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KCAL-TV (channel 9) is an independent television station in
Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...
, United States. It is owned by the
CBS News and Stations CBS News and Stations is a division of the CBS Entertainment Group unit of Paramount Global that owns and operates a group of United States, American television stations along with CBS News. , the division owns 28 stations: 15 are the core stati ...
group alongside CBS West Coast flagship
KCBS-TV KCBS-TV (channel 2), branded CBS Los Angeles, is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast of the United States, West Coast flagship station of the CBS network. It is owned and operated by the n ...
(channel 2). The two stations share studios at the Radford Studio Center on Radford Avenue in the Studio City section of Los Angeles; KCAL-TV's transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson.


History


KFI-TV (1948–1951)

Channel 9 signed on the air as commercial station KFI-TV on August 25, 1948, owned by Earle C. Anthony alongside KFI radio (640 AM). However, the station was originally licensed as
experimental An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...
W6XEA about 1940, and in 1944 applied for the call letters KSEE (which are now used by the NBC affiliate in Fresno, California). It is unknown whether any transmissions occurred under either call sign. The station initially broadcast a limited schedule with six hours weekly, and formally began operations on October 6, 1948, with hours that day. Though KFI had long been affiliated with NBC Radio, KFI-TV did not affiliate with the then-upstart NBC Television Network as NBC was building its own station, KNBH (channel 4, now
KNBC KNBC (channel 4) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast of the United States, West Coast flagship (broadcasting), flagship station of the NBC network. It is owned and operated by the network ...
), which went on the air in January 1949. KFI general manager William B. Ryan indicated a willingness to affiliate with a network other than NBC or start a mutual regional network. Channel 9 has been an independent station for virtually its entire history, though it carried DuMont programming from 1954 up until that network's 1956 demise. At the 3rd Emmy Awards in January 1951, the station won in the best educational show category for ''KFI-TV University''.


KHJ-TV (1951–1989)

