CISA-DT (channel 7) is a
television station
A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the earth's s ...
in
Lethbridge
Lethbridge ( ) is a city in the province of Alberta, Canada. With a population of 106,550 in the 2023 Alberta municipal censuses, 2023 municipal census, Lethbridge became the fourth Alberta city to surpass 100,000 people. The nearby Canadian ...
, Alberta, Canada, part of the
Global Television Network
The Global Television Network (more commonly called Global, or occasionally Global TV) is a Television in Canada, Canadian English language, English-language terrestrial television, terrestrial television network. It is currently Canada's se ...
.
Owned and operated
In the broadcasting industry, an owned-and-operated station (frequently abbreviated as an O&O) usually refers to a television or radio station owned by the network with which it is associated. This distinguishes such a station from an affiliate ...
by network parent
Corus Entertainment
Corus Entertainment Inc. (often simply known as Corus) is a Canadian mass media and television production company. The company was founded in 1987 as Shaw Radio Ltd. as a subsidiary of Shaw Communications and was spun-off from Shaw in 1999. It h ...
, the station maintains studios inside the
Royal Bank building at the corner of 7 Street South and 4 Avenue South in
Downtown Lethbridge, and its transmitter is located near
Highway 25 and Range Road 221, just outside the city.
The station carries the full Global network schedule, and its programming is similar to
sister station
In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement.
Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...
CICT-DT
CICT-DT (channel 2) is a television station in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, part of the Global Television Network. The station is owned and operated by network parent Corus Entertainment, and has studios at the Calgary Television Centre on 23 St ...
in
Calgary
Calgary () is a major city in the Canadian province of Alberta. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806 making it the third-largest city and fifth-largest metropolitan area in C ...
. It is the smallest station in the Global network (formerly second to the defunct Shaw-owned affiliate
CJBN-TV in
Kenora, Ontario
Kenora (), previously named Rat Portage (), is a city situated on the Lake of the Woods in Ontario, Canada, close to the Manitoba boundary, and about east of Winnipeg by road. It is the seat of Kenora District.
The history of the name exten ...
) and is the only standalone commercial station in
Southern Alberta
Southern Alberta is a region located in the Canadian province of Alberta. In 2016, the region's population was approximately 291,112. The primary cities are Lethbridge and Medicine Hat. The region is known mostly for agricultural production, but o ...
.
History
As CJLH-TV
The station first signed on the air on November 20, 1955, as CJLH-TV, broadcasting on VHF channel 7 from a 167,000-watt transmitter atop a tower located at what was the city limits of Lethbridge. The station was a joint venture between local radio station
CJOC (the "CJ" in the call sign) and the ''
Lethbridge Herald'' (the "LH"). It was managed by CJOC's owners, Taylor Pearson & Carson, and began life as an affiliate of the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is the Canadian Public broadcasting, public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a Crown corporation that serves as the national public broadcaster, with its E ...
's (CBC)
television network
A television broadcaster or television network is a telecommunications network for the distribution of television show, television content, where a central operation provides programming to many television stations, pay television providers or ...
. Network programs on
kinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program on motion picture film directly through a lens focused on the screen of a video monitor. The process was pioneered during the 1940s ...
arrived within a few days to a week after they went to air live in
Toronto
Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...
,
Montreal
Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...
,
Vancouver
Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...
, or the U.S. networks. Three months after CJLH went to air, measurement services showed that the station had a potential audience of 9,400 homes, but within a year, that grew to 19,200, and of those, 16,000 had bought television sets. At the time, CJLH was the only station in the Lethbridge area.
Local programming at the time included local newscasts; ''Channel 7 Spotlight'', showcasing area talent; ''Remember When'', a series of programs hosted by Harry Baalim using slides, pictures and relics to tell the history of
Southern Alberta
Southern Alberta is a region located in the Canadian province of Alberta. In 2016, the region's population was approximately 291,112. The primary cities are Lethbridge and Medicine Hat. The region is known mostly for agricultural production, but o ...
; and ''Home Gardener'', featuring many experts in the field demonstrating proper horticultural technique. These programs (along with several others) earned the station many awards, including seven awards from ''Liberty'' magazine in the 1950s and 1960s.
