2007 in American television
The following is a list of events affecting American television in 2007. Events listed include television show debuts, finales, cancellations, and new channel launches.
Notable events
January
February
| Date |
Event |
| 1 |
NBC affiliate WNKY in Bowling Green, Kentucky signs-on WNKY-DT2 as a CBS affiliate, giving the Bowling Green market its first locally based CBS affiliate.[1] |
| 22 |
The O.C.'s season finale airs on Fox. |
| 23 |
After 8 years, Cartoon Network ends its Friday night block, Fridays. The block originally began as Cartoon Cartoon Fridays in June 1999, becoming Summer Fridays in May 2003 before being known simply as Fridays in late September of the same year. |
March
April
| Date |
Event |
| 11 |
MSNBC announces its simulcast of radio's Imus in the Morning would be canceled, effective immediately, after public outcry against host Don Imus' derogatory remarks about the Rutgers University women's basketball team. Imus' relationship with his show's radio distributor, CBS Radio, would be terminated later in the spring over the same incident. |
May
| Date |
Event |
| 1 |
A headend, owned by Comcast, accidentally replaces an episode of Handy Manny on the Disney Channel with footage of graphic pornography for viewers in Lincroft, New Jersey. The incident is reported to Comcast, which investigates, but no findings are announced to the public. |
| 5 |
For the first time in 5 years, WNBC, NBC's New York flagship station, revives the We're 4 New York campaign after they return for a brief time during 2002 Winter Olympics. The song promos was stopped after 2008 Summer Olympics in 2008 in the wake of the "Lend America" incident. |
| 20 |
Fox airs the 18th season finale of The Simpsons, "You Kent Always Say What You Want". With this episode, The Simpsons reaches the landmark 400 episode milestone. |
| 23 |
On Fox, Jordin Sparks wins the 6th season of the popular singing competition American Idol; Blake Lewis is the runner up. |
| 27 |
ABC's New York flagship station, WABC-TV, is knocked off the air due to a newsroom studio fire that happened minutes before its scheduled 11:00 p.m. newscast. The station briefly returned to carry an ABC West Coast flagship feed and a rebroadcast of ABC World News. |
June
| Date |
Event |
| 14 |
Trace Gallagher resigns as anchorman of Fox Report Weekend on the Fox News Channel and is replaced by Laurie Dhue. As a result, Studio B Weekend, which was also anchored by Gallagher, is canceled. |
| 15 |
Bob Barker hosts The Price Is Right for the final time, ending his 35-year tenure on the show and 50 years on television. CBS airs Barker's final episode in both its regular daytime slot and in prime time (the latter airing as a lead-in to the 34th Daytime Emmy Awards, at which two of the network's soap operas share honors for Outstanding Drama Series (Guiding Light and The Young and the Restless)). |
| 26 |
In an on-air protest over trivial journalism (specifically MSNBC producers ranking Paris Hilton's release from jail ahead of developments in the Iraq War), newsreader Mika Brzezinski attempts to set fire to a news script, tears up a second, and shreds a third. |
| During installation of a new satellite receiver in Illinois, the Emergency Alert System is accidentally activated at 7:35 AM CDT. An Emergency Action Notification is issued for the United States, followed by dead air. This was played on almost every television and radio station in the Chicago area and throughout large portions of the state. The signal then switched to WGN radio. Garry Meier, then the announcer for WCKG, comes on the air, not knowing what has happened. |
July
August
| Date |
Event |
| 7 |
On the premiere episode of the CBS game show Power of 10, contestant Jamie Sadler wins $1,000,000. This was the first time that a contestant won $1,000,000 or more on the first episode of an American game show. |
| 17 |
The Disney Channel's premiere showing of High School Musical 2 becomes the most-watched made-for-cable movie ever, drawing in 17.24 million viewers. |
| 30 |
The Big Ten Network formally launches, but its debut is marred by its failure to reach carriage agreements with Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Charter Cable, and several other smaller providers serving the conference's geographical footprint. The dispute goes unsolved for nearly a year, causing millions of fans to miss several games seen in previous years via local syndication, public broadcasting stations connected to universities, and ESPN's family of networks. |
September
October
November
December
| Date |
Event |
| 3 |
ESPN's Monday Night Football telecast of the unbeaten New England Patriots and the Baltimore Ravens draws 17.52 million viewers, breaking the basic cable viewership record set earlier in the year by sister network Disney Channel's High School Musical 2. |
| 23 |
Ashlee Register wins the $1,720,000 jackpot, along with a banked total of $75,000, for a grand total of $1,795,000 on the ABC game show Duel. She becomes the second female contestant to win $1,000,000 or more on a game show and sets the record for the highest amount of money won on a game show by a woman. |
| 29 |
After weeks of political pressure (and, to a lesser extent, acknowledging the limited reach of the NFL Network), the National Football League allows that network's broadcast of the game between the New England Patriots and New York Giants to be simulcast nationally on league broadcast partners CBS and NBC. The Patriots would win the game to become the first team in NFL history to go undefeated in a 16-game regular season. (The teams would meet again later in Super Bowl XLII, where the Giants won the NFL title and prevented the Pats from going 19–0.) |
| 31 |
Nickelodeon Games and Sports for Kids leaves the air (although it stayed on Dish Network until April 23, 2009, when it was replaced by the west coast feed of Cartoon Network) and is replaced by The N, allowing that kids-oriented network and its sister channel Noggin to air on a 24/7 basis after previously sharing the same channel space. |
Programs
Debuts
Returning this year
Ending this year
Changes of Network Affiliation
Made-for-TV movies
Births
Deaths
References