CN_Brendan wrote:

Thanks for those pictures Glen. Would you or anyone else have pictures of the old tower that was sitting beside the tower just demolished? It was a short tower I remember seeing as a kid. I believe it was removed sometime in the late 1990's? Secondly, what was its purpose? 

Second question first. It was the aforementioned wavestack antenna, the station's original tower. When TV started in Canada, there was a rule that B contours couldn't overlap, which ruled out an omni antenna in the early years. Of course Toronto was where the money was so they had to find a way to work within those rules. And most of Toronto got enough of a signal to make it a two-station market. I have a reception report from 1957 or so comparing CH reception to VR, WGR, WBEN and WBUF. (WKBW-TV didn't exist yet.) But it wasn't until the big tower went up that they were able to send a full-power signal in all directions, thanks to the BBG (which succeeded the CBC as regulator in the Diefenbaker era.)

CN_Brendan wrote:

I believe the entire tower was demolished early this morning.

Indeed it has. There's a video on the former employees' FB page which will probably be posted on CHCH.com later today.

I still have my copy. It was an insert in the Monday, February 28, 1977 edition of the Hamilton Spectator. There was also a great series of one-hour specials focusing on each decade... Something that wouldn't happen today. I recorded each one but interference compromised quality.

RadioActive wrote:

In the days before VCRs (and simsub) Canadian stations were often the best way to catch a show you couldn't see because it was on opposite another one you wanted to watch. And this was the only real way to view both of them. And in some cases, primetime started at 7:30 PM, giving viewers an extra half hour of choice, with the CBC & CTV often airing American shows before they ran on the Big 3 Networks stateside.

The cable rules pretty much put the kibosh on that, and now almost everything is run concurrently with the U.S. stations.

dieter wrote:

CBC carried a lot of those Saturday shows, but on different nights because of Hockey Night in Canada.

Here's a look at what the CBC was running in that classic year of 1972. Notice where the CBS Saturday classics discussed above wound up. All In The Family and M*A*S*H were both on Friday, while Mary Tyler Moore came up on Tuesday. And Carol Burnett didn't air until Thursday.

CBC ran those shows as pre-releases - meaning we got to enjoy them twice. (Back then though, filmed shows sent to all the Canadian networks and stations were on 16mm as opposed to the 35mm versions the Amnets ran! Not only were they grainer, the film chains used to run them were often dark and dirty - and not in a fun way.)

I remember all three of the Amnet intros. ABC & CBS discontinued theirs around 1970 but NBC was using its intro until 1976 when they brought in the ill-advised, ill-fated 'N'. And while they used it on the Tonight Show, it wasn't used on the first SNLs, save for the Star Trek cancellation sketch (which is on YouTube.)

I also remember the CBC and CTV intros running well into the 70s. CBC stopped theirs around 1974 when they brought in the original exploding 'C'.

I remember finding the CHCH Ultra colour intro in their archives - but it was silent! Audio was run off a cart instead of from the film.

And for once, the CRTC isn't to blame for the delayed introduction of colour. That one's on its predecessor, the BBG. CFTO actually bought some of the earliest models from RCA when it built the Agincourt studio. And according to articles from that era, CFPL London was prepared to put colour on the air with 90 minutes' notice. But the BBG apparently decided that wasn't fair to the other stations - especially those in small markets that were still trying to pay for their original gear! So colour wasn't official launched here until 1966 - coincidentally, the same year all the Amnets ramped up their colo(u)r programming.

RadioActive wrote:

Speaking of CKDS, why didn't this happen?

Back then, the CRTC was actually concerned with media concentration. Also, Hamilton wasn't yet a Toronto exurb.

turkeytop wrote:

One of my favourite Canadian sitcome was Corner Gas. Did any of the US netwarks pick that up?

WGN America, the U.S. cable version of the Chicago independent. WGN owner Nexstar has since morphed it into NewsNation. Canada's received the WGN local feed (presumably with some rights exceptions) since 1991.

Tomas Barlow wrote:

I always found it ironic that those call letters are synonymous with news on radio in Detroit because of WWJ radio, but not on TV.