In 1958, the timeshifting problems the station had with network programming were eliminated when it was able to get a direct microwave link to the CBC network via its Calgary time-delay centre. The problem still existed for live sports events, such as
NHL
The National Hockey League (NHL; , ''LNH'') is a professional ice hockey league in North America composed of 32 teams25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. The NHL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Cana ...
hockey and
CFL
The Canadian Football League (CFL; , LCF) is a professional Canadian football league in Canada. It comprises nine teams divided into two divisions, with four teams in the East Division and five in the West Division. The CFL is the highest pr ...
football telecasts. In 1961, CJLH expanded into the
Crowsnest Pass
Crowsnest Pass (sometimes referred to as Crow's Nest Pass, ) is a low mountain pass across the Continental Divide of the Canadian Rockies on the Alberta–British Columbia border.
Geography
The pass is located in southeast British Columbia an ...
area, by opening a repeater station at
Burmis on channel 3. An application from
CFCN-TV in Calgary to open a repeater station in Lethbridge was unsuccessful in getting
CRTC approval that year.
However, a year later in 1968, an agreement was reached between CFCN and CJLH to share space on the CJLH tower and building for technical equipment. On September 3, CFCN went on the air with a repeater station on channel 13. That same year, the station's first 2-inch black and white videotape recorder was installed, and a repeater in
Brooks began operations, transmitting at low power on VHF channel 3.
As CJOC-TV
In 1970, program production was increased significantly when CJLH became a two-camera operation. Two years later, the ''Herald'' sold its stake in the station to
Selkirk Communications (as Taylor Pearson & Carson had been renamed in 1959), who changed its call sign to CJOC-TV to match the radio station. It became a semi-satellite of co-owned CFAC-TV in Calgary (now
CICT-DT
CICT-DT (channel 2) is a television station in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, part of the Global Television Network. The station is owned and operated by network parent Corus Entertainment, and has studios at the Calgary Television Centre on 23 St ...
) and continued local production with shows such as ''Time Out'', ''Ski Reports'', ''Our Town'', ''Sunday Hour'', ''Thought for the Day'', ''Focus on University'', ''College Campus'' and numerous specials. In 1974, CJOC went full
colour
Color (or colour in Commonwealth English; see spelling differences) is the visual perception based on the electromagnetic spectrum. Though color is not an inherent property of matter, color perception is related to an object's light absorp ...
with two colour cameras and three colour 1" VTRs. CFCN moved out of the CJOC building and into its own during that same year.
As CFAC-TV-7
On September 1, 1975, CFAC-TV disaffiliated from the CBC and became an
independent station
An independent station is a broadcast station, usually a television station, not affiliated with a larger broadcast television network, network. As such, it only broadcasts broadcast syndication, syndicated programs it has purchased; brokered pr ...
when CBC Television put its own station,
CBRT (channel 9), on the air. On the same day, CJOC also disaffiliated from the CBC as CBRT had set up a rebroadcaster in Lethbridge. In 1976, it changed its callsign to CFAC-TV-7. Despite its rebroadcaster-like callsign, it was still licensed as a full-fledged station. The station took on the same branding as CFAC-TV in Calgary, adopting the moniker "2&7 Lethbridge Television". In 1979, the station increased its transmitter power to 167,000 watts. In 1988, it added a satellite dish to get video news feeds from
Global Television, and also began carrying some of Global's entertainment programming along with its Calgary sister.
Local programming continued to play an important role at the station, with successful shows such as ''Ski West'', which was syndicated to
CHCH-TV
CHCH-DT (channel 11) is an independent television station in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. Owned by Channel Zero (company), Channel Zero, the station maintains studios on Innovation Drive in the west end of Hamilton; prior to 2021, it was located ...
in
Hamilton
Hamilton may refer to:
* Alexander Hamilton (1755/1757–1804), first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States
* ''Hamilton'' (musical), a 2015 Broadway musical by Lin-Manuel Miranda
** ''Hamilton'' (al ...
,
BCTV in Vancouver and
CFCF-TV
CFCF-DT (channel 12) is an English-language television station in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, part of the CTV Television Network. It is owned and operated by network parent Bell Media alongside Noovo flagship CFJP-DT (channel 35). The two statio ...
in Montreal, and was also judged best
syndicated show in the country at the time; ''We Won't Let Him Die'', which won the CanPro Founders award in 1983; and ''Kids Belong Together'' (1990) and ''Key to Literacy'' (1992), both shows won the
Canadian Association of Broadcasters
The Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB) is a trade association representing the interests of commercial radio and television broadcasters in Canada. It is co-located with the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council in Ottawa.