Channel 9's engineers threatened to go on strike in 1951 over financial reasons the station had to go through, leading Anthony to sell the station to the General Tire and Rubber Company in August of that year. A few months earlier, General Tire had purchased the Don Lee Broadcasting System, a regional West Coast radio network (the original Don Lee television station, KTSL (channel 2), was sold separately to CBS; it evolved into future sister
KCBS-TV KCBS-TV (channel 2), branded CBS Los Angeles, is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast of the United States, West Coast flagship station of the CBS network. It is owned and operated by the n ...
). Don Lee's flagship station was KHJ radio (930 AM), and General Tire changed its new television station's call letters to KHJ-TV in September 1951. One former employee referred to the call letters as standing for "kindness, happiness and joy", although the call sign was likely randomly assigned. The Don Lee name was so well respected in California broadcasting that KHJ-TV called itself "Don Lee Television" for a few years in the early 1950s, even though it had never been affiliated with KHJ radio until the 1951 deal. In 1955, General Tire purchased
RKO Radio Pictures RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, is an American film production and distribution company, historically one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Kei ...
to give the company's television station group access to RKO's film library. In 1959, General Tire's broadcasting and film divisions were merged as RKO General. By the mid-1960s, channel 9 offered a standard independent schedule of
movies A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, since ...
, off-network reruns, children's shows like ''The Pancake Man'' hosted by Hal Smith (who showed educational shorts like '' The Space Explorers''), first-run syndicated programs, and locally produced programs including local newscasts,
sports events Sport is a physical activity or game, often Competition, competitive and organization, organized, that maintains or improves physical ability and skills. Sport may provide enjoyment to participants and entertainment to spectators. The numbe ...
and public affairs programs. In the late 1960s, KHJ embarked on a novel, groundbreaking (and inexpensive) experiment, called ''Tempo'', which heavily borrowed from the
talk radio Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. They may feature monologues, dialogues between the hosts, Interview (jo ...
craze on local radio stations. Daytime programming was divided into three blocks running three hours in length, called ''Tempo I'', ''Tempo II'' and ''Tempo III''. The second of the three programs, ''Tempo II'' was perhaps the most active, controversial and innovative. For the first couple of years the hosts were Stan Bohrman and Maria Cole (the wife of
Nat King Cole Nathaniel Adams Coles (March 17, 1919 – February 15, 1965), known professionally as Nat King Cole, alternatively billed as Nat "King" Cole, was an American singer, jazz pianist, and actor. Cole's career as a jazz and Traditional pop, pop ...
). Guests ranged from William F. Buckley to Sammy Davis Jr. and the political movers and shakers in Southern California. At one point, Stan even quit the program after what he called censorship on the topic of Eldridge Cleaver. Bohrman came back to the program and was joined by a new co-host, Regis Philbin. They became a very popular fixture in Los Angeles television. In fact, in his book about those days, Philbin credits the chemistry with Bohrman and the format of the program as forerunners of much of what would become the cable news format 20 years later. In the early 1970s, KHJ-TV sought a similar programming strategy to that of crosstown competitor
KTLA KTLA (channel 5) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast flagship station of The CW. It is the largest directly owned property of the network's majority owner, Nexstar Media Group, and is ...
(channel 5), which focused more on talk shows, game shows, sports, feature films and off-network drama series. The cartoons were phased out (some of them moving to
KTTV KTTV (channel 11) is a television station in Los Angeles, California, United States, serving as the West Coast of the United States, West Coast flagship (broadcasting), flagship station of the Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox network. It is owned a ...
and KCOP-TV), and the station ran fewer off-network sitcoms. It did continue to have a weekday children's show called ''Froozles'', which ran until the late 1980s. It also produced many half-hour public affairs programs, as well as a local talk show called ''Mid-Morning L.A.'' The first hosts were Kathy McKee and Sandy Baron on the ''Mid Day'' and ''Good Morning L.A.'' talk shows. Both were hired by KHJ's then-station manager Lional Schaen.
Bob Hilton Bob Hilton (born July 23, 1943) is an American television game show personality. He hosted ''The Guinness Game'', a revival of ''Truth or Consequences'', and the 1990 revival of ''Let's Make a Deal'' for one season and replaced by Monty Hall, and ...
, Meredith MacRae, Geoff Edwards and Regis Philbin also hosted programs on the station well into the 1980s. Edwards and MacRae won
Emmy Awards The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award categor ...
for their hosting duties during the early 1980s. Some other locally produced public affairs programs included the investigative show ''Camera 9'' and ''The Changing Family'', a program about family and social issues during the 1980s. Despite this, KHJ-TV was perceived as an also ran while KTLA was the leading independent station, even though it had a similar format. Meanwhile, a behind-the-scenes battle was underway with serious implications for the station's future—and that of its owner. In 1965, RKO General faced a threat to its license for KHJ-TV from a group called Fidelity Television. At first, Fidelity's claim focused on channel 9's programming quality. Later, Fidelity levied a more serious claim that KHJ-TV was involved in reciprocal trade practices. Fidelity alleged that RKO's parent company, General Tire, forced its retailers to purchase advertising on KHJ-TV and other RKO-owned stations as a condition of their contracts with General Tire. An administrative law judge found in favor of Fidelity, but RKO appealed. In 1972, the FCC allowed RKO to keep the license for KHJ-TV, but two years later conditioned future renewals on the renewal of sister station
WNAC-TV WNAC-TV (channel 64), branded Fox Providence, is a television station in Providence, Rhode Island, United States, affiliated with Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox and The CW. It is owned by Mission Broadcasting, which maintains a local marketing ...
in
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
. Six years later, the FCC stripped WNAC-TV of its license for numerous reasons, but largely because RKO had misled the commission about corporate misconduct at General Tire. The decision was affirmed after the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal in April 1982. The FCC awarded a replacement license for channel 7 in Boston to New England Television, a merger of two competing groups for a new channel 7. RKO General sold off WNAC-TV's non-license assets to New England Television, who used them to launch WNEV-TV (now WHDH) in place of WNAC-TV that May 21. The WNAC-TV decision also meant KHJ-TV and sister station WOR-TV in New York City had lost their licenses, but an appeals court ruled that the FCC erred when it tied channel 9's renewal to that of WNAC-TV and ordered new hearings for KHJ-TV and WOR-TV. The hearings dragged on for five years; as a result of this, the station was forced to air an unusually large amount of public-affairs programming; a combination of this and the station's cash reserves being drained by RKO's legal battles led to decreased ratings (and the station's perception as an "also-ran"). For a time, KHJ-TV's large slate of sports programming was virtually the only thing keeping the station afloat. On August 11, 1987, FCC
administrative law judge An administrative law judge (ALJ) in the United States is a judge and trier of fact who both presides over trials and adjudicates claims or disputes involving administrative law, thus involving administrative units of the executive branch of go ...
Edward Kuhlmann found RKO General unfit to be a broadcast licensee due to numerous cases of dishonesty on both its part and that of parent company
GenCorp Aerojet Rocketdyne is a subsidiary of American Arms industry, defense company L3Harris that manufactures rocket, Hypersonic flight, hypersonic, and electric propulsive systems for space, defense, civil and commercial applications. Aerojet traces ...
(the renamed General Tire), including fraudulent billing and lying about its ratings. Kuhlman ordered that all of RKO General's broadcast licenses be revoked. This ruling notably excluded WOR-TV, which had already been divested to MCA Inc. nine months prior, and was renamed WWOR-TV. GenCorp initially filed an appeal, only to withdraw it after the FCC warned that any appeal would almost certainly be denied outright. The FCC strongly advised GenCorp to divest its remaining properties to avoid the indignity of additional license stripping without any compensation.


