| Concord, California | |
|---|---|
| Branding | KTNC 42 |
| Slogan | ¡Somos tu canal! (We're your station!) |
| Channels | Digital: 14 (UHF) |
| Subchannels | (see article) |
| Affiliations | Estrella TV |
| Owner | Titan TV Broadcast Group (TTBG/KTNC License Sub, LLC) |
| First air date | June 19, 1983 |
| Call letters' meaning | Television Northern California |
| Sister station(s) | KCNS |
| Former callsigns | KFCB (1983-1996) |
| Former channel number(s) | Analog: 42 (UHF, 1983-2009) Digital: 63 (UHF) |
| Former affiliations | independent (1983-2001) Azteca America (2001-2007) TuVision (2007-2009) |
| Transmitter power | 40 kW |
| Height | 962 m |
| Facility ID | 21533 |
| Website | www.ktnc.com |
KTNC-TV, digital channel 14, is the Estrella TV affiliate in Concord, California, serving both Bay Area and Sacramento areas. KTNC is owned by New World TV Group and broadcasts at 40 kilowatts.
Contents |
The station began broadcasting in 1983 as KFCB, a Christian-broadcasting station owned by First Century Broadcasting (later, Family Christian Broadcasting) — the initials in the company name formed the station's original call letters. At that time, its president was Rev. Ronn Haus. A majority of its air time was devoted to Christian programming, including its own in-house productions. The flagship program was called California Tonight, later retitled Coast to Coast, a Christian talk show with sermons, conversations with religious topics, and musical guests. The program utilized an applause cart (audio tape cartridge) to give the viewers the impression of a studio audience. Other programming included The 700 Club, Dr. Robert Schuller's Hour of Power, and various other local and national religious programs, usually of an evangelical nature.
In its earliest years, KFCB supplemented the religious programs with secular shows such as Speed Racer, Dennis The Menace, Donna Reed, Father Knows Best, Mighty Hercules, Candid Camera, New Zoo Revue, Danger Mouse, CNN Headline News, and others for about 5 hours per day. Although the station aired secular programming and commercials, KFCB's primary revenue source was always viewer donations; commercial revenue was not significant. Commercials that aired were primarily "direct response" spots. The station broadcast semi-annual telethons, in the manner of public television and radio. Christian children's programming included The Gospel Bill Show, Superbook, Davey and Goliath, and others. From 1985 to 1986, the station phased out most of its secular shows, although a lineup of Saturday morning secular shows remained until at least 1989. The secular shows were occasionally modified to meet the station's "Christian" standards—master control operators were instructed to cover up the "Hollywood Minute" feature of CNN Headline News, and beer commercials were deleted from It's Your Business, a syndicated discussion program. During the fall of 1989, KFCB aired a schedule of Western Athletic Conference college football games.
KFCB's studios were originally located at 5101 Port Chicago Highway, in the industrial section of north Concord, just north of the interchange with State Route 4. Later, space was leased in a neighboring office building for additional offices and a larger studio. Only the cameras (three RCA TK-761's) were moved to the new studio, with the control room remaining in the original building. The new studio was also the only television studio in the Bay Area to feature a restroom in the middle of the studio floor, the result of the studio being located in a roughed-in, but unfinished, office structure. The restroom was placed off-limits during tapings as a result of not being soundproof. The RCA transmitter was located on the north peak of Mount Diablo, in a very difficult to access building which was barely large enough to house the transmitter itself—the result of challenges from environmentalists against the station's original application for a construction permit. An engineer working on the front panel of the transmitter was actually standing outside the building itself. The North Peak transmitter site was to be decommissioned at the end of analog transmission in June, 2009. The digital transmitter site is on Mt. Diablo's main peak.
KFCB maintained a full-time production staff and generated much of its own programming, primarily short ministry programs with local ministers. A Sunday-afternoon public-affairs program, Open Forum, covered secular community issues and was the result of an agreement between First Century Broadcasting and a competing applicant for the channel 42 license. The program was later replaced by a similar show, The Informed Viewer.
Around 1988, a translator station, K34AV, was built in Fresno, California to rebroadcast KFCB's signal. The translator became low-power station KSDI-LP in 1997 (now on channel 33) and is no longer associated with KFCB/KTNC. Efforts around the same time to construct another translator in Modesto, California, and purchase a full-power station on Long Island, New York failed.
In 1990, the license renewal application of KFCB came under fire from minority groups for alleged failures to comply with the equal employment opportunity regulations of the FCC. After an investigation by the FCC, the license was ultimately renewed.
A few years later, Haus and other partners decided to form United Christian Broadcasting, with KFCB as the flagship station, which was intended to bring station's programming to a national audience. The venture would prove to be a financial disaster, and by 1996 Haus was forced to sell the station to Pappas Telecasting, at which time the station adopted the KTNC-TV callsign.
In 1997, Pappas acquired KFWU-TV in Fort Bragg in 1997 from Sainte Limited,[1] at which point KFWU became a satellite of KTNC (though at first, KFWU was considered the main station and KTNC the satellite).[2] That station became KUNO-TV in 2003.
KUNO was sold to Jeff Chang in July 2010.[3] Chang would later drop the KTNC simulcast in favor of Retro Television Network programming, under new call letters (originally KBQR; now KQSL), upon taking over.[4]
KTNC was among the earliest affiliates of Azteca America upon its formation in 2001.[5] However, Pappas Telecasting terminated KTNC's affiliation agreement with Azteca America after the end of the June 30, 2007 broadcast day.[6] The next day, KTNC officially became a part of Pappas' independent Spanish language network, TuVision.[7] The Azteca América affiliation for the San Francisco DMA moved to a newly-created digital subchannel of KBWB (now KOFY-TV), while the Azteca América affiliation for the Sacramento DMA moved to a low-power station, KSTV-LP.[8] DirecTV replaced KTNC with the KBWB subchannel in some locations on July 1, 2007.
On January 16, 2009, it was announced that several Pappas stations, including KTNC and KUNO, would be sold to New World TV Group, after the sale received United States bankruptcy court approval.[9]
On June 3, 2009, the Federal Communications Commission announced that KTNC would be one of 35 stations to go dark at the end of full-power analog television operation on June 12, 2009.[10] However, the station was transmitting a digital signal as of June 13, 2009.
KTNC affiliated with Estrella TV upon its launch in 2009.[11]
The station's digital channel is multiplexed:
Digital channels
| Digital Channel | Programming |
|---|---|
| 42.1 | Estrella TV // Bay Area |
| 42.2 | Estrella TV // Central Valley |
| 42.3 | This TV |
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