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WE ASSUME TELEVISION SWEPT over the United States like a tsunami wave, but in reality the FCC was stymied in 1948 and so stopped giving out construction permits for new licenses in October of that year. Most expected this "Freeze" to last a few months, a year at the most. The FCC's re-allocation map of stations did not come until April 1952, with July 1,1952 as the official beginning of licensing new stations.

The FCC's "Sixth Report & Order" ended the Freeze, and many anticipated that it would unleash TV across the USA "overnight." But it would take five years for the U.S. to grow from 108 stations to more than 550. Looking back, new stations came on line slowly, only five by the end of November, 1952. Historians have told us much of the legalese of the Sixth Report & Order, but only with a close look the first five "new" stations can we fully understand how out TV nation came on line. Indeed, these first five would set the precedents that mattered, and give the major stations which define our "TV nation."

Denver had been the largest U.S. city without a TV station by 1952. Senator Edwin Johnson (D-Colorado), chair of the Senate's Interstate and Foreign Commerce Committee, had made getting Denver the first post-Freeze station his personal mission. He had pressured the FCC, and proved ultimately successful as the first new station came on-line a remarkable ten days after the Commission formally announced the first post-Freeze construction permits.

KEEL-TV's first regular telecast- on July 21,1952 - surely should be noted as the re-launching of our TV nation.

Fittingly, KEEL-TV's first image was congratulatory speech by Senator Johnson - who took time from his duties at the Democratic Party Convention in Chicago to speak live via coaxial cable to his constituents in and around Denver. Milton Berle and Arthur Godfrey would come later that week.

David Sarnoff wanted to stay on the good side of this powerful committee chair, and sent 25 of RCA's engineers to install KEEL-TV's transmission tower. Owner (and local businessman) Eugene O'Fallon worked his own staff three shifts around the clock to construct a station that could blanket the Front Range with its TV signal. Every day before its formal July 2 debut, accounts and photographs of construction dominated the local newspapers. That August, 1952, RCA estimated some 4,000 Denver-area set owners tuned to watch General Douglas MacArthur address the Republican Party's national convention. The Freeze was officially over.

Portland, Oregon was the second-largest city with no TV station. There was no Senator to negotiate a deal, and applications piled up for Portland's then three VHF allocations. So David Sarnoff himself took a calculated risk, and moved his engineers to construct a UHF station. Fittingly channel 27 was fully operational on 27 September 1952 - the world's first UHF television station!

KPTV's tower was then the first UHF transmitter RCA had built, costing $3 million, and before shipment to Denver was used for experiments for three years from Bridgeport, Connecticut. RCA staff dismantled the transmitter, and shipped it across the USA by rail and truck. California businessman Herbert Mayer had put WXEL-TV on in Cleveland in 1949, and was already turning down $5 million for that investment. He figured that being first in Portland would prove an equally lucrative investment and invested a half million dollars in KPTV, even with RCA virtually giving him a tower and transmitter.

In 1952 UHF seemed the promised land. All of Portland, from outspoken, boastful mayor Fred Peterson to thousands of ordinary folks who stood for hours in line in front of appliance stores, embraced Channel 27. Television Digest headlined its September 20, 1952 issue with an event which threw the "entire industry - telecasters, manufacturers, distributors, even the federal regulators-into a dither of excitement."

KPTV played the best NBC had to offer: Dragnet, The Colgate Comedy Hour, and You Bet Yom-Life. Sarnoff himself formally "christened" the station when on October 1, 1952, just before NBC's telecast of the World Series commenced, owner Herbert Mayer's 14-year-old daughter Sandra went on the air to present the General himself with a scroll of appreciation. Sarnoff then compared this UHF experiment to the Lewis and Clark expedition, which had connected Portland to the rest of the nation more than a century earlier. FCC Chairman Paul Walker called KPTV a "harbinger of the more abundant television service to all Americans."

All proved to be wrong. RCA `s engineers in technical journals admitted the UHF signal was no match for a VHF even in Portland, where the bulk of the population lived directly in line of sight of KTPV's transmission, engineers had measured "dead spots," and calculated that one in twenty Portland households could not get KTPV's signals in watchable form.

In time the FCC allocated three VHF construction permits for Portland, and the networks lined up to affiliate with them. So it came as no surprise that on 15 December 1956, NBC switched affiliation to Portland's third VHF station, and channel 27 was never heard from again. This initial case proved the harbinger: UHF would never be a money maker - even with NBC behind it - until cable television leveled the playing field. On cable there are no dead spots, and a channel 27 is the equal, signal wise, of a channel 4, 5 or 6.

Denver's channel 9 came next - first lighting Denver TV sets on 12 October 1952. Here again Senator Edwin Johnson brokered a deal so that all but one applicant dropped out. But these negotiations for a VHF station took time, and the Freeze had been over for three-and-a-half months before KBTV went on the air. Johnson's constituents appreciated his efforts, but without the notoriety of being a "first," and lacking NBC's publicity machine behind it (as in the case of Portland), Denver's channel 9 generated little publicity.

