The Times Leader from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania • 103

Profile '87, Wilkes-Borre, PA, Saturday, March 7, 1987 Boom Town 1 1 tour of TV land Through the years From their pioneer era By TROUT POMEROY Staff Writor in the early 1950s through the decades. TV stations in the Wilkes-BarreScranton market have had to overcome their fair share of obstacles. Among them have been: 'v 3 3L Discrimination suits. Allegations their reporters were snoops. Car accidents in which reporters, cameramen and other personnel have been injured.

II I Lanuary 1, 1953 Law suits regarding former employees who committed suicide. The introduction of cable systems which they feared would destroy free 'Local news sets the tone for your station, gives you identity and brings people to you who wouldn't watch you Gary Ritchie WYOU-TV, Channel 22 'There isn't any other market in the top 50 markets where the people are better served than they are Elden Hale Jr. WNEP-TV, Channel 16 Terry S. Baltimore WBRE-TV, Channel 28 Jf.r.V;n"M;r..,M7i(U.' 1 I II "FK 71" chiwi i. lie aii Ti hi th 12:00 Noon Welcome To Television 12:30 PM Tournament 01 Roses Cotton Bowl Came 4:45 PM Dose Bowl'Game 7:30 PM Dinah Shore Slum television service.

Equal time brouhahas for people opposing on-air editorials. Allegations that businesses have had to leave the area after being maligned on TV. License renewal struggles. Strikes. Broken power lines.

Ice build-ups on broadcast antennas. Transmission power line failures. And countless other technical calamities that regularly took stations off the air in the '50s and '60s. Trout Pomeroy WILKES-BARRE We are a region of TV junkies, so much so that we support five local stations. Consider: Researchers recently searched ins vain for a local viewer who hadn't watched a local TV news show in three days We're not the largest of the country's 213 TV markets.

New YorkPoughkeepsie is. We're not the smallest market, either. Glendive, is. Wilkes-Barre-Scranton is the 59th television market in America down from 42nd in the 1970s due to population losses. According to the Arbitron Ratings Company, our market has 421,600 television households out of 430,600 iiomes a figure that places Wilkes-Barre-Scranton between the Wichita, and Richmond, markets in overall viewing households.

Arbitron is a New York-based television ratings company. Figures tallied by the National Association of Broadcasters show that the Wilkes-Barre-Scranton market ranked 73rd in the country in total billing and around 100th in total profits in 1980. the last year in which such figures were available. Nevertheless, it's worth noting that since the Wilkes-Barre-Scranton market's stations are linked to various cable outlets in the region, programming created here is actually available for viewing in some 1,229,400 households in a three-state area 1,203,700 of them with TV sets. More than half of those homes have two sets, nearly all of them are geared to receive UHF signals and more than 70 percent of them are tuned into a cable system.

Local broadcast executives report our 70-plus percentage of cable penetration is the highest of any major market in the country. Local television's relationship with cable was rocky at first. In December 1964, officials from WBRE, WDAU and WNEP 8:00 PM Groucho Mar 8:30 PM Treasury Men In Action 9:00 PM Foreign Intrigue 10:00 PM News And Review Of 1952 10:30 PM Madison Square Garden WBRE-TV H. B.C. Wilkes-Barre This is one of the first advertisements for WBRE-TV when it began programming in 1953.

formed Total Television Cable Inc. to seek CATV franchises in municipalities of Lackawanna and Luzerne counties. The incorporators were owners Madge Megargee Holcomb, David M. Baltimore and Thomas P. Shelburne.

They said revenue from their cable system "would offset the obvious economic impact of CATV on the stations and permit us to continue producing the type of high quality, public service programming presently presented." Despite their concern with three station owners backed off from their idea. "Things began to quiet down after that initial alarm and the corporation was never activated," Shelburne said in a recent interview. "We learned how to live with cable and cable learned how to live with us." While the presence of cable has increased the number of stations area viewers can see, it has also helped local stations by getting their signals into homes in outlying areas that were previously unable to receive those signals. "When you add it all up I think the local stations got a little more out of it than they lost," Shelburne said. and Scranton have two daily newspapers." Hale made reference to a recent situation in which re-searchers in the area went looking for people who do and do not watch the local news on a regular basis.

"They were trying to find people who hadn't watched local news last three days and they couldn't find anyone," he said. Viewers in the area watch: WBRE-TV, Channel 28, an NBC affiliate broadcasting from Wilkes-Barre. WYOU--fV, Channel 22, a CBS affiliate broadcasting from Scranton. WNEP-TV, Channel 16, an ABC affiliate broadcasting from Avoca. WVIA-TV, Channel 44, a PBS station broadcasting from Pittston Township.

WOLF-TV. Channel 38, an independent station broadcasting from Scranton. WWLF-TV, Channel 56. a satellite of WOLF broadcasting from Hazelton. Area viewers also report seeing Philadelphia-area TV stations WCAU, WPVI AND WTAF during daytime viewing hours, as well as WOR-TV from Secau- cus, N.J.

Competition is particularly What viewers are seeing on their TV tubes is a variety of programming that would have astounded our ancestors. Considering Wilkes-Barre area viewers who didn't have high-power antennas were virtually shut off from the nation's first TV stations in New York and Philadelphia until the early 1950s, it is no less than amazing to see what we have now. What we have are five area television stations, employing more than 400 workers and creating layer upon layer of local programming. In aggregate form, the Wilkes-Barre-Scranton television industry is among the primary driving forces of our regional economy. The community is the beneficiary, our TV station's managers say.

"There isn't any other market in the top 50 markets where the people are better served than they are here," said Elden Hale vice president and general manager at WNEP. "There is no more concentrated area of news junkies in the country than in this area. Their appetite for information is unparalleled, as evidenced by the fact both Wilkes-Barre emerged as the clear-cut ratings leader in the all important category of local news. For their own part, WYOU and WBRE have made significant strides in their effort to keep pace with WNEP, primarily in the acquisition of helicopters, mobile vans, elaborate news sets and in establishing news bureaus around the region. WVIA-TV.

the public television station in the market, has achieved an important place in the market with its emphasis on children's and cultu- (See TUNED, Page 12) keen between WBRE, WYOU and WNEP, the three network affiliates. "We're competitive because it's in our blood to be," said Gary Ritchie, general manager and vice president of WYOU. The battles take place primarily within the area of local news. Traditionally, the station in any given market that is No, 1 in news-Is usually No. 1 in profitability.

"Local news sets the tone for your station, gives you identity and brings people to you who wouldn't watch you otherwise," Ritchie said. In recent years, WNEP has XX PROVIDING THE GROWING POWER NEEDS FOR X) THE GROWTH OF PENNSYLVANIA. -sr 1" ELECTRICAL CONTRACTOR lrfefcg-l SPECIALIZING IN THE CON- 35 STRUCTION OF HIGH VOLT- d55 AGE LINES, SUBSTATIONS -zFTiT" AND DISTRIBUTION FOR JX rj Bf i I UTILITIES AND INDUSTRY. JJ i.