KCAL-TV (1989–present)


Disney ownership (1988–1996)

In the midst of RKO's corporate issues, the company reached terms to sell KHJ-TV to
Westinghouse Broadcasting The Westinghouse Broadcasting Company, also known as Group W, was the broadcasting division of Westinghouse Electric Corporation. It owned several radio and television stations across the United States and distributed television shows for syndi ...
in November 1985. However, the protracted legal issues delayed FCC action on the transfer and Westinghouse ultimately withdrew its offer. A short time later, RKO General agreed to sell the station to
The Walt Disney Company The Walt Disney Company, commonly referred to as simply Disney, is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was founded on October 16 ...
; however, this transfer was also held up for over a year for the same reasons. Fidelity Television, the group that originally challenged the license in 1965, also argued against the sale. In July 1988, the FCC allowed Disney to acquire channel 9 for $324 million in a complicated settlement. RKO dropped its bid to renew the station's license, handing it to Fidelity Television. Disney then bought the channel 9 license from Fidelity for $105.4 million and KHJ-TV's non-license assets (intellectual property, studios, etc.) from RKO for $218.6 million. According to FCC general counsel Diane Killory, the settlement had the same effect as finding RKO unfit to be a broadcast licensee, and RKO thus had no choice but to "get out of the business of broadcasting" (though it would take another three years for RKO to unwind its broadcasting interests). Disney began operating KHJ-TV on December 2, 1988. Over the next few months Disney fired channel 9's entire management team it inherited from RKO, including general manager Charles Velona and news director Stephanie Rank Brady. Several of the station's newscasters were pushed out as well. During the RKO/Fidelity/Disney transition, KHJ-TV's
city of license In U.S., Canadian, and Mexican broadcasting, a city of license or community of license is the community that a radio station or television station is officially licensed to serve by that country's broadcast regulator. In North American broadcast ...
was changed to the Los Angeles suburb of Norwalk, also as part of the FCC settlement. For all intents and purposes, though, it remained a Los Angeles station; the license was moved back to Los Angeles proper on October 28, 1991. On December 2, 1989—the first anniversary of its ownership, Disney changed channel 9's callsign to the present KCAL-TV, and relaunched the station as "California 9", selected from a shortlist of three possible monikers. Channel 9's longtime radio sisters had changed their calls to KRTH some years before, so Disney was theoretically free to continue trading on the KHJ call letters' 66-year legacy in Southern California. However, newly hired station manager Blake Byrne said that market research revealed the station was seen as a "non-entity" in the market, leading Disney to conclude that it needed a fresh start. Disney did, however, keep a fresco mural of RKO stars in the station lobby. The station also continued to overhaul its format in the wake of its ownership change, adding a three-hour prime time newscast on March 5, 1990, featuring veteran newscasters Jerry Dunphy, Pat Harvey, Larry Carroll and Jane Velez-Mitchell. KCAL also added many more children's programs, including cartoons from the Walt Disney animation library (including the syndicated series ''
DuckTales DuckTales refers to: Film and television * ''DuckTales'' (1987 TV series), original TV series ** '' DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp'' * ''DuckTales'' (2017 TV series), reboot TV series Video games * ''DuckTales'' (video game) ...
'' and '' Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers'', and later '' The Disney Afternoon''). The station also added a few more family-oriented off-network sitcoms and syndicated programs and then broadcast the popular
anime is a Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, , in Japan and in Ja ...
series '' Dragon Ball Z'', Eisner, Michael D. (March 22, 2011). Chapter 7: Animation. Chapter pages 48-52
Work in Progress: Risking Failure, Surviving Success
Hyperion.
that lasted well into 1997. In the early 1990s, family sitcoms were gradually phased out and KCAL added more first-run syndicated talk, reality and
court show A court show (also known as a judge show, legal/courtroom program, courtroom series, or judicial show) is a broadcast programming genre comprising legal dramas and reality legal programming. Court shows present content mainly in the form of legal ...
s, as well as
newsmagazine A news magazine is a typed, printed, and published magazine, radio, or television program, usually published weekly, consisting of articles about current events. News magazines generally discuss stories in greater depth than newspapers or new ...
series. On March 30, 1992, Disney agreed to sell KCAL-TV's license to Pinelands, Inc., then the parent company of channel 9's former New York City sister station, now called WWOR-TV. Disney would have received a 45% ownership stake in Pinelands, allowing for increased original programming to be shared between the two reunited stations. The planned merger never materialized; Pineland would agree to sell WWOR-TV to
Chris-Craft Industries Chris-Craft Industries, Inc., formerly National Automotive Fibers, Inc., was a publicly held American corporation that was traded on the New York and Pacific Stock Exchanges. In 1962, the company adopted the name of one of its acquisitions, Chris ...
, then-parent of KCOP (channel 13). In 1995, the station adopted the "K-CAL 9" branding.


Young Broadcasting ownership (1996–2002)

In 1996, The Walt Disney Company purchased Capital Cities/ABC, owners of ABC West Coast flagship KABC-TV (channel 7). Due to FCC regulations at the time that barred the ownership of two television stations in the same media market, Disney chose to retain KABC-TV and divest KCAL, which was purchased by Young Broadcasting (which Disney owned a stake in at the time) on May 14, 1996, for $385 million. The afternoon children's program block would remain until 1999, when KCOP began airing a block of animated series that UPN contracted Disney to produce. By 2000, children's programs that aired during the morning hours were dropped as well under the ownership of Young Broadcasting.