WWJ radio and the original WWJ-TV, channel 4 - now WDIV - were owned by The Detroit News. That gave it a leg up in the local news race, and it led until 1967, when the News decided to downplay the riot that tore the city apart... referring to it as a 'disturbance.' As this excellent documentary produced by channel 4 admits, they essentially torpedoed their credibility, and gave away their audience to WJBK and WXYZ. It took a lot of work, a lot of money and a lot of time to get their viewers back.

You'll notice there's a fleeting reference to 'channel 9' in the doc: Windsor's CBET (originally CKLW-TV), still located on Riverside Drive, with a tower in the back -- all the better to get the signal to the original target audience in the D.



 

Some historic pics of the original tower construction in 1954, from the Hamilton Spectator collection of the Hamilton Public Library:

In many cases Bell is upgrading these transmitters simply because they can't get analog replacements. Channel Zero (CHCH) had a different problem in their northern Ontario markets because of the repack, but has said they can't afford digital units.

Per, this December 9, 2020 message from the Digital Forum OTA station status thread:

CHCH off-the-air in Northern Ontario

[i]Well this sucks. An email that I received when inquiring about the status of CHCH's over-the-air signal in North Bay and Sudbury. No word yet whether Sault-Ste-Marie & Timmins have been affected.

[color=#2969b0]Thank you for contacting us regarding the over-the-air transmission of CHCH-TV in the Sudbury area. We regret to inform you that CHCH is, at present, no longer available via over-the-air transmission locally.

Background:
In the spring of 2019, the Government of Canada completed its auction of the 600 MHz frequency across Canada. CHCH-TV had used a portion of that frequency to operate our over-the-air television transmitter which provided signal into Sudbury and surrounding areas. In total, the Government sold the 600 MHz frequency for more than $3.4 billion dollars.
ISED (Innovation, Science and Economic Development), who regulates the use of broadcast frequencies in Canada, mandated that broadcasters using the 600 MHz frequency transition to different frequencies if they wished to continue broadcasting over-the-air. This transition would have required investment in new broadcast equipment and a retrofit of each transmission tower prior to the deadline in 2020.
To date, Canadian broadcasters have not been provided with any compensation or assistance to fund the cost of this transition, despite the fact that the auction generated over $3.4 billion in revenue for the Government of Canada. In other countries, such as the United States, broadcasters have been compensated when similar frequency auctions and mandated evictions have occured, to assist them in transitioning to new

RadioActive wrote:

Dale Patterson wrote:

Does this seem like a good idea, given how well known the 680 News brand is? Or does it matter, as CITY News is quite well known too?

https://broadcastdialogue.com/rogers-news-radio-stations-announce-citynews-rebrand-date/

They had the same debate when CityPulse became CityNews a few decades ago. I was never quite sure why they did this, because the Pulse branding was so strong, I still hear people referring to it to this day. (And Mark Dailey's famous "CityPulse...Everywhere!" phrase practically entered the lexicon in Toronto.) But for whatever reason they made the move and have been CityNews ever since. I'm guessing CityNews is clearer than the Pulse moniker. 

CityPulse became CityNews after CHUM jettisoned Moses and bought the Craig stations. Someone decided that CityPulse, despite being a well-established brand meant nothing outside Toronto. The beginning of the blandification of City.

I remember the '29 News Capsule' in the early 70's. Anchor was John Bray. They even did a promo that ended with him being locked out of the studio.

Not now; just in isolation

It may have to do with protecting CKLY Lindsay when it was broadcasting at 910 kHz. Of course they're now at 91.9 but it probably wasn't worth redesigning the antenna array to remove that eastern null.

The old CHML Vinemount site was still standing well into the 1990s, even though it hadn't been transmitting since 1978.

I remember it like it was yesterday, even though it was an early Saturday evening in June 1986, which would make me nearly 100 years old! And it wasn't 'Eye Dispenser Missing', it was 'Eye Dispenser Still Missing'! 

I even have proof:



I'm sure that nice young man learned from his mistake, and went on to do great things. Or maybe he just stayed in television!