KTXH
Encyclopedia
MyNetworkTV
MyNetworkTV is a television broadcast syndication service in the United States, owned by the Fox Entertainment Group, a division of News Corporation...
-affiliated television station in Houston, Texas
Houston, Texas
Houston is the fourth-largest city in the United States, and the largest city in the state of Texas. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the city had a population of 2.1 million people within an area of . Houston is the seat of Harris County and the economic center of , which is the ...
. It is owned by the Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation
News Corporation
News Corporation or News Corp. is an American multinational media conglomerate. It is the world's second-largest media conglomerate as of 2011 in terms of revenue, and the world's third largest in entertainment as of 2009, although the BBC remains the world's largest broadcaster...
, and is one-half of a duopoly with Fox network
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
station KRIV (channel 26).
Along with programming from MyNetworkTV, the station also airs cartoons, sitcoms, first run syndicated talk/reality shows, and some paid programming. Although the station does not carry a regular newscast, it will pre-empt its programming for news coverage from either KRIV or the Fox News Channel
Fox News Channel
Fox News Channel , often called Fox News, is a cable and satellite television news channel owned by the Fox Entertainment Group, a subsidiary of News Corporation...
(both owned by Fox) when situations warrant.
Launch
KTXH began broadcasting on November 7, 1982, using the on-air branding tagline "20 Vision." Channel 20 became the third independent station in Houston, after KRIV (then owned by MetromediaMetromedia
Metromedia was a media company that owned radio and television stations in the United States from 1956 to 1986 and owned Orion Pictures from 1986-1997.- Overview :...
), and Gaylord Broadcasting
Gaylord Entertainment Company
The Gaylord Entertainment Company operates a number of hotel, resort, and media companies that were built by Edward Gaylord. It was previously a subsidiary of the Oklahoma City-based Oklahoma Publishing Company, which is owned by the Gaylord family and publishes the Daily Oklahoman newspaper...
's KHTV (channel 39, later KHWB and KHCW and now KIAH). It was also the second station in Texas owned by a group headed by television station entrepreneur Milton Grant
Grant Broadcasting System II
Based in Roanoke, Virginia, Grant Broadcasting System II is an owner of various television stations in the United States....
.
The group launched a similarly-formatted station, KTXA
KTXA
KTXA, virtual channel 21 , is an independent television station based in Fort Worth, Texas, and serving the Dallas/Fort Worth designated market area. With its transmitter in Cedar Hill, KTXA is owned by CBS Corporation and is the sister station of CBS outlet KTVT .KTXA was originally an...
in Fort Worth
Fort Worth, Texas
Fort Worth is the 16th-largest city in the United States of America and the fifth-largest city in the state of Texas. Located in North Central Texas, just southeast of the Texas Panhandle, the city is a cultural gateway into the American West and covers nearly in Tarrant, Parker, Denton, and...
, in January 1981. It programmed a general entertainment format consisting of cartoons, vintage off-network sitcoms and dramas, old movies, westerns, and sports.
The fledgling station was broadcasting from a tower under construction that collapsed in 1982, killing seven workers. It was eventually replaced by the Senior Road Tower
Senior Road Tower
Senior Road Tower is a high guyed radio mast for FM and TV broadcasting in unincorporated northeastern Fort Bend County near Missouri City, Texas, USA, at . Senior Road Tower was built in 1983 as a replacement for a tower which collapsed in 1982...
.
Ownership changes, switch to UPN
Grant Broadcasting sold both KTXH and KTXA to Gulf Broadcasting in 1984. Several weeks later, Gulf sold its television broadcasting division to Taft BroadcastingTaft Broadcasting
The Taft Broadcasting Company, also known as Taft Television and Radio Company, Incorporated, was an American media conglomerate based in Cincinnati, Ohio....
. Even after going through three owners within the same year, the station did not change its programming format, aside from adding more programming owned by Taft and distributed by new sister company Worldvision Enterprises, such as Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera
Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. was an American animation studio that dominated North American television animation during the second half of the 20th century...
cartoons.
Taft sold its group of independent and Fox-affiliated stations, including KTXH and KTXA, to the TVX Broadcast Group
TVX Broadcast Group
The TVX Broadcast Group was an American media company that owned a group of UHF television stations during the 1980s. Originally known as the Television Corporation, the company was headquartered in Norfolk, Virginia, and was founded by a group of Norfolk-area businessmen led by Timothy McDonald...
in February 1987. Two years later, Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
purchased a minority ownership in TVX, which suffered from financial problems after the Taft purchase. Paramount bought out the remainder of TVX's shares in 1991. Under Paramount, the station added several first run syndicated shows in the mid-1990s and rebranded to Paramount 20.