CBS ownership (2002–present)

As a result of massive debt the company accrued from its 2000 purchase of its San Francisco station,
KRON-TV KRON-TV (channel 4) is a television station licensed to San Francisco, California, United States, serving as the San Francisco Bay Area's outlet for The CW. Owned and operated by The CW's majority owner, Nexstar Media Group, KRON-TV has studios ...
(which lost its NBC affiliation in January 2002 due to a dispute between Young and the network), Young Broadcasting put KCAL up for sale in 2002. With duopolies now allowed by the FCC, the station was purchased by CBS, then a subsidiary of Viacom, on February 14, 2002; the deal was finalized on June 1, 2002. KCAL's operations were merged with those of KCBS-TV, and channel 9 moved from its longtime headquarters at the Viacom-owned Paramount Studios on Melrose Avenue in Hollywood to CBS Columbia Square, located north of the studio lot; the Melrose Avenue facility was subsequently occupied by then-sister station KRTH (which had previously been based out of the Columbia Square facility), and is currently used by the Paramount studio tour. The sale reunited the station with fellow former RKO General property KRTH-FM, which CBS acquired in 1997. The properties were split again when CBS spun off its radio division to Entercom (now Audacy, Inc.) in 2017. When CBS/Viacom bought KCAL-TV, broadcasting industry observers speculated that UPN's programming would move to KCAL from KCOP-TV. KCOP's previous owners, Chris-Craft Industries, had co-founded UPN with Viacom in 1995, and owned 50% of the network before selling its stake in UPN to Viacom in 2000. Fox Television Stations purchased KCOP and most of Chris-Craft's UPN stations in 2001. However, CBS continued to operate channel 9 as an independent station, as Fox renewed its affiliation agreement for its UPN affiliates; it is widely believed that Fox used KCOP as leverage to keep UPN on Fox-owned stations in New York City (WWOR-TV, KCAL's former sister station) and Chicago ( WPWR-TV), threatening to drop the network in those markets should Viacom move the UPN affiliation in Los Angeles to KCAL. This issue became moot with the January 2006 announcement of the merger of UPN and
The WB The WB Television Network (shortened to The WB, stylized as "THE WB", and nicknamed the "Frog Network" and/or "The Frog" for its former mascot Michigan J. Frog) was an American television network that ran from 1995 to 2006. It launched on ter ...
into
The CW Television Network The CW Network, LLC (commonly referred to as The CW or simply CW) is an American commercial broadcast television network which is controlled by Nexstar Media Group through a 75% ownership interest. The network's name is derived from the first ...
. The new network launched on September 18, 2006, with former WB affiliate KTLA as its Los Angeles outlet, due to an affiliation agreement with owner Tribune Broadcasting that resulted in 16 of Tribune's WB affiliates joining the network. KCAL-TV remains an independent station, and is currently one of thirteen such stations owned by CBS as a result of the CBS-owned CW stations reverting to independent status in 2023. On April 21, 2007, KCBS-TV and KCAL-TV moved from Columbia Square to an all-digital facility at the CBS Studio Center in Studio City. The move allowed both stations to begin broadcasting all locally produced programs in high definition, and in addition, the two stations operate in a completely tapeless newsroom. This newsroom is named in honor newscaster Jerry Dunphy, who worked at both stations during his career. With the move to Studio City and
KCET KCET (channel 28) is a secondary PBS member television station in Los Angeles, California, United States. It is owned by the Public Media Group of Southern California alongside the market's primary PBS member, Huntington Beach–licensed KOC ...
's later move to Burbank, KTLA is currently the only remaining station in Los Angeles (either in radio or television) whose studios are operated out of Hollywood. KCAL-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 9, at 1:10 p.m. on June 12, 2009, and converted its broadcasts exclusively to digital television as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.List of Digital Full-Power Stations
The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 43 to VHF channel 9. Sister station KCBS-TV took over the channel 43 allocation as it moved its digital signal from channel 60 as a result of the phaseout of channels 52–69. On December 4, 2019, CBS Corporation and Viacom remerged into ViacomCBS (now
Paramount Global Paramount Global (Trade name, d/b/a Paramount) is an American multinational mass media and entertainment Conglomerate (company), conglomerate controlled by National Amusements and Headquarters, headquartered at One Astor Plaza in Times Square, ...
). On January 5, 2023, as part of a general rebranding of its news department coinciding with the launch of new morning news blocks, KCAL changed its branding to ''KCAL News'', which was adopted across KCBS-TV's newscasts on the same day.


Programming

Although KCAL-TV is an independent station, it will occasionally air CBS programming due to extended breaking news coverage or special events that may result in programs being unable to air on KCBS-TV. For E/I programming, KCAL has the '' Go Time'' syndicated block. KCAL was the Southern California home of the annual '' MDA Labor Day Telethon'' between 1997 and 2011. In June 1979, KHJ-TV aired "Thames on 9", a week-long prime time programming stunt that featured programs from Thames Television, then a member of the British ITV network. Shows that aired during that week included '' Man About the House'' (on which the American sitcom '' Three's Company'' was based) and ''
The Benny Hill Show ''The Benny Hill Show'' is a British comedy television show starring Benny Hill that aired on the BBC and ITV between 15 January 1955 and 1 May 1989. The show consisted mainly of sketch comedy, sketches typified by slapstick, mime, parody, and ...
''; a similar stunt had aired on KHJ-TV's former New York City sister station WOR-TV two years earlier. From 1981 to 1985, KHJ-TV was home to '' Elvira's Movie Macabre''. KHJ-TV was home to the live broadcast of the Strawberry Festival Parade in Garden Grove, California, from 1986 until 1989.


