From The TV IV

CTV is an English language broadcast television network run by CTV Inc., which is owned by CTVglobemedia. It airs a mixture of American shows and movies and original Canadian shows. All shows airing on CTV Television, and most ads, are closed captioned.

CTV has one of Canada's largest stables of specialty channels. These include interests in: CTV Newsnet, a 24-hour headline news channel; Business News Network, an all-business news network; MTV Canada, a music-oriented specialty channel (previously talktv, an all-talk channel); The Comedy Network, Canada's first 24-hour network dedicated to comedy; TSN, a Canadian sports specialty channel; RDS, a 24-hour French-language all-sports channel; and the award-winning Discovery Channel. A minority interest in Viewer's Choice Canada (pay-per-view) is also held. CTV owns interests in and operates six digital specialty channels: CTV Travel, Animal Planet, Discovery Civilization, ESPN Classic Canada, NHL Network and RIS (Le Réseau Info Sports). It formerly had ownership interests in the Outdoor Life Network and CTV Sportsnet (now Rogers Sportsnet), both of which have since been sold to Rogers Communications.

Contents 1 History 2 CTV affiliates (including city of licence and date of first sign-on) 2.1 CTV-owned 2.2 Privately owned 2.3 Former affiliates 3 External link

[edit] History

Following the 1958 Canadian federal election which saw the minority Conservative government of Prime Minister John Diefenbaker return to power with a majority, one of the Diefenbaker government's first acts in Parliament was to pass the Broadcasting Act of 1958. This led to the creation of the Board of Broadcast Governors (BBG), which was established to take over broadcasting regulation duties from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, which had been both the broadcast regulator and public broadcaster in Canada until then. The BBG was created in response to demands by private broadcasters to allow alternate viewing choices on Canadian television, something which the private broadcasters alleged had not been possible at the time with the CBC operating as both their regulator and their competition.

As its first act, the BBG held public hearings in 1960 to request applications for second television stations in eight major Canadian cities. Of those eight cities, privately-owned CBC Television affiliates operated in Calgary (CHCT-TV) and Edmonton (CFRN-TV), while the other six were served by CBC-owned stations (CBUT in Vancouver, CBWT in Winnipeg, CBLT in Toronto, CBOT in Ottawa, CBFT and CBMT in Montreal, and CBHT in Halifax). From an initial list of more than 35 applicants, the eight winning applicants were, by city (including first sign-on dates):

• Vancouver - Vantel Broadcasting (CHAN-TV; October 31, 1960)
• Calgary - the Love family (CFCN-TV; September 9, 1960)
• Edmonton - the CBC (CBXT, which would relieve CFRN of its CBC affiliation; October 1, 1961)
• Winnipeg - Moffat Broadcasting (CJAY-TV; November 12, 1960)
• Toronto - Baton-Aldred-Rogers Broadcasting (CFTO-TV; January 1, 1961)
• Ottawa - Ernie Bushnell (CJOH-TV; March 12, 1961)
• Montreal - Canadian Marconi Co. (CFCF-TV; January 21, 1961)
• Halifax - Finlay Macdonald (CJCH-TV; January 1, 1961)

One of the losing Toronto applicants, Spence Caldwell, set out soon after to establish a network in order to link together and control the winning applicants. The seven new independent stations initially did not like the idea of this and responded by creating their own group, a program sharing co-operative called the Independent Television Organization (ITO). Caldwell's push for a network, however, gained ground when CFTO head John Bassett gained the TV rights to air games from the Canadian Football League's Eastern Conference and he needed a network to air them on. Following negotiations with all involved parties and the BBG, Caldwell was granted his network licence and CTV was launched on October 1, 1961, consisting of the seven ITO members and CFRN.

During CTV's first full season, live network programming was only available on CFTO, while network shows were transmitted to the other affiliates via the CBC's microwave network during CBC Television's off-hours, to air via tape delay. When a second microwave network was gradually established over the next few years, live CTV programming eventually became available across Canada. Programs aired on CTV during the first season included Canadian productions Cross Canada Barndance (a country variety show), Showdown, Twenty Questions and Take a Chance (game shows) and West Coast (variety), along with American imports The Andy Griffith Show, Checkmate, The Rifleman, Sing Along with Mitch and Top Cat, the BBC series Maigret and Australian-filmed Western series Whiplash.

