KTNV-TV

KTNV-TV (channel 13) is a television station in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States, affiliated with ABC. It is owned by the E. W. Scripps Company alongside Laughlin-licensed independent station KMCC (channel 34). The two stations share studios on South Valley View Boulevard in the nearby unincorporated community of Paradise (though with a Las Vegas mailing address); KTNV-TV's transmitter is located atop Mount Arden in Henderson.

Channel 13 was the third station to be activated in Southern Nevada, beginning broadcasting in May 1956 as KSHO-TV. The station originally operated on a 24-hour basis, unique for the time, with a rotating schedule of movies and minimal news coverage; it remained an independent station until affiliating with ABC in December 1957. Amid financial difficulties, multiple stock sales and ownership transfers occurred from 1957 until 1961, when the licensee, Television Company of America, declared bankruptcy, and a receiver was appointed. In 1963, the Federal Communications Commission opened an investigation into an unauthorized transfer of control of the station, which resulted in a decision to deny renewal of its broadcast license. KSHO-TV continued to operate on an interim basis while seven applicants fought for the permanent license; Talmac, Inc., owned the station from then until 1972, followed by Arthur Powell Williams.

The Journal Company acquired KSHO-TV in 1979 and relaunched it as KTNV-TV in March 1980. Journal made technical investments at the station, and the news department also grew, but KTNV-TV has not been able to substantially rise from third place in the market despite several overhauls and tweaks to the station's newscasts. Scripps acquired Journal, including KTNV, in 2015.

Channel 13 in Las Vegas was first applied for in 1951 by the Desert Television Company, a consortium of local businessmen associated with local radio station KRAM, which was in turn sold to Huntridge Theaters in 1952. Another application was filed by the Western Television Company, but while Western withdrew its application in February 1954 and left Desert Television unopposed, a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) hearing examiner denied the application because the group failed to prove its financial qualifications.

On September 28, 1955, Moritz Zenoff, owner of radio station KBMI in nearby Henderson as well as the Boulder City News and Henderson Home News, was granted a construction permit to build channel 13 in Las Vegas. Zenoff built the station and signed on KSHO-TV on May 4, 1956. It was an independent station with a 24-hour schedule—possibly the only one at that time—consisting of four rotating six-hour movie blocks, interrupted in the evening for brief five-minute news breaks that were the station's only local programming. The studios were located in the Fremont Hotel and Casino, from which the station broadcast with a mere 250 watts of power; low-budget advertisements were a major draw, as was a classified advertising feature aired throughout the day. KSHO-TV was built for $70,000, a fraction of the cost of most new-build TV stations, and run by just two technical employees per shift, but its low-cost programming made the small operation profitable.

Zenoff sold the station and KBMI radio to the Television Company of America (TCA) in September 1956, four months after putting it on the air. TCA was owned by a number of TV and radio investors in the western United States, including Albert Zugsmith. It was the second attempt to sell the station that year after a previous application to sell the outlet to Wilbur Clark, developer and owner of the Desert Inn, was withdrawn. Stock in Television Company of America changed hands multiple times in the late 1950s. In March 1957, Morton Sidley and Ira Laufer, both radio executives in Los Angeles, bought stock in TCA, as did Nathan and Merv Adelson and Irwin Molasky.

That fall, the station relocated to El Rancho Vegas and applied to increase its power, and on December 15, it became an ABC affiliate, the 81st primary outlet of the network nationally. However, financial trouble and continued ownership turnover remained as hallmarks. In February 1959, the sale of the station to Rube Jolley, the founder of KLAS-TV, was announced. The FCC granted the $137,500 purchase of TCA stock by Jolley's company, the Nevada Broadcasters Fund, in November. Jolley was president but did not own any of the stock; among the notable stockholders was Howard D. Johnson, owner of radio and television interests in Idaho and Utah. The Television Company of America, meanwhile, had to obtain a court order to prevent it from being evicted from El Rancho Vegas.

Television Company of America filed for bankruptcy protection in May 1961, and it asked for permission to transfer the license to a court-appointed receiver. However, in March 1963, the FCC instead designated its license renewal as well as a proposed transfer of the license to Arthur Powell Williams, a businessman from Los Angeles, for hearing. The commission ordered the hearings over complications in ownership. The FCC alleged that, over two years of what Variety called "financial gamesmanship", ownership had passed from Television Company of America to Nevada Broadcasters' Fund to a company controlled by Johnson, who advanced funds to keep the station in business; that there was an unauthorized contract for a transfer of control to Johnson; and that Nevada Broadcasters' Fund had disclosed in stock sales that it acquired control of KSHO-TV before even filing the application with the FCC, which must approve all transfers of control of radio and television stations. Hearings were held in Las Vegas before an FCC examiner over the various unauthorized transfers and attempts to solicit public investment. KSHO-TV's weakened position also was revealed by testimony in a concurrent FCC battle over the licensing of channel 4 in Boulder City, wherein applicants for that station—including KSHO-TV's station manager—were found to have discussed how to seek a network affiliation and "what part Channel 13 would play if it became dead".