Sports programming

For much of its history overall, sports have been a part of channel 9's identity. Indeed, during the station's two-decade licensing dispute, its large slate of sports programming was essentially the only thing that kept it as part of the Southern California television landscape. As of 2023, KCAL has the rights to six games a season from the NHL's
Los Angeles Kings The Los Angeles Kings are a professional ice hockey team based in Los Angeles. The Kings compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Pacific Division (NHL), Pacific Division in the Western Conference (NHL), Western Conference. ...
, produced by
Bally Sports West FanDuel Sports Network West is an American regional sports network owned by Main Street Sports Group (formerly Diamond Sports Group) and operated as part of FanDuel Sports Network, along with its sister network FanDuel Sports Network SoCal. The ...
. KCAL was also home to the Kings in the early 1980s and during the mid-to-late 1990s. As of 2025, KCAL+ also holds the broadcast rights to the
Ontario Reign The Ontario Reign are a professional ice hockey team based in Ontario, California. They are the American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate of the National Hockey League's Los Angeles Kings. The team plays its home games at the Toyota Arena. The fra ...
, the minor league affiliate of the Kings. Since 2024, KCAL has the rights to select matches featuring Orange County SC of the
USL Championship The USL Championship (USLC) is a men's professional association football, soccer league in the second tier of the United States soccer league system#Men's leagues, United States league system. It is organized by the United Soccer League (USL) a ...
. KCAL-TV previously held the broadcast television rights to the
Los Angeles Dodgers The Los Angeles Dodgers are an American professional baseball team based in Los Angeles. The Dodgers compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (baseball), National League (NL) National League West, West Div ...
baseball team, carrying a slate of games from 2006 to 2013, televising at least 50 games each year, with all telecasts being broadcast in high definition. In 2014, KCAL lost rights to the Dodger telecasts to the cable-exclusive
regional sports network A regional sports network (RSN) in the United States and Canada is a television channel that presents sports programming to a local media market or geographical region. Such channels often focus on one or a few teams who currently play in Major L ...
SportsNet LA, which is co-owned by the team and Charter Communications. Channel 9 is best known as the longtime broadcast home of the NBA's
Los Angeles Lakers The Los Angeles Lakers are an American professional basketball team based in Los Angeles. The Lakers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Pacific Division (NBA), Pacific Division of the Western Conference (NBA ...
. The station carried Lakers games from 1961 to 1964 (as KHJ-TV), and again from
1977 Events January * January 8 – 1977 Moscow bombings, Three bombs explode in Moscow within 37 minutes, killing seven. The bombings are attributed to an Armenian separatist group. * January 10 – Mount Nyiragongo erupts in eastern Zaire (no ...
to
2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...
. The latter 35 years were the NBA's longest consecutive station-team broadcast partnership, and coincided with the Lakers' golden eras of the 1980s and early 2000s. For most of channel 9's second stint with the Lakers, it aired road games only. In 2012, KCAL lost rights to the Lakers telecasts to the cable-exclusive regional sports network Spectrum SportsNet and Spectrum Deportes which was renamed in 2016 after the merger of
Time Warner Cable Time Warner Cable Enterprises LLC was an American cable television company. Before it was acquired by Charter Communications on May 18, 2016, it was ranked the second largest cable company in the United States by revenue behind only Comcast, o ...
and Charter Communications. From 1961 to 1963, KHJ-TV was the first television home of the
Los Angeles Angels The Los Angeles Angels are an American professional baseball team based in the Greater Los Angeles, Greater Los Angeles area. The Angels compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) American League West, ...
; the baseball team's telecasts moved to KTLA in 1964, when then-Angels owner
Gene Autry Orvon Grover "Gene" Autry (September 29, 1907 – October 2, 1998), nicknamed the Singing Cowboy, was an American actor, musician, singer, composer, rodeo performer, and baseball team owner, who largely gained fame by singing in a Crooner ...
's Golden West Broadcasters purchased that station. The television rights to Angels games returned to KCAL-TV in 1996 (The Walt Disney Company's ownership interest in the Angels briefly overlapped its stewardship of the station), and added more basketball coverage that same year with the
Los Angeles Clippers The Los Angeles Clippers are an American professional basketball team based in the Greater Los Angeles area. The Clippers compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference. The ...
, in addition to its Lakers telecasts. The station and the Clippers parted ways in
2001 The year's most prominent event was the September 11 attacks against the United States by al-Qaeda, which Casualties of the September 11 attacks, killed 2,977 people and instigated the global war on terror. The United States led a Participan ...
as they eventually moved their over-the-air telecasts to KTLA, while the Angels left KCAL after the 2005 season, moving to KCOP the following year. In addition, KCAL had broadcast select weekend Mighty Ducks of Anaheim games from the
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 ...
team's inaugural season in
1993 The United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly of the United Nations designated 1993 as: * International Year for the World's Indigenous People The year 1993 in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands had only 364 days, since its ...
(both the team and KCAL were Disney properties until 1996) until
2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...
, when the Ducks moved their over-the-air broadcasts to
Anaheim Anaheim ( ) is a city in northern Orange County, California, United States, part of the Greater Los Angeles area. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 346,824, making it the most populous city in Orange County, the tenth-most ...
-based independent station KDOC-TV. Also, at the end of the 2013 season, the Dodgers would part ways with KCAL-TV (becoming cable-exclusive on SportsNet LA, although a few games per season have been seen on KTLA since 2016), thus ending the station's 36-year run of local sports coverage. KCAL also carried select
Los Angeles Galaxy The Los Angeles Galaxy are an American professional Association football, soccer club based in the Greater Los Angeles area. The club competes in Major League Soccer (MLS) as a member of the Western Conference (MLS), Western Conference. The Gal ...
Major League Soccer Major League Soccer (MLS) is a professional Association football, soccer league in North America and the highest level of the United States soccer league system. It comprises 30 teams, with 27 in the United States and 3 in Canada, and is sanc ...
games until
2005 2005 was designated as the International Year for Sport and Physical Education and the International Year of Microcredit. The beginning of 2005 also marked the end of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples, Internationa ...
, when the games became cable-exclusive to Fox Sports West. In 1997, KCAL premiered the first fifteen-minute weekday sports report ''Final Quarter'', the show was an expansion of the typical five-minute sports report seen towards the end of a newscast. Several years later, the show was renamed ''KCAL 9 Sports News'' and with the purchase by CBS and the formation of the duopoly between KCAL and KCBS-TV, was renamed ''Sports Central''; the show has since expanded to a half-hour broadcast on Friday through Sunday evenings. Channel 9 has aired preseason coverage of the NFL's Chargers (then based in San Diego) from
2005 2005 was designated as the International Year for Sport and Physical Education and the International Year of Microcredit. The beginning of 2005 also marked the end of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples, Internationa ...
to
2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...
, and aired games from the Chargers'
AFC West The American Football Conference – Western Division or AFC West is one of the four divisions of the American Football Conference (AFC) in the National Football League (NFL). The division comprises the Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, ...
Division rival, the Raiders (then based in Oakland) in
2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...
(whose preseason games also aired on the station during the mid-1990s). Although Los Angeles returned to the NFL in the 2016 season via the Rams' return after two decades in St. Louis, sister station KCBS is the Rams' preseason partner. After 2016, the Chargers relocated back to Los Angeles after 56 years in San Diego and KABC-TV picked up the Chargers preseason coverage starting in the 2017 season. KCAL broadcast two '' NFL on CBS'' games during the 2017 regular season as part of an arrangement with the NFL that saw CBS get both a Rams and Chargers game on weeks when Fox had the doubleheader. Since its founding in 1994 until 2008, KCAL was the originating station of the annual John R. Wooden Classic
college basketball College basketball is basketball that is played by teams of Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. In the Higher education in the United States, United States, colleges and universities are governed by collegiate athle ...
game.