More stations, mostly existing CBC affiliates, began joining CTV over then next few years. CHAB-TV in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, originally a CBC affiliate, switched networks on August 25, 1962 and put a semi-satellite, CHRE-TV, on the air in Regina on December 21. CHEK-TV, a CBC affiliate in Victoria, British Columbia, became a dual CBC-CTV affiliate in September 1963. CKCO-TV in Kitchener, Ontario switched to CTV in 1964, prompting nearby London CBC affiliate CFPL-TV to expand its signal to Kitchener to continue CBC service in the region, and CJON-TV in St. John's, Newfoundland joined CTV on October 1, 1964 when the CBC opened CBNT.

The relationship between CTV and its affiliates was not a smooth one due to competition between the network and the affiliates (operating under their ITO co-operative) for the rights to American programming, and the network found itself in financial difficulty almost from the beginning of operations. Caldwell stepped down as the head of CTV on October 1, 1965, but this did little to solve the problem and the network was nearing bankruptcy. In January 1966, CTV's affiliated stations announced their intention to apply to the BBG to purchase CTV. The application was approved and, at the start of the 1966-67 TV season, the CTV affiliates owned the network, which they planned to run as a co-operative as they previously had the ITO (with an additional provision of "one corporate owner, one vote" per station owner as part of the new co-operative) and which would have an expanded network broadcast schedule of 60 hours a week.

CTV began broadcasting in color with the arrival of color television in Canada on September 1, 1966, and the network introduced its current logo (which has undergone minor alterations over its years of use) that same day. One of CTV's longest-running programs, the newsmagazine show W-FIVE (originally titled as W5), made its debut in 1966, predating the debut of the similarly-formatted CBS series 60 Minutes by two years.

Beginning in 1968, the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), the successor to the BBG, asked CTV to consider expanding its service to other parts of Canada, as CTV covered only 70% of English-speaking Canadian audiences at that point. Broadcast stations in smaller communities, most often private CBC affiliates, raised objections to this over concerns about competition from the major-market CTV stations. To relieve those concerns, CTV planned out several methods to use in its expansion to smaller markets:

• The "twinstick" model, where (in its original model) a rebroadcaster of the nearest CTV affiliate opened up in a small market with an existing privately-owned CBC affiliate, with the CBC affiliate substituting its local advertisements onto those of the CTV station to help the CBC affiliate maintain revenue. The first CTV affiliate to do this was CFCN, which began broadcasting in Lethbridge, Alberta in 1968 through a twinstick arrangement with then-CBC affiliate CJLH-TV. In a later version of the twinstick model, which became common in communities in Saskatchewan and northern Ontario, a company which owned an existing CBC affiliate opened up or acquired an originating CTV affiliate to maintain ad revenue for both stations under the parent company's ownership
• Arranging to affiliate an existing private CBC affiliate with CTV when the CBC opened its own station or added a rebroadcaster of the nearest CBC-owned station (or the nearest private CBC affiliate)
• In rare cases, some small-market CBC affiliates were sold to the nearest CTV affiliate and became that station's rebroadcaster (this was the case with CBC affiliate CJSS-TV in Cornwall, Ontario, which was sold to Ernie Bushnell in 1963 and became a repeater for CJOH)

In 1969, Moose Jaw CTV affiliate CHAB and its Regina semi-satellite CHRE, the original CTV stations in Saskatchewan, were sold to the CBC as the result of a CRTC ruling requiring previous owner Moffat Broadcasting (which had acquired CHAB/CHRE in 1968) to sell the stations to a third party. With the CBC purchase, CHRE became CBKRT (now CBKT) and CHAB became CBKMT (now rebroadcaster CBKT-1) on September 13 that year, moving the CTV affiliation to previous Regina CBC affiliate CKCK-TV. Also in 1969, Moncton, New Brunswick CBC affiliate CKCW-TV switched to CTV and opened Saint John semi-satellite CKLT-TV, leading to Saint John CBC affiliate CHSJ-TV to expand its service to Moncton. Saskatoon's CFQC-TV, which became a dual CBC-CTV affiliate in 1969 after 15 years with CBC, became solely affiliated with CTV on October 17, 1971 when the CBC put CBKST on the air in that city. On July 28, 1972, Thunder Bay Electronics, the owner of Thunder Bay, Ontario CBC affiliate CKPR-TV, began its own twinstick when it signed on the CTV-affiliated CHFD-TV in the city. Sydney, Nova Scotia CBC affiliate CJCB-TV switched over to CTV on September 26, 1972 when the CBC put CBIT (a semi-satellite of Halifax's CBHT) on the air. CHEK became the full-time Victoria CTV affiliate on January 5, 1981 when Vancouver's CBUT put rebroadcasters on the air in Sooke and Mount Macdonald.

