KODE-TV (channel 12) 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 ...

licensed to

Joplin, Missouri Joplin is a city in Jasper County, Missouri, Jasper and Newton County, Missouri, Newton counties in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Missouri. The bulk of the city is in Jasper County, while the southern portion is in Newton County. J ...

, United States, serving as the

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Broadcasting * Aliw Broadcasting Corporation, Philippine broadcast company * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial American ...

affiliate for the Joplin, Missouri–

Pittsburg, Kansas Pittsburg is a city in Crawford County, Kansas, Crawford County, Kansas, United States, located in southeast Kansas near the Missouri state border. It is the most populous city in Crawford County and southeast Kansas. As of the 2020 United S ...

television market A media market, broadcast market, media region, designated market area (DMA), television market area, or simply market is a region where the population can receive the same (or similar) television and radio station offerings, and may also incl ...

. It is owned by

Mission Broadcasting Mission Broadcasting, Inc. is a television station group that owns 29 full-power television stations in 26 markets in the United States. The group's chair is Nancie Smith, the widow of David S. Smith, who founded the company in 1996 and died in 2 ...

, which maintains joint sales and

shared services Shared services is the provision of a service by one part of an organization or group where that service had previously been found in more than one part of the organization or group. Thus the funding and resourcing of the service is shared and the ...

agreements (JSA/SSA) with

Nexstar Media Group Nexstar Media Group, Inc. is an American publicly traded media company with headquarters in Irving, Texas, Midtown Manhattan, and Chicago. The company is the largest television station owner in the United States, owning 197 television station ...

, owner of

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

affiliate

KSNF KSNF (channel 16) is a television station licensed to Joplin, Missouri, United States, serving the Joplin, Missouri–Pittsburg, Kansas media market#Television, television market as an affiliate of NBC. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which ...

(channel 16, also licensed to Joplin), for the provision of certain services. The two stations share studios on South Cleveland Avenue in Joplin, where KODE-TV's transmitter is also located.

History

The station began broadcasting on September 26, 1954, as KSWM-TV (for Southwestern Missouri) and was a primary

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

affiliate, but shared ABC with then-NBC affiliate

KOAM-TV KOAM-TV (channel 7) is a television station licensed to Pittsburg, Kansas, United States, serving the Joplin, Missouri–Pittsburg, Kansas market as an affiliate of CBS. It is owned by Morgan Murphy Media, which provides certain services to ...

. It was locally founded by Austin Harrison who also owned radio station KSWM (1230 AM; now

KZYM KZYM (1230 AM) is an American radio station broadcasting from Joplin, Missouri. Programming AM 1230 The Talker features: Glenn Beck, Markley Van Camp and Robbins, Dave Ramsey, Jesse Kelly, and At Home with Gary Sullivan. KZYM also features ne ...

). It originally operated from studios and transmitter located on West 13th Street in Joplin. Harrison sold his stations to Friendly Broadcasting, owners of WSTV (now

WTOV-TV WTOV-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Steubenville, Ohio, United States, serving the Wheeling, West Virginia–Steubenville, Ohio market as an affiliate of NBC and Fox. Owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, the station maint ...

) in

Steubenville, Ohio Steubenville ( ) is a city in Jefferson County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Located along the Ohio River west of Pittsburgh, it had a population of 18,161 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The Weirton–Steubenville m ...

, in 1956. In 1957, the call letters were changed to KODE-AM-TV. Friendly then sold both KODE and WRGP (now

WRCB WRCB (channel 3), branded Local 3, is a television station in Chattanooga, Tennessee, United States, affiliated with NBC. The station has been owned by Sarkes Tarzian, Inc. since 1982. WRCB's studios are located on Whitehall Road on Chattanoog ...

) in

Chattanooga, Tennessee Chattanooga ( ) is a city in Hamilton County, Tennessee, United States, and its county seat. It is located along the Tennessee River and borders Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the south. With a population of 181,099 in 2020, it is Tennessee ...

, to

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

-based United Printers & Publishers in 1961. Gilmore Broadcasting of

Kalamazoo, Michigan Kalamazoo ( ) is a city in Kalamazoo County, Michigan, United States, and its county seat. At the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, Kalamazoo had a population of 73,598. It is the principal city of the Kalamazoo–Portage metropolitan are ...