Newscasts

KCAL-TV presently broadcasts a total of hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with hours each weekday and hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in regards to the number of hours devoted to news programming, it is the second-highest local newscast output of any television station in the Los Angeles market (behind KTLA, which runs 94 hours, 20 minutes of newscasts each week). Because of the amount of news programming on the station, channel 9 is known for showing the most police chases among the Los Angeles market's news-producing stations. Often regular news programming on KCAL is suspended to cover a police chase, and programs that follow the newscast are sometimes preempted to show the chase's conclusion. In 2003, KCAL reported a quadrupling of ratings every time a police chase was shown, with up to 1.6 million viewers watching at a given time during such events. Between 2012 and 2020 (when he moved to KTTV), chases were often shown with the voice and in-air helicopter camera work of Stu Mundel; since 2021, former KNX pilot Desmond Shaw took over Mundel's role as the duopoly's chief helicopter reporter. In the 1970s, KHJ-TV aired a prime time newscast at 10 pm, which was moved to 9 p.m. during the 1980s; the station subsequently added a half-hour 8 p.m. newscast during the late 1980s, and also carried afternoon newscasts throughout this time. Some of its most notable personalities included anchors George Putnam, Chris Harris, Stan Bohrman, Tom Lawrence, Nathan Roberts, Lonnie Lardner, Linda Edwards and weather personality Andrew Amador. Shortly after taking over, Disney invested $30 million on upgrading the station's news department, tripling the number of staff and investing on electronic news equipment, including expanding the stations' studio facility at Paramount Studios to house a new newsroom and studio; the station also hired veteran newscasters Jerry Dunphy, Pat Harvey, Larry Carroll and Jane Velez-Mitchell. After retaining, in the interim, the existing 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. newcasts, and a delay on its launch from January 15, in March 5, 1990, Disney implemented the concept of a prime time news block, with the three-hour long ''Prime 9 News'' airing from 8 to 11 pm. A few years later in the early 1990s, KCAL added a short-lived half-hour newscast at 6:30 p.m. called ''First 9 News'', which focused primarily on local news and competed against the national network newscasts aired on KCBS-TV, KNBC and KABC-TV (KCBS also aired a 6:30 p.m. newscast during the mid to late 1990s, while the ''
CBS Evening News The ''CBS Evening News'' is the flagship evening News broadcasting#Television, television news program of CBS News, the news division of the CBS television network in the United States. The ''CBS Evening News'' is a daily evening broadcast featu ...
'' aired at 5:30 pm). Under Disney ownership, more daytime newscasts were added to channel 9 weekdays at 2 and 3 pm, and the 6:30 p.m. newscast was discontinued (a local newscast returned to that timeslot in the market in January 2009, when KTLA launched its own 6:30 p.m. newscast). KCAL is notable for airing newscasts during unconventional time periods; the station maintains the large amount of local newscasts that it presently does (which is far more than what is typical of most stations involved in a duopoly with a major network station) simply due to the fact that KCAL and KCBS-TV's newscasts air in timeslots that do not compete against one another, as a result, the station's newscast schedule remained unchanged after KCAL merged its operations with KCBS. Along with newscasts at noon (where it competes against KTLA), 4 p.m. (where it competes against KABC, KTLA and KNBC) and 10 p.m. (where it competes against KTLA and KTTV), and seven nights a week at 8 and 9 p.m. KCAL's newscasts are variable in tone, depending on the timeslot. Its 8 p.m. newscast is generally an update on the day's news, which largely features stories focusing on California and the Los Angeles area (and was previously branded as the ''California Report'' during the ''Prime 9 News'' era). Its 9 p.m. newscast is generally the most serious in format (and was branded in previous years as the ''Prime 9 News World Report''), that newscast prominently features political, business and international news. The noon newscast, on the other hand, features lighter stories, including features on food, health and the entertainment industry. The 4 p.m. newscast was essentially a repurposed KCBS-TV newscast and was presented by former channel 2 anchors Harold Greene and Ann Martin, who did not appear recently elsewhere on KCAL. The 4 p.m. newscast moved to KCAL from KCBS-TV in 2002 to make room for '' Dr. Phil'', which by contractual stipulations was not allowed to air opposite ''
