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WKAR-TV
WKAR-TV (channel 23) is a PBS member television station licensed to East Lansing, Michigan, United States, serving central southern Michigan. The station is owned by Michigan State University (MSU) and operated as part of WKAR Public Media, along with NPR members WKAR (870 AM) and WKAR-FM (90.5). The three stations share studios in the Communication Arts and Sciences Building, at the southeast corner of Wilson and Red Cedar Roads on the MSU campus in East Lansing; WKAR-TV's transmitter is located off Dobie Road near Kinawa Drive in Meridian Charter Township between East Lansing and Williamston.
WKAR-TV was the third educational TV station established in the United States and is the second-oldest still in operation, though its license history is not continuous. The station first broadcast on UHF channel 60 from January 1954 to June 1958, broadcasting from studios in a complex of converted Quonset huts on the campus of what was then Michigan State College in East Lansing. The vast majority of its programming was live and included educational programs, courses for Lansing city schools, and occasional sports telecasts. Its performance as an educational outlet was severely limited by the troubles of early UHF television, particularly small coverage areas and the inability of many sets to receive UHF channels without a converter. As channel 60 was going on the air, VHF channel 10 was assigned to Onondaga, 20 miles (32 km) south of Lansing. Michigan State filed an application opposite four commercial bidders. It then teamed with Television Corporation of Michigan, a group with close ties to Lansing commercial radio station WILS, to propose a shared-time operation. Believed to be the first of its kind, it called for Michigan State to air educational programming 38 hours a week and lease the transmitter facility for a commercial operation that would air for the balance of the time. The proposal met with stiff opposition, even after the Federal Communications Commission granted a construction permit. WKAR-TV ceased broadcasting on channel 60 in June 1958, and Michigan State—by now a university—resumed broadcasting as WMSB, sharing time with the commercial station WILX-TV, on March 15, 1959. The expanded coverage area increased the visibility and use of MSU's educational programs for schools.
Many of the circumstances that led to the WMSB–WILX-TV relationship had changed by the late 1960s, including new leadership at MSU; increased programming availability for public television; and the All-Channel Receiver Act, which required television sets built after 1964 to include UHF capability. In 1970, MSU filed for the educational channel 23 in East Lansing, which was built and began broadcasting once more as WKAR-TV on September 6, 1972. This ended the 13-year sharing of channel 10, whose facilities were sold to WILX-TV, and more than doubled the station's operating hours per week. Shortly before the move, the station debuted Off the Record, a long-running Michigan political program still in production today. In 1981, WKAR-TV moved out of the Quonset huts after 27 years and into purpose-built studios in the new Communication Arts Building.
WKAR-TV began broadcasting a digital signal in 2004 and debuted multiple subchannels of programming in 2007. It was the first public TV station in the U.S. to be authorized to build an ATSC 3.0 experimental station, in 2018. In addition to PBS and other public TV programs, the station continues to produce programs of local and state interest.
On April 14, 1952, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) moved to end a years-long freeze on the assignment of new TV stations. It allocated the new ultra high frequency (UHF) band to television and set aside hundreds of very high frequency (VHF) and UHF channels nationally to education. East Lansing was assigned channel 60, though it was not one of the seven educational channels allotted throughout the state. Michigan State College had been fully equipped to produce television programs since 1950 and only lacked a transmitter. When the freeze was lifted, Michigan State officials immediately announced their intention to seek channel 60. The first application made its way to the FCC in June, but it had to be refiled because the college specified Lansing instead of East Lansing. The commission granted the construction permit on October 15, 1952; college officials began planning to build a transmitter site at Okemos to connect with the existing television studio. The Ford Foundation provided $100,000 to purchase the transmitter. During this time, the college continued to provide its equipment for a variety of production tasks, including a joint telecast of election returns in 1952 with WJIM-TV (channel 6) and the Lansing State Journal newspaper which utilized Michigan State–owned cameras and control equipment.
The state board of agriculture approved a contract for the construction of the transmitter facility in July 1953. While the 1,034-foot (315 m) tower was completed and the antenna raised to the top, college officials announced their plans for WKAR-TV to build on the Michigan State television operation, which had produced more than 750 programs since 1951, including the relocation of the studios from the electrical engineering building into a series of Quonset huts along Kalamazoo Street on the campus and the acquisition of mobile units for outside broadcasting. One program, Curtain Going Up, was a television adaptation of the popular WKAR radio program by the same name, which had been on the air for 18 years. Also slated were nightly telecourses in drivers' education and political science.
WKAR-TV began broadcasting on January 15, 1954. The first day featured several activities and events on the campus, including a luncheon at which FCC commissioner John C. Doerfer spoke, as well as a dedication broadcast in the evening with speeches from Governor G. Mennen Williams and Michigan State president John A. Hannah. WKAR-TV was the third noncommercial educational TV station in the United States, following KUHT in Houston and KTHE in Los Angeles (which soon folded). Live shows predominated, representing as much as 80 percent of WKAR-TV's program output. The station launched four months before the Ann Arbor–based Educational Television and Radio Center initiated regular program service to the nation's then-six educational stations on May 16. Despite operating out of Quonset huts that were noisy when it rained, the studio facility—once a cafeteria for postwar student housing—was seen as among the best. Robert Page recalled that others called them "the fat cats of educational TV".
In 1957, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) revised restrictions on college football telecasts, at the behest of several state legislatures, to permit the telecast of home games on a noncommercial basis by "the home college's institutionally owned educational television station", with WKAR-TV as a potential beneficiary. The station took advantage and carried a game between the Notre Dame and Michigan State from Spartan Stadium on November 9 of that year. That same year, WKAR-TV began airing educational television programs for seven Lansing elementary schools, where fifth-graders received art, science, and music lessons.