, bought the KODE stations in 1962. KODE became a sole ABC affiliate on January 1, 1968, and three days later KUHI-TV (now NBC-affiliated

) started and took over the CBS affiliation. On March 15, 1970, KODE weatherman Lee George made his famous flurries forecast. He predicted only light flurries for the next day and it ended up snowing over at the Joplin Regional Airport. KODE was acquired by Mission Broadcasting in 2002. Subsequently, KODE then entered into a shared services agreement with Nexstar Broadcasting, which owns NBC affiliate KSNF. The same year, it was announced KSNF and KODE would merge, with KSN's studios expanded to accommodate the combined operation. On May 8, 2009, a powerful storm system slammed Joplin, knocking out power to KODE and knocking down the tower of sister station KSNF. KODE-TV returned to the air early on the morning of May 9, while KSNF did not return to the air until June 17. Both stations moved to a rebuilt KSNF building in April 2010 making it the next-to-last Nexstar duopoly to do so (as Nexstar formed a virtual duopoly in

Evansville, Indiana Evansville is a city in Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 118,414 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is Indiana's List of cities in Indiana, third-most populous city after India ...

, in December 2011 with the purchase of that market's ABC affiliate

WEHT WEHT (channel 25) is a television station in Evansville, Indiana, United States, affiliated with American Broadcasting Company, ABC. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which provides certain services to The CW, CW outlet WTVW (channel 7) under ...

and transfer of its existing Evansville

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 ...

(now CW affiliate)

WTVW WTVW (channel 7) is a television station in Evansville, Indiana, United States, serving as a ''de facto'' owned-and-operated station of The CW. It is owned by Mission Broadcasting, which maintains a shared services agreement (SSA) with Nexst ...

to Mission Broadcasting, and Nexstar almost immediately moved WTVW's operations to the WEHT facility). On December 19, 2012, KODE began broadcasting its local newscasts in

High Definition High definition or HD may refer to: Visual technologies *Blu-ray Disc, the universal optical High Definition disc format *HD Photo, former name for the JPEG XR image file format *HDV, format for recording high-definition video onto magnetic tap ...

. On June 15, 2016, Nexstar announced that it has entered into an affiliation agreement with

Katz Broadcasting Scripps Networks, LLC, formerly known as Katz Broadcasting, is an American specialized digital multicasting network media company and a division of the E. W. Scripps Company. The company owns (as of 2024) eight broadcast television networks, ...

for the

Escape Escape or Escaping may refer to: Arts and media Film * ''Escape'' (1928 film), a German silent drama film * ''Escape!'' (film), a 1930 British crime film starring Austin Trevor and Edna Best * ''Escape'' (1940 film), starring Robert Taylor and ...

, Laff,

Grit Grit, Grits, or Gritty may refer to: Food * Grit (grain), bran, chaff, mill-dust or coarse oatmeal * Grits, a corn-based food common in the Southern United States Minerals * Grit, winter pavement-treatment minerals deployed in grit bins * G ...

, and

Bounce TV Bounce TV is an American digital terrestrial television, digital broadcast television network owned by Scripps Networks, a subsidiary of E. W. Scripps Company. It launched on September 26, 2011, and was promoted as "the first 24/7 digital multic ...

networks (the last one of which is owned by Bounce Media LLC, whose COO Jonathan Katz is president/CEO of Katz Broadcasting), bringing the four networks to 81 stations owned and/or operated by Nexstar, including KODE-TV and KSNF.

News operation

KODE-TV presently broadcasts 17 hours of local newscasts each week (with three hours each weekday and an hour each on Saturdays and Sundays).

Notable former on-air staff

Jonathan Elias Jonathan Elias (born 1956) is an American composer best known for his film soundtracks. Background Elias was born in New York City in 1956. He is of Jewish-Hungarian background. Elias started playing piano at the age of six, and was composin ...

– reporter * Robb Hanrahan *

Evan Rosen Evan Rosen is an American author, speaker, business strategist, and journalist. He is Executive Director of The Culture of Collaboration Institute and Chief Strategist of Impact Video Communication, Inc., which he co-founded. Rosen is the author ...

* Marny Stanier

Subchannels

The station's signal is

multiplexed In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource— ...

References

External links

*
KSNF Storm Damage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kode-Tv 1954 establishments in Missouri American Broadcasting Company affiliates Bounce TV affiliates Grit (TV network) affiliates Ion Television affiliates Nexstar Media Group Television channels and stations established in 1954 ODE-TV