Twin Cities Public Television

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KTCA and KTCI
Minneapolis-St. Paul
Branding	TPT-2, TPT-17, etc.
Channels	2 (VHF), 17 (UHF), 4 KTCA translators analog, 34 (UHF), 16 (UHF) digital
Affiliations	PBS
Owner	Twin Cities Public Television
Founded	KTCA=September 3, 1957, KTCI=May 3, 1965
Call letters meaning	Twin Cities Area
Former affiliations	NET (1957-1970)
Website	www.tpt.org

Twin Cities Public Television (TPT) is the organization that operates the KTCA and KTCI television stations in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota. KTCA broadcasts on channel 2 and 34 (digital), and KTCI broadcasts on 17 and 16 (digital). The two stations were usually referred to individually, but the TPT name came around as the Twin Cities stations transitioned toward the use of digital television, which blurs the line on what a television channel actually is. KTCA began broadcasting on September 3, 1957, and its sister station came online on May 3, 1965. In 1967, KTCA became the first educational station in the United States to broadcast in color. Channel 17 was also earlier assigned to the Tedesco Brothers in the early 1950s to be a commercial station, WCOW-TV (see KDWB) affiliated with the DuMont network, but this station never made it on the air.

Contents 1 Programming 1.1 The Minnesota Channel 1.2 Digital TV 2 Transmissions 3 Documentaries 4 Series 5 External link 6 References

[edit] Programming

The organization has not been as prolific as some public television stations in the amount of material produced, but some very high quality productions have been made. The station produced Newton's Apple from 1983 to 1998 as well as the acclaimed 1994 movie Hoop Dreams.

The Friday night public-affairs program Almanac, which is distributed to other channels around the state via Minnesota Public Television, has been aired weekly for more than 20 years. Longtime hosts Eric Eskola and Cathy Wurzer are married—considered the most visible couple in Minnesota journalism, they have also spent time at other area stations. Eskola currently contributes political reports to WCCO radio and Wurzer now hosts the regional portion of Morning Edition at Minnesota Public Radio. Eskola is noted for his fondness for scarves, wearing a different one each week on Almanac. Almanac at the Capitol, a special extra political report hosted by Mary Lahammer (daughter of longtime Associated Press political writer Gene Lahammer, now retired), has been airing for a few years during the time when the Minnesota State Legislature is in session.

KTCI channel 17 usually broadcasts weather information during daylight hours, providing a simple service similar to The Weather Channel. However, programming on 17 is preempted when the Legislature is convened, and the station carries C-SPAN-like coverage. In the evening around prime time, 17 often rebroadcasts programs that had been shown on channel 2 a few days before.

KTCA experimented with an evening newscast named NewsNight Minnesota from the mid-1990s until 2001. Also broadcast throughout the state, it aired Monday through Thursday and took a slower approach to the news where stories were covered in greater depth.

TPT provided some resources for the program Mental Engineering, which analyzes advertisements aired on commercial television. Originally a public-access TV program from St. Paul, it is reportedly the first such show to air nationally in prime time. In that episode, host John Forde and guests including Aisha Tyler, Lizz Winstead, and two others analyzed the ads aired during Super Bowl XXXVI in 2002. It aired on PBS stations covering 85% of the United States. The program went off the air for a couple of years, but returned in 2005 as part of TPT's "Minnesota Channel" (described below).

More recently, the station produced Chris Farrell's series Right on the Money!, which was a companion series to his radio program Sound Money, produced by American Public Media. TPT has also worked on numerous individual documentaries and documentary series.

[edit] The Minnesota Channel

In 2004, TPT began setting aside time on 17 for the "Minnesota Channel" or "TPT-MN" on Saturday and Sunday evenings, a timeslot dedicated to Minnesota-related programming that often includes shows produced by other PBS stations in the state.

A number of the programs broadcast in the TPT-MN time frame include ethnic programming targeting some of the different communities that now call Minnesota and the Twin Cities home. Some of these shows are also broadcast on public access cable television channels in the region:

• Zona Latina (Latino)
• Kev Koom Siab (Hmong)
• Geetmala (Hindi)
• BelAhdan (Middle Eastern)
• Journey to the East (Chinese)
• Vietnamese News (Vietnamese)

Originally, the TPT-MN programming block was essentially a reorganization of pre-existing shows, but TPT began to work with various non-profit organizations within the state to create new documentaries and other material. In this arrangement, the collaborating organization contributes money to TPT, while TPT provides production support and guarantees at least three broadcasts. Strict editorial guidelines were created to help prevent the programs from simply turning into infomercials.

At the end of 2005, TPT dropped the standard-definition broadcast of (analog) KTCI from the KTCI-DT signal, replacing it with a 24-hour version of the Minnesota Channel.

[edit] Digital TV

Twin Cities Public Television offers six channels of digital programming 24 hours a day to viewers with a DTV receiver or subscription to local cable providers. The digital sub-channels are tpt-HD (digital channel 2-1, Time Warner 1025, Comcast 240, Mediacom 802, and Charter Communications 782), tpt-2D (digital channel 17-1, Time Warner 237 and 1024, and Mediacom 101), tpt-MN (digital channel 17-2, Time Warner 234 and 1021, Comcast 243, and Mediacom 102), tpt-Kids (digital channel 17-3, Time Warner 233 and 1020, Comcast 242, and Mediacom 103), tpt-Create (digital channel 17-4, Time Warner 235 and 1022, Comcast 241, and Mediacom 104), and tpt-Wx (digital channel 17-5, and Time Warner 236 and 1023).

[edit] Transmissions

Channel 17 usually stops broadcasting at midnight. On KTCI's digital broadcast, one subchannel (called TPT-WX) is always broadcasting with weather information. Four other subchannels are typically carried on KTCI-DT:

• Standard definition TPT-2
• TPT-MN
• PBS Kids
• Create

The entire bandwidth of KTCA-DT is used for high-definition broadcasts, so it is called TPT-HD.

KTCA and KTCI are broadcast from the KMSP Tower in Shoreview, Minnesota. There are four broadcast translators for KTCA:

• K65FW 65 (Frost)
• K45EH 45 (Jackson)
• K46AA 46 (St. James)
• K44AE 44 (Willmar)

[edit] Documentaries

Some of the more notable documentaries produced by the organization include:

• Hoop Dreams which followed some aspiring basketball players (1995 George Foster Peabody Award)
• Liberty! about the American Revolution (1997 George Foster Peabody Award)
• Benjamin Franklin about the historical figure (2002–2003 Creative Arts Emmy Award: Outstanding Nonfiction Special)
• The Forgetting about Alzheimer's disease (2003–2004 Creative Arts Emmy Award: Outstanding Nonfiction Special)

[edit] Series

• Newton's Apple
• Right on the Money
• DragonflyTV
• Face Off Minnesota

[edit] External link

• Twin Cities Public Television
• Query the FCC's TV station database for KTCA
• Query the FCC's TV station database for KTCI
• Query the FCC's TV station database for K65FW
• Query the FCC's TV station database for K45EH
• Query the FCC's TV station database for K46AA
• Query the FCC's TV station database for K44AE

[edit] References

• Geneva Collins (2005-03-14). TPT gives area nonprofits a voice on Minnesota Channel. Current. Retrieved on 2006-02-20.