Beginning in the mid-1980s, Baton Broadcasting, the owner of CTV flagship station CFTO, began a quest to take over control of CTV by acquiring as many affiliated stations as they could. Baton had purchased Saskatoon's CFQC from the Murphy family in 1972 and did not encounter opposition to that purchase, so it decided to begin its expansion in Saskatchewan by acquiring CKCK Regina from the Hill family and the stations of Yorkton Television (Yorkton's CKOS-TV, a CBC affiliate, and CICC-TV, a CTV affiliate, and Prince Albert CBC affiliate CKBI-TV and yet-to-air CTV affiliate CIPA-TV) in 1986, followed by CJOH Ottawa in 1988 and northern Ontario's Mid-Canada Television mini-system (CICI-TV Greater Sudbury, CKNY-TV North Bay, CHBX-TV Sault Ste. Marie and CITO-TV Timmins, along with their respective CBC twinstick stations) in 1990. In 1994, CTV was restructured from a co-operative into a corporation, and that same year, Baton launched a sub-system within CTV called the Baton Broadcast System (BBS), which broadcast only to the Baton-owned stations in Saskatchewan and Ontario.

In 1996, Baton acquired CFCN Calgary from Rogers Communications and took control of Electrohome-owned CFRN Edmonton and CKCO Kitchener through a joint venture with Electrohome which gave Baton control of Electrohome's vote in CTV. In 1997, Baton acquired CHUM Limited's CTV-affiliated ATV system (CJCH, CJCB, CKCW and CKLT) in exchange for four Baton-owned BBS affiliates in southern Ontario (CFPL London, CHWI-TV Windsor, CKNX-TV Wingham and CHRO-TV Pembroke) going to CHUM. With the ATV purchase, Baton acquired controlling interest in CTV. On September 22, 1997, Baton put CIVT-TV on-air in Vancouver; while initially operated as an independent station with a mix of local, Citytv and BBS programming (although it never carried the BBS brand locally), it was intended by Baton from the beginning to make CIVT the new Vancouver CTV station (at that time shared by independently-owned CHAN Vancouver and CHEK Victoria) at the first available opportunity. In late-1997, the BBS sub-system was discontinued and folded into CTV, and with full ownership of the network, Baton changed its name to CTV Inc. in January 1998 and began plastering the CTV brand on all its owned-and-operated (O&O) stations, including on non-CTV programming.

CTV allowed its network licence to expire in 2000, thereby legally making it a "television service" under CRTC definition from that point. When CHAN and CHEK were acquired by Canwest (as a result of the split of the broadcast assets of Western International Communications) in 2000 and disaffiliated from CTV on September 1, 2001 (with CHAN becoming the new Vancouver Global TV affiliate and CHEK going to Canwest's new CH system), the Vancouver CTV affiliation officially moved to CTV O&O CIVT. CTV also acquired its last two major-market affiliates in 2001 when it bought CKY Winnipeg from Shaw Communications and CFCF Montreal from Canwest. CJON mostly disaffiliated from CTV in 2002 as the result of a disagreement with CTV over affiliation terms, but the station continues to carry CTV's news programming, including CTV National News, W-FIVE and Canada AM, in exchange for providing Newfoundland news coverage to CTV.

As a result of its corporate acquisitions over the years, CTV now airs a standard broadcast schedule outside of local news on most of its O&O stations (the only exception being CIVT, which does not air The Oprah Winfrey Show as other CTV O&Os do due to CHAN, the Vancouver Global affiliate, owning the local rights to broadcast Oprah; CIVT instead airs The Ellen DeGeneres Show in the usual CTV slot for Oprah). Beginning in July 2002 and leading up to October 2005, CTV began gradually dropping the use of its O&O stations' call signs in on-air branding in favor of generic branding with the CTV logo.

When CTV Inc. acquired CHUM Limited, which had itself once been a shareholder in the then-co-operatively run CTV, in June 2007, it had planned to assume control of CHUM's flagship Citytv system to run parallel to CTV, but the CRTC ordered CTV to instead sell Citytv to Rogers Communications and retain CHUM's secondary system, A-Channel. CTV originally announced that it would program A-Channel separately from the main network, but those plans were later changed in the summer of 2007 as programs which CTV could not make room for on its schedule were moved down to A-Channel (which became A on August 11, 2008).

[edit] CTV affiliates (including city of licence and date of first sign-on)

Charter CTV affiliates are indicated in bold text.