Viacom acquired ownership of KTXH, KTXA, and their sister stations when they purchased Paramount in 1994. The station became an owned and operated station of the United Paramount Network
UPN
United Paramount Network was a television network that was broadcast in over 200 markets in the United States from 1995 to 2006. UPN was originally owned by Viacom/Paramount and Chris-Craft Industries, the former of which, through the Paramount Television Group, produced most of the network's...
(co-owned by Viacom and Chris-Craft Industries
Chris-Craft Industries
Chris-Craft Industries, Inc., formerly National Automotive Fibers, Inc., was a publicly-held American corporation traded on the New York and Pacific Stock Exchanges. It later took on the name of one of its acquisitions, Chris-Craft Boats...
) at the network's launch on 16 January 1995.
Sale to Fox, switch to MyNetworkTV
KTXH was purchased by Fox Television Stations in 2001, as part of a station trade which saw Viacom exchanging KTXH and WDCA-TVWDCA
WDCA, virtual channel 20, is a television station in Washington, D.C.. Owned by Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation, WDCA is a sister station to Fox network outlet WTTG , and is affiliated with the co-owned MyNetworkTV programming service...
in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
in exchange for KBHK-TV (now KBCW-TV) in San Francisco, which Fox had bought as part of its purchase of Chris-Craft's broadcasting division. The transaction established the first television duopoly in Houston with KRIV and KTXH (Fox had also owned several of KTXH's former sister stations under Taft). Channel 20 also relocated its broadcasting facilities from the original studios on Kirby Drive near present-day Reliant Park
Reliant Park
Reliant Park is a complex in Houston, Texas, USA, named after the energy company Reliant Energy. It is located on Kirby Drive at the 610 Loop...
to KRIV's studios.
The UPN and WB
The WB Television Network
The WB Television Network is a former television network in the United States that was launched on January 11, 1995 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and Tribune Broadcasting. On January 24, 2006, CBS Corporation and Warner Bros...
networks announced that they would merge into a new network called the CW
The CW Television Network
The CW Television Network is a television network in the United States launched at the beginning of the 2006–2007 television season. It is a joint venture between CBS Corporation, the former owners of United Paramount Network , and Time Warner's Warner Bros., former majority owner of The WB...
. KHCW, owned by Tribune Broadcasting
Tribune Broadcasting
The Tribune Broadcasting Company is a group of radio and television stations located throughout the United States which are owned and operated by the Tribune Company, a media conglomerate based in Chicago, Illinois and named for the flagship Chicago Tribune newspaper.- History :Tribune Broadcasting...
, was announced as the CW's Houston station. Almost immediately, KTXH dropped the UPN branding from its station branding, and revamped its logo to just feature the boxed "20", and also announced that they would no longer promote any UPN programming.
Additionally, the station began referring to itself in promos as "Houston's 20". Similar changes were also made to Fox's other UPN affiliates, as the CW network list consisted of both stations owned by Tribune and stations owned by CBS. News Corporation also chose not to affiliate stations with the CW in markets where neither Tribune nor CBS (excluding CBS owned-and-operated stations) owned a station.
In June 2006, Channel 20 began the transition to its new network by rebranding as My20. The transition was complete when MyNetworkTV began operations on September 5, 2006. KTXH and its sister stations did not carry the final two weeks of UPN programming, which explained UPN's low-key sign-off. Occasionally as time permits, KTXH may now air Fox network programming whenever KRIV cannot in the event of an emergency.
On October 1, 2009, KTXH launched its new website at www.my20houston.com using the same platform as its sister station KRIV. Early content included a schedule for both local and national programming with links to weather, news, and traffic on www.myfoxhouston.com.
Sports coverage
For many years, KTXH was the over-the-air broadcast rights holder for both the Houston AstrosHouston Astros
The Houston Astros are a Major League Baseball team located in Houston, Texas. They are a member of the National League Central division. The Astros are expected to join the American League West division in 2013. Since , they have played their home games at Minute Maid Park, known as Enron Field...
baseball team and the NBA's Houston Rockets
Houston Rockets
The Houston Rockets are an American professional basketball team based in Houston, Texas. The team plays in the Southwest Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association . The team was established in 1967, and played in San Diego, California for four years, before being...
. Hannah Storm
Hannah Storm
Hannah Storm is an American television sports journalist, serving as co-anchor of ESPN's SportsCenter Monday–Thursday mornings, and is also host of the NBA Countdown pregame show on ABC as part of the network's NBA Sunday game coverage.-Early life and career:Storm was born in Oak Park, Illinois,...
, later a noted national broadcast personality, anchored the station's coverage of the Rockets in the mid-1980s. In 2008, KTXH has once again acquired the rights to air Houston Astros games. They broadcast 20 games in the 2008 season but only five games are scheduled to be shown on the station in 2009.