3 to 2 – 70 years ago
November 23, 2022WDTV was the first television station in Pittsburgh in 1949 signing on as part of the DuMont Television Network. But it was channel 3. It was the fifty-first TV station in the country. Channel 3 was a seemingly appropriate channel allocation given WDTV was DuMont’s third station behind WABD (4 New York; now WNYW Channel 5) and WTTG (5 Washington, DC).
It was on this day 70 years ago – November 23, 1952 – when WDTV had to move down one click to Channel 2. The move was made because WNBK (now WKYC) in Cleveland moved to Channel 3 to avoid colliding with WLWC-TV in Columbus (now WCMH) and WWJ-TV in Detroit (now WDIV).
WDTV was eventually sold as the DuMont Network began to falter. KDKA Radio parent Westinghouse Broadcasting came to the rescue buying the station for $9.75 Million in late 1954. The station adopted the KDKA callsign in January 1955.
The channel 2 which carried WDTV/KDKA was, of course, its analog signal which, like all others, signed off in 2009. KDKA-TV operates over digital transmission channel 25.
I’ve heard about WDTV from my parents and grandparents, how they were the first TV station here, and that they were on channel 3. They were on top of it, TV was their high tech, like we have computers and the internet nowadays.
All told, 2 is probably better for range and being able to use lower broadcast power, though there can be more ‘skip’ interference from TV stations in other cities on low VHF.
Boom