KOBF
Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox television station
KOBF (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Farmington, New Mexico, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is a satellite of Albuquerque-based KOB (channel 4) which is owned by Hubbard Broadcasting. KOBF's transmitter is located south of Farmington on NM 371.
KOBR (channel 8) in Roswell also serves as a satellite of KOB. These satellite operations provide additional news bureaus for KOB and sell advertising time to local sponsors.
KOBF has repeated KOB since 1983, when Hubbard acquired it from the last of several owners of KIVA-TV, a small local station that was also an NBC affiliate.
HistoryEdit
KIVA-TVEdit
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) allocated channel 12 to Farmington in 1957 at the request of Farmington Broadcasting Company, a corporation affiliated with the local cable firm which proposed to build a station that would attempt to seek affiliation with all three major networks.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> This application was then merged with another from Farmington radio station KVBC.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
No station ever materialized, and it was not until 1970 that another bid on the channel was made, this time by Woodland Broadcasting, which owned radio station KUBC in Montrose, Colorado.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> By this time, channel 12 was used by KOB-TV translator K12GK, which was located on Caviness Mountain near Mancos, Colorado.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Woodland's application for a construction permit was granted by the FCC on October 27, 1971.<ref name="hc">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }} (Guide to reading History Cards)</ref>
Before the station was built, Woodland transferred the construction permit to Four States Television, Inc. The transmitter tower was built on the bluffs south of town, and KIVA-TV, an NBC affiliate,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> began broadcasting on the afternoon of October 20, 1972.<ref name="Albu721021">Template:Cite news</ref> It received network programs from KOA-TV, then the NBC affiliate in Denver, because KOB-TV did not grant permission for the new station to use its NBC feed.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Originally broadcasting with 38,000 watts, KIVA-TV was approved to increase to an effective radiated power of 230,000 watts in 1974.Template:R That same year, sale of a minority interest in channel 12 to Allen Theatres and sales manager Marty Ball was announced;<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> this fell through the next year, forcing general manager Jerry Proctor to postpone his plans to move to Houston and build a cable system there.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
A group of five Houston investors led by John Catsis acquired KIVA-TV in 1976<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> and closed on the deal in January 1977; they promised to add a local news department to the station with two full-time reporters.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In addition, they pledged to tackle "picture reliability" and network feed issues that plagued KIVA-TV's telecast of network programming.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
The Catsis group sold KIVA-TV in 1981 to Center Group Broadcasting, whose primary shareholder was Alfred Burke and which also counted Stephen Adams among its stockholders, for $1.2 million and the assumption of up to $700,000 in debt.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Center Group had its own plans for expanding the studio facilities and the news staff.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> However, it had to deal with a balky and "very old" transmitter that was prone to failing and taking the station out for days at a time.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> One of the failures was late in the fourth quarter of a football game; with the game tied, the station's electronic equipment switched automatically to another game, resulting in angry phone calls and even a bomb threat.Template:RTemplate:Efn Dale Palmer, who owned part of Center Group and was the second general manager under the company's ownership, noted that, while the company specialized in turning around broadcast properties, it had received "bad advice" about KIVA-TV, noting, "Essentially, all we got was a license and a building".<ref name="optimism">Template:Cite news</ref>
KOBFEdit
In April 1983, an unexpected offer turned around KIVA-TV's hard luck. It came from KOB-TV, which was anxious to improve its circulation statewide and challenge KOAT-TV for first place in the New Mexico television news ratings. At the time, there were three NBC affiliates in New Mexico: KSWS-TV in Roswell, KIVA-TV, and KOB-TV; the former two stations prevented KOB-TV from broadcasting into southeastern and northwestern New Mexico. Hubbard Broadcasting reached a deal to buy the Roswell station and then offered $3.6 million for KIVA-TV, which Adams accepted within eight minutes.<ref name="boost">Template:Cite news</ref>
Hubbard, like other buyers before it, was buying a fixer-upper, a station that had "[n]ever made a nickel" in its history.Template:R It promised to infuse as much money as needed to turn the station around technically and in its local productions; ground was broken in November 1983 on a new studio facility at Lake and Broadway streets.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Bettie Sue Cleveland, appointed general manager by Hubbard, became the first woman to hold that post at a New Mexico television station; she died in 1990.<ref name="Albu900618">Template:Cite news</ref>
Local news at the conversion to satellite operation in 1983 consisted of one-minute news updates in prime time and cut-ins during The Today Show.<ref name="Albu830922">Template:Cite news</ref> KOBF debuted an expanded news service in 1989,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> which included news inserts into KOB's newscasts that covered the Four Corners region. By 1996, KOBF aired a 16-minute insert into KOB's 6 p.m. newscast and a 22-minute insert into its 10 p.m. program.<ref name="SanJ961009">Template:Cite news</ref> Young reporters often learned the ropes of the television news business in Farmington, setting up, shooting and reporting their own stories.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
On March 1, 2007, most of the extra news and all of the extra sports content was ended for viewers of KOBF. KOB management fired three of the four members of the news department, retaining one reporter/photographer. The decision was made due to stagnating national advertising revenue in the New Mexico television market.<ref name="Albu070303">Template:Cite news</ref>
Technical informationEdit
SubchannelsEdit
The station's signal is multiplexed:
| CitationClass=web
}}</ref> |
Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12.1 | 1080i | 16:9 | KOBF-DT | NBC | |
| 12.2 | 480i | 4:3 | KOBFDT2 | Heroes & Icons | |
| 12.3 | KOBFDT3 | MeTV | |||
| 12.4 | 16:9 | KOBFDT4 | Catchy Comedy | ||
| 12.5 | 4:3 | KOBFDT5 | Ion Plus | ||
| 12.6 | KOBFDT6 | Ion Television | |||
| 12.7 | 16:9 | KOBFDT7 | Start TV |
Analog-to-digital conversionEdit
KOBF ended regular programming on its analog signal, over VHF channel 12, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 17 to VHF channel 12.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>
TranslatorsEdit
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Bayfield, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Cortez, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Cortez, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Cortez, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Crownpoint
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Dulce–Lumberton
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Durango, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Gallup
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Hesperus, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Indian Village
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Klagetoh, AZ
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Many Farms, AZ
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Pagosa Springs, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Tohatchi
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Vallecito, CO
- Template:FCC-LMS-Facility Zuni Pueblo
NotesEdit
ReferencesEdit
External linksEdit
Template:Albuquerque TV Template:English TV Stations New Mexico Template:Colorado TV Template:Hubbard Broadcasting Corporation