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WKAR-TV
WKAR-TV (channel 23) is a PBS member television station licensed to East Lansing, Michigan, United States, serving central southern Michigan. The station is owned by Michigan State University (MSU) and operated as part of WKAR Public Media, along with NPR members WKAR (870 AM) and WKAR-FM (90.5). The three stations share studios in the Communication Arts and Sciences Building, at the southeast corner of Wilson and Red Cedar Roads on the MSU campus in East Lansing; WKAR-TV's transmitter is located off Dobie Road near Kinawa Drive in Meridian Charter Township between East Lansing and Williamston.
WKAR-TV was the third educational TV station established in the United States and is the second-oldest still in operation, though its license history is not continuous. The station first broadcast on UHF channel 60 from January 1954 to June 1958, broadcasting from studios in a complex of converted Quonset huts on the campus of what was then Michigan State College in East Lansing. The vast majority of its programming was live and included educational programs, courses for Lansing city schools, and occasional sports telecasts. Its performance as an educational outlet was severely limited by the troubles of early UHF television, particularly small coverage areas and the inability of many sets to receive UHF channels without a converter. As channel 60 was going on the air, VHF channel 10 was assigned to Onondaga, 20 miles (32 km) south of Lansing. Michigan State filed an application opposite four commercial bidders. It then teamed with Television Corporation of Michigan, a group with close ties to Lansing commercial radio station WILS, to propose a shared-time operation. Believed to be the first of its kind, it called for Michigan State to air educational programming 38 hours a week and lease the transmitter facility for a commercial operation that would air for the balance of the time. The proposal met with stiff opposition, even after the Federal Communications Commission granted a construction permit. WKAR-TV ceased broadcasting on channel 60 in June 1958, and Michigan State—by now a university—resumed broadcasting as WMSB, sharing time with the commercial station WILX-TV, on March 15, 1959. The expanded coverage area increased the visibility and use of MSU's educational programs for schools.
Many of the circumstances that led to the WMSB–WILX-TV relationship had changed by the late 1960s, including new leadership at MSU; increased programming availability for public television; and the All-Channel Receiver Act, which required television sets built after 1964 to include UHF capability. In 1970, MSU filed for the educational channel 23 in East Lansing, which was built and began broadcasting once more as WKAR-TV on September 6, 1972. This ended the 13-year sharing of channel 10, whose facilities were sold to WILX-TV, and more than doubled the station's operating hours per week. Shortly before the move, the station debuted Off the Record, a long-running Michigan political program still in production today. In 1981, WKAR-TV moved out of the Quonset huts after 27 years and into purpose-built studios in the new Communication Arts Building.
WKAR-TV began broadcasting a digital signal in 2004 and debuted multiple subchannels of programming in 2007. It was the first public TV station in the U.S. to be authorized to build an ATSC 3.0 experimental station, in 2018. In addition to PBS and other public TV programs, the station continues to produce programs of local and state interest.
On April 14, 1952, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) moved to end a years-long freeze on the assignment of new TV stations. It allocated the new ultra high frequency (UHF) band to television and set aside hundreds of very high frequency (VHF) and UHF channels nationally to education. East Lansing was assigned channel 60, though it was not one of the seven educational channels allotted throughout the state. Michigan State College had been fully equipped to produce television programs since 1950 and only lacked a transmitter. When the freeze was lifted, Michigan State officials immediately announced their intention to seek channel 60. The first application made its way to the FCC in June, but it had to be refiled because the college specified Lansing instead of East Lansing. The commission granted the construction permit on October 15, 1952; college officials began planning to build a transmitter site at Okemos to connect with the existing television studio. The Ford Foundation provided $100,000 to purchase the transmitter. During this time, the college continued to provide its equipment for a variety of production tasks, including a joint telecast of election returns in 1952 with WJIM-TV (channel 6) and the Lansing State Journal newspaper which utilized Michigan State–owned cameras and control equipment.
The state board of agriculture approved a contract for the construction of the transmitter facility in July 1953. While the 1,034-foot (315 m) tower was completed and the antenna raised to the top, college officials announced their plans for WKAR-TV to build on the Michigan State television operation, which had produced more than 750 programs since 1951, including the relocation of the studios from the electrical engineering building into a series of Quonset huts along Kalamazoo Street on the campus and the acquisition of mobile units for outside broadcasting. One program, Curtain Going Up, was a television adaptation of the popular WKAR radio program by the same name, which had been on the air for 18 years. Also slated were nightly telecourses in drivers' education and political science.
WKAR-TV began broadcasting on January 15, 1954. The first day featured several activities and events on the campus, including a luncheon at which FCC commissioner John C. Doerfer spoke, as well as a dedication broadcast in the evening with speeches from Governor G. Mennen Williams and Michigan State president John A. Hannah. WKAR-TV was the third noncommercial educational TV station in the United States, following KUHT in Houston and KTHE in Los Angeles (which soon folded). Live shows predominated, representing as much as 80 percent of WKAR-TV's program output. The station launched four months before the Ann Arbor–based Educational Television and Radio Center initiated regular program service to the nation's then-six educational stations on May 16. Despite operating out of Quonset huts that were noisy when it rained, the studio facility—once a cafeteria for postwar student housing—was seen as among the best. Robert Page recalled that others called them "the fat cats of educational TV".
In 1957, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) revised restrictions on college football telecasts, at the behest of several state legislatures, to permit the telecast of home games on a noncommercial basis by "the home college's institutionally owned educational television station", with WKAR-TV as a potential beneficiary. The station took advantage and carried a game between the Notre Dame and Michigan State from Spartan Stadium on November 9 of that year. That same year, WKAR-TV began airing educational television programs for seven Lansing elementary schools, where fifth-graders received art, science, and music lessons.