But the local owners of channel 9 did make an historical decision. They chose to affiliate primarily with CBS, and secondarily with ABC. They recognized that, CBS, not NBC, had the hottest shows. In October 1952 William Paley was happy just to gain a presence in one of America's largest cities.

The Commission kept at its task, and Denver's channel 7 debuted a year later. Paley pounced, and signed channel 7 to an exclusive CBS deal. Channel 9 had no choice but to fall back on its affiliation with ABC.

One month later, in December 1953, KOA-TV, Denver's channel 4, came online, and since KOA-AM had long been the NBC radio outlet in the mile-high city, NBC switched from channel 2 to the new channel 4.

This left Denver's "first" -KEEL-TV with DuMont, a network the on the verge of bankruptcy. Thus for both Denver, and Portland, being first proved no advantage. The two mighty networks of the day - CBS and NBC - held all the cards, and waited until they could affiliate with a friendly VHF to leverage their mutual profits. Being first only mattered if CBS or NBC stuck with you.

Lubbock, Texas, the fourth of the first five, pioneered small-city TV in November 1952. Lubbock, not even ranked as a top100 market, needed a Texas wildcatter, Wesley DeWilde Rogers, Jr. - "Dub" to his many friends - to take a bold chance. The 33-year-old had helped launch San Antonio's pre-freeze station, but was out of a job when that station was sold in 1952. "Dub" surveyed Texas, moved to Lubbock, and sought to open his own TV station.

"Industry experts" howled: no small town could support a station. "Dub" knew better. VHF signals sometimes would travel for maybe 100 miles across the Texas flatlands in any direction. He reasoned his fellow Texans would embrace TV. He proved right on both counts. On some nights channel 13 reached as far as Amarillo, some 120 miles distant. And ratings for the appropriately named KDUB-TV were high right from the beginning because Dub affiliated with CBS and Texans loved Lucy, Arthur Godfrey, and Jack Benny.

On 13 November 1952, "Dub" formally flipped the switch, and KDUB-TV was on the air. He had wanted to pull that switch months earlier, but had to wait because the Commission worked down a list from the biggest cities without TV to smaller ones like Lubbock.

To speed up the process, "Dub" called his friend Senator Lyndon Baines Johnson. LBJ placed a few calls, and not only did "Dub" get his license months before the formal schedule called for, but he also acquired an affiliation with CBS.

Here was an historical turning point, because all prior affiliations - when given a choice - had preferred NBC. But in late 1952 "Dub" and LBJ figured William Paley and company were producing programming with more mass appeal that NBC. They were right, and both would become rich men based on this hunch.

Austin, Texas - with LBJ's own station - was the last of the "first five." When in April 1952 the Commission had announced the "Thaw," applications poured in, and as of the 1 July 1952 (the formal end of the Freeze), FCC offices were filled with applications. LBJ made sure he would go to the front of the line.

FCC Commissioners and their staffs worked feverishly over the Fourth of July weekend in 1952, and on in its first post Freeze formal meeting on Friday the 1lth of July 1952 announced the first 10 new stations. Newspapers the following day headlined that the TV was beginning again.

What the press missed was a second meeting that July day when in a 10 p.m. to midnight "special session," the Commission announced four more construction permits. Fittingly one was for the lone VHF station allocated to the capital of Texas, and the winner was Mrs. Lyndon Baines Johnson!

KTBS-TV channel 7 went on the air on 28 November 1952. We now know that LBJ had had worked behind the scenes throughout the Freeze to make sure that the Sixth Report & Order allocated but a single VHF outlet to Austin, and that his family would get it - uncontested.

LBJ had considered seeking a TV license as early as 1948, but missed filing before the Freeze.

He was not going to let any political hurdle get in his way again, and called in all manner of political chits, particularly from his close friend, then Speaker of the House, Sam Rayburn.

LBJ - like his buddy "Dub" Rogers - signed with CBS. He already had a on-going relationship with William Paley as his KTBS-AM had been affiliated with CBS for eight years. LBJ reasoned Paley's signing of top radio stars would give it an edge over NBC. He was right, and throughout the 1950s citizens of Austin embraced CBS's growing list of top shows, from Lucy to Gunsmoke.

LBJ had pulled off the deal that would turn him into a multi-millionaire.

Focusing on these "first five" - from Denver, Portland, Lubbock, and Austin - we find the trends and precedents which defined how the United States became a "TV nation."

Technically UHF would never work. NBC proved that in Portland. Political power did. The two Senators Johnson-Edwin and Lyndon-proved that political connections would dictate who got the remainder of the 300 licenses still to be given out, and those who worked the system best made millions.

These first five case studies also demonstrated that CBS was passing NBC as the dominant TV network - not by being first - but by being preferred by both city dwellers (as in Denver and Portland) and small town folks (as in Lubbock) alike. It was programming that mattered (Paley's strategy), not superior technology (Sarnoff's strategy). Lucy and company convinced Americans to willingly spend more time watching TV than doing anything else except sleeping and working; our nation has never been the same since.

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