[edit] CTV-owned

Station	City	First sign-on date	Notes
CIVT-TV	Vancouver, British Columbia	September 22, 1997	Officially independent until it joined CTV on September 1, 2001, though it did carry CTV programming not cleared by the then-main CTV affiliate in Vancouver, CHAN-TV
CFCN-TV	Calgary, Alberta	September 9, 1960	Canada's first independent station prior to the establishment of CTV
CFRN-TV	Edmonton, Alberta	October 25, 1954	Formerly a CBC affiliate until September 30, 1961
CFQC-TV	Saskatoon, Saskatchewan	December 1954	Formerly a CBC affiliate until 1969, then a dual CBC-CTV affiliate until October 16, 1971
CIPA-TV	Prince Albert, Saskatchewan	January 12, 1987
CKCK-TV	Regina, Saskatchewan	July 28, 1954	Formerly a CBC affiliate until September 12, 1969
CICC-TV	Yorkton, Saskatchewan	1974
CKY-TV	Winnipeg, Manitoba	November 12, 1960	Formerly known as CJAY-TV until May 31, 1973
CHBX-TV	Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario	September 23, 1978	formerly known as CKCY-TV until 1986
CICI-TV	Greater Sudbury, Ontario	October 25, 1953	Formerly a CBC affiliate until October 3, 1971, using the callsign CKSO-TV; recalled with current callsign in 1980
CITO-TV	Timmins, Ontario	April 1, 1971	Originally a rebroadcaster of CKSO-TV as CKSO-TV-2; became autonomous and adopted its current callsign in 1980
CKNY-TV	North Bay, Ontario	December 19, 1955	Formerly a CBC affiliate known as CKGN-TV until 1960, then as CFCH-TV until 1970; switched to CTV on October 15, 1971
CKCO-TV	Kitchener, Ontario	March 1, 1954	Formerly a CBC affiliate until 1964
CFTO-TV	Toronto, Ontario	December 31, 1960	Flagship station of CTV
CJOH-TV	Ottawa, Ontario	March 12, 1961
CFCF-TV	Montreal, Quebec	January 20, 1961
CKLT-TV	Saint John, New Brunswick	September 21, 1969
CKCW-TV	Moncton, New Brunswick	November 30, 1954	Formerly a CBC affiliate until 1969
CJCH-TV	Halifax, Nova Scotia	January 1, 1961
CJCB-TV	Sydney, Nova Scotia	October 9, 1954	Formerly a CBC affiliate until September 25, 1972

[edit] Privately owned

Station	City	First sign-on date	Notes
CITL-TV	Lloydminster, Alberta/Saskatchewan	July 28, 1976	Owned by Newcap Communications
CJBN-TV	Kenora, Ontario	1980	Owned by Shaw Communications
CHFD-TV	Thunder Bay, Ontario	October 14, 1972	Owned by Dougall Media

[edit] Former affiliates

Station	City	First sign-on date	Notes
CHAN-TV	Vancouver, British Columbia	October 31, 1960	Charter CTV affiliate upon the network's formation; disaffiliated from CTV and joined Global Television on September 1, 2001
CHEK-TV	Victoria, British Columbia	December 1, 1956	Formerly a CBC affiliate until September 1963, then a dual CBC-CTV affiliate until January 4, 1981; disaffiliated from CTV and joined CH Television on September 1, 2001
CHRE-TV	Regina, Saskatchewan	December 21, 1962	Purchased by CBC Television, switched to CBC and renamed CBKRT on September 13, 1969; renamed CBKT in 1978
CHAB-TV	Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan	July 7, 1959	Originally a CBC affiliate, switched to CTV on August 25, 1962; purchased by CBC Television, switched to CBC and renamed CBKMT on September 13, 1969; renamed CBKT-1 in 1978
CHRO-TV	Pembroke, Ontario	August 19, 1961	Formerly a CBC affiliate known as CHOV-TV until 1977; switched to CTV in 1991; purchased by CHUM Television and disaffiliated in 1997
CKLW-TV	Windsor, Ontario	September 16, 1954	Originally a CBC affiliate; co-purchased by Baton Broadcasting (75%) and CBC (25%) and made a dual CBC-CTV affiliate in 1970; CBC fully purchased the station and renamed it CBET in 1975, but retained CTV as a secondary affiliation into the early 1980s
CJON-TV	St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador	September 6, 1955	Formerly a CBC affiliate until September 30, 1964; disaffiliated from CTV in 2002, but still carries CTV News programming

[edit] External link

• CTV official website