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Spectrum was an American
subscription television Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, bu ...
channel that was owned and operated by United Cable. Existing during the early 1980s, the service was available in the
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...
and Minneapolis–St. Paul metropolitan areas. United Cable, which owned a majority stake in Spectrum through its Home Entertainment Network division, also owned a third STV operation in the
Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state lin ...
and
Dayton Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Da ...
market, which used the ON TV brand name under license; United had purchased a majority share in Home Entertainment Network from original owners Buford Television for a reported $20 million in 1982.


History

Spectrum began operating in Chicago on September 29, 1981, on a new television station, WFBN channel 66, owned by Focus Broadcasting. By early 1983, Spectrum there had 60,000 subscribers—in comparison to ON TV's 125,000—and had not turned a profit since its inception. United Cable launched Spectrum in the Twin Cities on a new station, KTMA, on September 22, 1982, making it one of the later subscription television startups. It competed with TVQ, which operated a microwave distribution system of HBO to some 15,000 subscribers. The new service quickly secured valuable programming when it struck a deal to televise
Minnesota Twins The Minnesota Twins are an American professional baseball team based in Minneapolis. The Twins compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central Division. The team is named after the Twin Cities area ...
baseball and
Minnesota North Stars The Minnesota North Stars were a professional ice hockey team in the National Hockey League (NHL) for 26 seasons, from 1967 to 1993. The North Stars played their home games at the Met Center in Bloomington, Minnesota, and the team's colors fo ...
hockey home games: the entire North Stars home slate and 50 Twins home games, packaged as "Spectrum Sports"—available for $19.95 a month or $29.90 along with the Spectrum movie service. At its peak, in May 1983, the service attracted 27,000 Twin Cities subscribers, making it the most successful of United Cable's three STV operations. Even then, United Cable was laying off 55 staff, cutting costs, and considering outsourcing its movie programming to Oak Industries, owners of ON TV. Three months later, the company wrote down the Home Entertainment Network division and put the three STV systems on the market. In Chicago, Spectrum encountered technical issues with their broadcast signal. WFBN's broadcast from the eastern mast atop the
John Hancock Center The John Hancock Center is a 100- story, 1,128-foot supertall skyscraper located in Chicago, Illinois. Located in the Magnificent Mile district, the building was officially renamed 875 North Michigan Avenue in 2018. The skyscraper was designe ...
in the
Chicago Loop The Loop, one of Chicago's 77 designated community areas, is the central business district of the city and is the main section of Downtown Chicago. Home to Chicago's commercial core, it is the second largest commercial business district in Nort ...
was prone to
multipath interference In radio communication, multipath is the propagation phenomenon that results in radio signals reaching the receiving antenna by two or more paths. Causes of multipath include atmospheric ducting, ionospheric reflection and refraction, and ref ...
caused by the large number of high rise buildings in the area. The interference resulted in mediocre to poor quality pictures, and caused problems with Spectrum's set top descramblers. By 1983, in the face of cable television entering the Chicago market and the
economic recession In economics, a recession is a business cycle contraction when there is a general decline in economic activity. Recessions generally occur when there is a widespread drop in spending (an adverse demand shock). This may be triggered by variou ...
, Spectrum announced its intent to go out of business. United Cable finally discontinued the service in February 1984 and sold its subscriber base to Oak Industries and ON TV; ON TV took over Spectrum programming on March 1, 1984, while subscribers were converted to Oak's equipment. At the time of the sale, there were 28,000 Spectrum subscribers, while ON TV had fallen to 84,000. WFBN then broadcast music videos for the summer before relaunching as a general-entertainment independent that fall. As a sports service, Spectrum in the Twin Cities never reached the intended subscriber figures, prompting profits to fall far short of expectations for the Twins. Further, a federal judge had ruled against the Twins and North Stars pooling their broadcast rights in the Spectrum deal after
WCCO-TV WCCO-TV (channel 4) is a television station licensed to Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, broadcasting the CBS network to the Twin Cities area. It is owned and operated by the network's CBS News and Stations division, and maintains studi ...
sued on antitrust charges. (Sports telecasts continued while the case was being appealed; after Spectrum's demise, the
United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit (in case citations, 8th Cir.) is a United States federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the following United States district courts: * Eastern District of Arkansas * Western Di ...
found in the teams' favor.) In August 1985, the Twins and North Stars opted not to renew their Spectrum rights deal, a decision that sounded the death knell for the service—already down to just 13,000 subscribers; the movie service ended September 29, 1985, while Spectrum Sports concluded with the final game of the Twins season on October 6.


See also

* ON TV, an over-the-air subscription service that served
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...
,
Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state lin ...
,
Dallas Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
/ Fort Worth,
Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
,
Fort Lauderdale A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...
, Phoenix, Salem/
Portland Portland most commonly refers to: * Portland, Oregon, the largest city in the state of Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States * Portland, Maine, the largest city in the state of Maine, in the New England region of the northeas ...
and
San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
. *
PRISM Prism usually refers to: * Prism (optics), a transparent optical component with flat surfaces that refract light * Prism (geometry), a kind of polyhedron Prism may also refer to: Science and mathematics * Prism (geology), a type of sedimentary ...
, an over-the-air and cable television subscription service that served Southeastern
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Ma ...
, Southern New Jersey,
Delaware Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacen ...
and the
Delmarva Peninsula The Delmarva Peninsula, or simply Delmarva, is a large peninsula and proposed state on the East Coast of the United States, occupied by the vast majority of the state of Delaware and parts of the Eastern Shore regions of Maryland and Virginia. ...
. * SelecTV, an over-the-air subscription service that served
Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...
,
Milwaukee Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at th ...
and
Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
and later the Wometco Home Theater territories after WHT ceased its own programming. *
SuperTV Super TV was an American subscription television service operating in the Washington, D.C. and Baltimore metropolitan areas. that was owned by Subscription Television of Greater Washington, Inc. It was an early form of subscription television th ...
, an over-the-air subscription service that served
Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
, the Capital and Central regions of
Maryland Maryland ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; ...
and Northern
Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the East Coast of the United States, Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography an ...
. *
Wometco Home Theater The Wometco Home Theater (WHT) was an early pay television service in the New York City area, that was owned by Miami-based Wometco Enterprises, which owned several major network affiliates in mid-sized media markets and its flagship WTVJ in Mia ...
– an over-the-air subscription service that served
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...
, Northern and
Central Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known a ...
New Jersey New Jersey is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic States, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States, Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York (state), New York; on the ea ...
, Long Island and
Fairfield County, Connecticut Fairfield County is a county in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is the most populous county in the state and was also its fastest-growing from 2010 to 2020. As of the 2020 census, the county's population was 957, ...
.


References

{{Authority control American subscription television services Defunct television networks in the United States Television channels and stations established in 1981 Television channels and stations disestablished in 1985 1981 establishments in Illinois 1984 disestablishments in Illinois 1982 establishments in Minnesota 1985 disestablishments in Minnesota