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Remembering Channel 13 — New Jersey’s first television station

WNDTlogo_optBY ERIC MODEL
NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
JOURNEYS INTO NEW JERSEY

The recent demise of NJN (new Jersey Network) got some us thinking again about television in the Garden State.

Yes, we are now in an era of hundreds of stations at our disposal. There is also News 12 New Jersey and FIOS that offer local news. But still many feel there is a news hole.

Some of the questions asked today are similar to those asked more than 60 years ago when the first TV station started broadcasting from New Jersey.

It all got us to thinking about a New Jersey station from many years ago – Channel 13. Now called WNET, back then it was impactful for a time as both a commercial and public broadcaster before becoming what have come to know and appreciate. In those early days there was a special view to New Jersey as well.

The time period in question stretched from the later 1940s to the early 1960s.

Initially the station was known as WATV, and was a commercial television station owned by Atlantic Television, a subsidiary of Bremer Broadcasting Corporation. It started broadcasting on May 15, 1948 on Channel 13.

Bremer also owned two northern New Jersey radio stations, WAAT (970 AM, now WNYM) and WAAT-FM (94.7 MHz, now WFME). The three stations were based in the Mosque Theater on Broad Street in Newark. WATV was the first of three new stations in the New York area market to start up during 1948, and was also the first independent station.

WFPG-TV was South Jersey's first television station. It went on the air December 21, 1952, at the "World's Finest Playground," Atlantic City, New Jersey-the first to operate with a commercial UHF transmitter (RCA 1-KW).

Back north at WATV, one unusual daytime program, Daywatch, consisted of a camera focused on a teletypewriter printing wire service news stories, interspersed with cutaways to mechanical toys against a light music soundtrack.

On October 6, 1957, Bremer Broadcasting announced it had sold its stations for $4.5 million to National Telefilm Associates, an early distributor of motion pictures for television. On May 7, 1958, channel 13's call sign was changed to WNTA-TV to reflect the new ownership; the radio stations adopted these call letters as well. NTA's cash resources enabled WNTA-TV to produce a schedule of programming with greater emphasis on the people and events of New Jersey, in comparison to the other commercial television stations. NTA also sought to make channel 13 a center of nationally syndicated programming and produced several such entries, notably the anthology drama series Play of the Week; the talk show Open End, hosted by David Susskind; children's show The Magic Clown (sponsored by Bonomo’s Turkish Taffy), and a popular dance program emceed by Clay Cole.

If one recalls correctly, the station even carried some Dodger and Giant games originating from Philadelphia back to betrayed fans in the New York area after the departure of those two teams from Ebbets Field and the Polo Grounds to Los Angeles and San Francisco respectively.

But even with baseball, innovative programming and New Jersey content, WNTA-TV continued to lag behind New York's other independent stations — WNEW-TV (now WNYW), WOR-TV (now WWOR), and WPIX — in terms of audience size, and NTA incurred a large debt load. National Telefilm Associates put the WNTA stations up for sale in February 1961.

After three prospective purchasers expressed interest in WNTA-TV, the most prominent turned out to be Educational Television for the Metropolitan Area (ETMA), based in New York City. A group of local businesspeople, cultural leaders and educators, ETMA was focused on creating an educational television outlet for New York, and believed that the non-commercial frequency the FCC allocated to the city, UHF Channel 25, would not be sufficient. (Prior to 1964, most viewers could not view UHF stations except with an expensive converter; only a few manufacturers made sets with built-in UHF tuning).

The group had previously attempted to buy the station in 1957. This time it was eventually more successful against two other groups, including one led by David Susskind and backed by Paramount Pictures – but not until a endorsement from FCC chairman Newton Minow (“Television As a Vast Wasteland” speech) and his opening up of public hearings on the fate of Channel 13.

Ultimately, after public opinion was swayed, the private firms withdrew their interest.

On June 29, 1961, ETMA agreed to purchase WNTA-TV for $6.2 million, and the FCC converted channel 13's commercial license to non-commercial. (About $2 million of that amount came from the five of the six remaining commercial VHF stations -- WPIX was the lone holdout -- all of whom were said to be pleased to see a commercial competitor eliminated by the conversion of Channel 13 to public broadcasting. CBS donated a facility in Manhattan to ETMA and NET for production uses.)