The Oprah Winfrey Show ''The Oprah Winfrey Show'' is an American first-run syndicated talk show that was hosted by Oprah Winfrey. The show ran for twenty-five seasons from September 8, 1986, to May 25, 2011, in which it broadcast 4,561 episodes. The show was taped i ...
'' (which aired in Los Angeles on KABC-TV at 3 pm, until its syndication run ended in September 2011). Its 10 p.m. newscast is simply more of an update of the 8 p.m. news (and during the ''Prime 9 News'' era, was simply branded as the ''10 O'Clock Report''), as it competes with KTTV and KTLA (and in the past, KCOP), though in recent years, it has been shortened to 30 minutes, to make way for the local sports news program ''Sports Central''. On April 1, 2008, CBS Television Stations ordered widespread budget cuts and staff layoffs from its stations. As a result of the budget cuts, roughly 10 to 15 staffers were released from KCBS-TV and KCAL-TV, including reporters Jennifer Sabih, Greg Phillips and Jennifer Davis. 4 p.m. co-anchors Greene and Martin, who were then also the 6 p.m. anchors on KCBS-TV, were also said to have been on the layoff list, but both decided to retire from television upon the June 2009 expiration of their contracts. On April 23, 2009, former KTTV anchor Rick Garcia joined KCAL, and was paired with Pat Harvey as co-anchor of the station's weeknight 8 and 10 p.m. newscasts (Garcia is now paired with Sharon Tay, as Harvey moved to sister station KCBS-TV to co-anchor that station's 5 and 11 p.m. newscasts).


NewsCentral era

On September 19, 2009, KCBS and KCAL rebranded the newscasts on both stations to the unified ''NewsCentral'' branding (unrelated to
Sinclair Broadcast Group Sinclair, Inc., doing business as Sinclair Broadcast Group, is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. Headquartered in the Baltimore suburb o ...
's now-defunct national news division of the same name; CBS coincidentally owns former Sinclair station KOVR in
Sacramento Sacramento ( or ; ; ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of California and the seat of Sacramento County. Located at the confluence of the Sacramento and American Rivers in Northern California's Sacramento Valley, Sacramento's 2020 p ...
). The newscasts were refocused to cover more community news, including stories from outlying communities. Local news headlines from the Los Angeles Newspaper Group and
MediaNews Group MNG Enterprises, Inc., Trade name, doing business as Digital First Media and MediaNews Group, is a Denver, Colorado, United States–based newspaper publisher owned by Alden Global Capital. As of May 2021, it owns over 100 newspapers and 200 ass ...
newspapers were displayed on a ticker, "street team" submissions of video and photos from viewers were featured, reporters ended stories with ''NewsCentral'' rather than the individual station brands, and microphone flags and news vehicles were branded to show both stations' logos at once (previously, the KCBS and KCAL logos were displayed on alternating sides). Under the ''NewsCentral'' format, the two stations claimed that they covered more local news than any other television station in the country (with reporters in
Ventura County Ventura County () is a county located in the southern part of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 843,843. The largest city is Oxnard, and the county seat is the city of Ventura. Ventura County comprises ...
, the
Inland Empire The Inland Empire (commonly abbreviated as the IE) is a metropolitan area and region inland of and adjacent to coastal Southern California, centering around the cities of San Bernardino and Riverside, and bordering Los Angeles County and Or ...
and Orange County), and the only Los Angeles television station with two helicopters (subcontracted to Angel City Air, owned by reporter Larry Welk). Ed Asner was used to introduce the new newscast. CBS denies this move was made in response to other stations pooling newsgathering resources. On December 10, 2009, CBS Television Stations hired Steve Mauldin to replace Patrick McClenahan as president and general manager of the KCBS-KCAL duopoly. That week, the duopoly ultimately rescinded the ''NewsCentral'' branding, reverting to the "CBS2" and "KCAL9" news identities. The ''NewsCentral'' graphics, mic flags and logos remained in use during the interim, though on-air staff no longer used the ''NewsCentral'' identity.


