The KMSP call letters were featured on prop television cameras in the May 29, 1963, episode of the CBS sitcom The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, produced by 20th Century Fox Television; the show was loosely set in the Twin Cities area. The episode was titled "The Call of the, Like, Wild".

During its early years until 1972, the station's studios and offices were located in a lower level of the Foshay Tower in downtown Minneapolis; the transmitter was located on top of the building, the tallest structure in the area until 1971, along with WCCO-TV (channel 4) and WTCN-TV (channel 11, now KARE).

KMSP-TV took over the ABC affiliation from WTCN-TV on April 16, 1961. Throughout its years with ABC, KMSP was perennially the lowest-rated network affiliate in the Twin Cities, with only one-third of the viewing audience of each of their two competitors, CBS affiliate WCCO-TV and NBC affiliate KSTP-TV. It was also notorious for having a sub-standard news department with large staff turnover. In 1971, KMSP built a new tower in Shoreview, while the studios and offices relocated in 1972 to Edina on York Avenue South, across from Southdale Shopping Center.