It was first ...
Gold Ribbon Award for community involvement.
As CISA-TV
In 1989, Selkirk Communications merged with CFCN's then-owner,
Maclean Hunter, who immediately sold most of Selkirk's television holdings, including CFAC-TV-7, to
Western International Communications. One year later, WIC changed the station's calls to CISA-TV. Through the years, CISA's commitment to local programming has continued to reap both industry awards, making it one of the country's most awarded stations, and audience numbers in its local area.
In 1998, the Griffiths family sold WIC's assets to
Shaw Communications
Shaw Communications Inc. was a Telecommunications in Canada, Canadian telecommunication, telecommunications company which provided telephone, Internet, television, and mobile services. The company was founded in 1966 as Capital Cable Televisio ...
and
Canwest
Canwest Global Communications Corporation, which operated under the corporate name Canwest, was a major Canadian media conglomerate based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, with its head offices at Canwest Place (now called 201 Portage). It held radio, ...
. In 1999, agreements were lodged with the CRTC to split WIC assets between Canwest,
Corus Radio
This is a list of assets owned by Corus Entertainment, a Canadian multimedia broadcasting company. Approximately 80% of the voting control in Corus is held by the family of JR Shaw. The same family also owned about 80% of the voting rights in S ...
and Shaw. The CRTC approved the purchase in 2000; Western International Communications was sold to Canwest, and CISA-TV became a full-time Global Television Network station under the brand "Global Lethbridge" on September 4 that year. CISA was the last Global station to have its website integrated into the
canada.com network.
Programming
Since 1970, CISA's non-news schedule has been identical to that of CICT. Both stations air Global programming on the same schedule as
CITV
CITV is a British children's morning programming block on ITV2 and formerly a free-to-air channel owned by ITV plc. CITV, then Children's ITV, launched on 3 January 1983 as a late afternoon programming block on the ITV network for children aged ...
in
Edmonton
Edmonton is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta. It is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Central Alberta ...
.
News operation
CISA-DT presently broadcasts hours of locally produced newscasts during the week; in regards to the number of hours devoted to news programming, it is the lowest local newscast output out of Global's news-producing owned-and-operated stations. On September 10, 2008, news production for CISA shifted from Lethbridge to Calgary, with the addition of a new virtual set. In 2015, a new local news production model was launched at CISA, eliminating locally produced weekend newscasts.
Notable former on-air staff
*
Jackson Proskow
Technical information
Subchannel
Analogue-to-digital conversion
On July 27, 2011, one month before Canadian television stations in CRTC-designated mandatory
markets transitioned from analogue to digital broadcasts, the station shut down its Lethbridge analog transmitter and
flash cut
A flash cut, also called a flash cutover, is an immediate change in a complex system, with no phase-in period.
In the United States, some telephone area codes were split or overlaid immediately, rather than being phased in with a permissive di ...
to digital, becoming the first television station in Southern Alberta to convert to digital. The station's digital signal remained on
VHF channel 7.
Transmitters
The following translators will continue to offer the analog signal after CISA's main Lethbridge transmitter is converted to digital.
Alberta translators
Montana translator
CISA-DT has one translator in
Montana
Montana ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota to the east, South Dakota to the southeast, Wyoming to the south, an ...
, which is operated by a local TV association.
References
External links
Global LethbridgeCISA-DTat The History of Canadian Broadcasting by the
Canadian Communications Foundation
The Canadian Communications Foundation (CCF) was a Canadian nonprofit organization which documented the history of broadcasting in Canada, particularly radio and television networks, programs and broadcasters. The organization was established in ...
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cisa-Dt
1955 establishments in Alberta
Corus Entertainment
ISA-DT
Mass media in Lethbridge
Television channels and stations established in 1955
ISA-DT