Recent history

On January 14, 2012, KCAL debuted two-hour-long weekend morning newscasts (airing at 7 a.m. on Saturdays and on Sundays, which follow one-hour newscasts on KCBS); the programs are KCAL's first morning newscasts—ironically though, channel 9 was the only news-producing station in the market that did not have a news program on weekday mornings. On December 10, 2014, KCAL announced it would be dropping its hour long 2 p.m. and half-hour 3 p.m. newscasts before the end of the year to be replaced by ''
Judge Mathis ''Judge Mathis'' is an American Court show#Arbitration-based reality court show, arbitration-based reality court show presided over by Judge Greg Mathis, a former judge of Michigan's 36th Michigan district courts, District Court and African Ame ...
'' and ''
The People's Court ''The People's Court'' is an American Court show#Arbitration-based reality court show, arbitration-based reality court show, featuring an arbitrator handling small claims court, small claims disputes in a simulation, simulated courtroom set. W ...
''. As a result, the 4 p.m. newscast was truncated from an hour to 30 minutes, and ''Inside Edition'' moved from 3:30 p.m. to the 4:30 p.m. slot previously occupied by the other half of the 4 p.m. newscast. As of September 11, 2017, KCAL has reinstated the second half-hour of the 4 p.m. newscast and making the news a full hour. On July 12, 2022, KCAL announced that it would launch a seven-hour morning newscast from 4 to 11 am, replacing that of KCBS and marking the first-ever weekday morning newscast in the station's history;L.A. TV News Shakeup: KCAL Adds Morning Block as KCBS Double Pumps 'CBS Mornings' (EXCLUSIVE)
Variety, July 12, 2022.
the new ''KCAL News Mornings'' launched on January 5, 2023. At this time, KCBS replaced its existing morning newscast with a broadcast of the live Eastern edition of the network's national morning show ''
CBS Mornings ''CBS Mornings'' is an American morning television program which is broadcast on CBS. The program debuted on September 7, 2021, and airs live every weekday from 7:00a.m. to 9:00a.m., EST. It is hosted by Gayle King, Tony Dokoupil, Nate Burleson, ...
'', followed by a simulcast of the 6 a.m. hour of ''KCAL News Mornings''. In addition, to emphasize the station's history and reputation for local news programming, all newscasts across the KCBS-KCAL duopoly were rebranded as ''KCAL News'', and the station changed its on-air branding from "KCAL 9" to "KCAL Los Angeles".


Notable alumni

* Jerry Dunphy *
Mike Emanuel Mike Emanuel (born December 10, 1967) is the Chief Washington Correspondent and a former White House Correspondents' Association journalist for Fox News. He has worked for the network since July 1997. He hosts ''Fox News Live'' on Sunday at 1 p. ...
* Carter Evans * Rich Fields * Hal Fishman * Harold Greene * Pat Harvey * Jim Hill * Sharon Ito * Lisa Joyner * Kristine Leahy * Tawny Little * Dave Malkoff * Ann Martin * Byron Miranda * Leyna Nguyen *
Charles Perez Charles Dabney, known professionally as Charles Perez, is an American writer and television news reporter, anchor and talk show host. He served as the host of ''The Charles Perez Show'' from 1994 to 1996. Career Perez was in the news business ...
* Cassandra Peterson (host of '' Elvira's Movie Macabre'', retained full rights to the Elvira character after departing KHJ-TV) * Hank Plante * George Putnam * Bill Ritter * Tracie Savage * David Sheehan * Kent Shocknek * Don Steele (host of ''The Real Don Steele Show'') *
Mark Steines Mark Anthony Steines (born June 7, 1964) is an American broadcast journalist and actor who was host of the syndicated gossip and entertainment round-up program ''Entertainment Tonight'' from 2004 to 2012, joining the program on August 24, 1995. ...
* Jane Velez-Mitchell


Technical information


Subchannels

The station's signal is multiplexed:


Translators

* Daggett * Lucerne Valley * Lucerne Valley * Morongo Valley * Ridgecrest * Twentynine Palms * Yucca Valley


References


External links

*
KHJ-KCAL-TV logos and screenshots from 1950s to the present day
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kcal-Tv 1948 establishments in California CBS News and Stations Comet (TV network) affiliates Independent television stations in the United States MeTV Toons affiliates The Nest (TV network) affiliates RKO General Television channels and stations established in 1948 CAL-TV