But this change to public broadcast did not occur without concern from New Jersey.

Outgoing New Jersey governor Robert B. Meyner, addressing state lawmakers' concerns over continued programming specific to New Jersey, and fearing the FCC would move the Channel 13 allocation to New York City, petitioned the U.S. Court of Appeals on September 6, 1961, to block the sale of WNTA-TV. The court ruled in the state's favor two months later.

Faced with either consummating the transaction or seeing it cancelled, ETMA settled its differences with New Jersey officials on Dec. 4, 1961. Almost simultaneously, the state withdrew its block petition, and the FCC gave final approval of the transfer of Channel 13. After a few last-minute issues arose to cause further delays, the transfer became final on December 22. Later that evening, WNTA-TV signed off for the final time. ETMA and NET then went to work converting the station, which they said would return with its new format within three months.

Ten months later, Channel 13 was ready to be reborn. With legendary reporter Edward R. Murrow at the helm on the maiden broadcast, ETMA — now the non-profit Educational Broadcasting Corporation — flipped the switch to WNDT (for "New Dimensions in Television") on September 16, 1962.


"Tonight, you join me in being present at the birth of a great adventure," Murrow said on the first broadcast of WNDT on September 16, 1962.

Over the years, Channel 13 maintained a tie with Newark (After its original location at the Mosque Theater, for a short time studios were located at the Gateway Center in Newark before the station eventually moved its operations to Manhattan in 1982. A transmitter was once located in West Orange), but clearly the station was anchored in New York.

The resulting void led to the creation of NJN in 1968 (first broadcast in 1971).

Now four decades later Channel 13 has taken over the operations of NJN with NJTV.

From some we hear concern that when it comes to New Jersey content, it is, to quote Montclair’s immortal Yogi Berra, “Deja vu all over again”.

Eric Model explores the "offbeat, off the beaten path, overlooked and forgotten" on Sirius XM-Radio and at journeysinto.com.

ALSO BY ERIC MODEL

Keansburg, N.J.: 'The working man's riviera'

First in New Jersey: Canned beer

Danny Stiles: The ‘Vicar of Vintage’ endures even after his passing

Roebling, N.J.: A place of industry and history

Paterson enjoys a rich baseball history

South Cape May: The town that vanished into the Atlantic

South Hackensack: A New Jersey town truly divided

Remembering the Bergen County Mall as a real town center

New Jersey’s turnpike travel landmark: A ‘ship’ in a cornfield

The place on 9W where Frank Sinatra was ‘discovered’

Exploring New Jersey's original 17th century turnpike

President's Day in New Jersey: Remembering the Roosevelts

Black history month in New Jersey: Local favorites of distinction

 
Comments (3)
3 Friday, 20 December 2013 14:02
Richard Grayson
In the 1950s, I used to watch the kids' shows on WNTA. The best was Jimmy Nelson, the ventriloquist, with his dummies Danny O'Day, Humphrey Higsbey (sp?), the dog Farfel (famous for Nestle's commercials), the cat Ftatateeta, and puppets that included the supposed producer of the show "David Somekind," a parody of the station's own David Susskind. It was very sophisticated humor, with all kinds of veiled political and ethnic jokes -- though very mild, the kind of stuff that wouldn't offend anyone today. Clay Cole's record show was good, a poor man's version of Dick Clark's American Bandstand. The Magic Clown was a little young for me but my brother watched it. I remember the wonderful Bonomo's Turkish Taffy jingle. It also had the very erudite Rutgers professor, Richard Heffner's "The Open Mind" talk show, and David Susskind's more provocative talk show. Although it was a Newark station, I watched it in Brooklyn. (For some reason, in the 1950s, I could also get, very early in the morning, the Philadelphia stations WCAU/10 and WRCV/3 until dawn, when they faded out.)
2 Sunday, 14 August 2011 18:02
Sean Strebin
WHat do you mean? Did you destroy another government institution? You must be from California.
1 Wednesday, 10 August 2011 00:47
anonymous
The bulk of the text was ripped from the WNET entry in Wikipedia.

The author of this here "article" could have at least given the source credit. Or you could have really tried to write something original.

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