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WBAL-TV, channel 11, is an NBC-affiliated television station located in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. It is the flagship television station of Hearst Television, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Hearst Corporation, and is locally co-owned with sister radio stations WBAL (1090 AM) and WIYY (97.9 FM). The three stations share a studio and office facility on Television Hill in the Woodberry section of Baltimore, near the transmitting tower that WBAL-TV shares with WIYY and four other Baltimore television stations. ==History== WBAL-TV began operations on March 11, 1948, from its original studios on North Charles Street in Downtown Baltimore.〔"WBAL-TV; Baltimore NBC outlet begins operations." ''Broadcasting - Telecasting'', March 15, 1948, pg. 97. ()〕 The station's parent, the Hearst Corporation, also owned WBAL radio and two local newspapers, the ''Baltimore News-Post'' and the ''Baltimore American'' (which later merged as the ''Baltimore News-American'' before shutting down in 1986). WBAL-TV is one of two Hearst-owned broadcast properties to have been built and signed on by the company (the other being WTAE-TV in Pittsburgh), and the oldest to be continuously owned by Hearst through its various television subsidiaries through the years. At its launch, WBAL-TV was an NBC affiliate, owing to its radio sister's long affiliation with the NBC Red Network. Early programming on channel 11 included ''Musical Almanac'', ''Look and Cook'' and ''Know Baltimore'', along with news and sports productions. In the 1950s, the station introduced ''Romper Room'', a children's program produced locally by Bert and Nancy Claster that eventually became a nationally franchised and syndicated program. Another long-running show of the 1950s was the weekday ''Quiz Club'', co-hosted by local personalities Brent Gunts and Jay Grayson. ''Baltimore Sun'' columnist Jacques Kelly described it at the time of Grayson's death in June 2000, as "pure 1950s live television ... executed on a low budget ... the genial hosts ... ruled the 1 p.m. airwaves".〔 WBAL-TV produced several local bowling shows in the 1960s and early 1970s, including ''Strikes and Spares'', ''Pinbusters'', ''Duckpins and Dollars'', ''Bowling for Dollars'' and ''Spare Time''. The station even went as far as building bowling alleys at its studios. It also launched several children's entertainment shows during this period, such as ''Rhea and Sunshine'', ''Pete the Pirate'', ''P.W. Doodle'', ''Heads Up'', and the teen-oriented ''Kirby Scott Show''. WBAL-TV has boasted many television firsts, including becoming the first Baltimore television station to broadcast in color, the first station in Maryland (and the eighth in the world) to acquire a videotape cartridge machine; the first station in Baltimore to acquire a mobile satellite news-gathering system (dubbed "NEWSTAR 11") and the first Baltimore station to hire an African-American news anchor and an African-American news director.〔(【引用サイトリンク】publisher=WBAL-TV )〕 In the late 1970s, ABC steadily rose in the ratings to become the number one network in primetime. Accordingly, the network began to seek upgrades to its slate of affiliates, which included some stations that either had poor signals or poorly performing local programming. WBAL-TV had been invited to switch to ABC in 1977, but opted to remain with NBC out of concerns about the poor ratings for ABC's evening newscasts.〔("In brief." ''Broadcasting'', March 21, 1977, pg. 30 )〕〔("In brief." ''Broadcasting'', March 28, 1977, pg. 34 )〕 WBAL-TV's first stint as an NBC affiliate ended on August 30, 1981, when the station swapped networks with WMAR-TV (channel 2), then owned by the A.S. Abell Company (owners of the ''Baltimore Sun'' at the time), and became a CBS affiliate. In its reasoning for initiating the switch, CBS cited displeasure with WMAR-TV's frequent preemptions and low ratings for the station's newscasts.〔"CBS switches affiliation to WBAL-TV in Baltimore." ''Broadcasting'', March 9, 1981, pg. 152. ()〕 As a CBS affiliate, however, channel 11 preempted an hour of the network's daytime schedule everyday, as well as half of its Saturday cartoon lineup. Channel 11 also did not run CBS's late night programming. Baltimore viewers who wanted to see the entire CBS lineup could be able to view those programs through WDVM-TV/WUSA in Washington, D.C., which was available over-the-air in most of the Baltimore area and preempted little network programming. In 1994, the E. W. Scripps Company, present owners of WMAR-TV, negotiated with ABC to affiliate with its Baltimore station as part of a multi-station deal. In response, CBS and Westinghouse Broadcasting formed a partnership which resulted in the CBS affiliation moving from WBAL-TV to Westinghouse's WJZ-TV (channel 13), Baltimore's longtime ABC affiliate. Largely by default, channel 11 rejoined NBC on January 2, 1995. The station was a prominent feature in the 1982 movie ''Diner'', set in Baltimore. One of the main characters' girlfriends worked at the station, and another character watches ''College Bowl'', an NBC program that aired on WBAL-TV. It was also the primary setting for the 1991 film ''He Said, She Said'', in which two newspaper columnists for the ''Baltimore Sun'' (Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth Perkins) serve as hosts of an opinion/debate segment on the station. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「WBAL-TV」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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