WSBK-TV (channel 38) is an independent television station in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It is owned by the CBS News and Stations group alongside CBS outlet WBZ-TV (channel 4). The two stations share studios on Soldiers Field Road in the Allston–Brighton section of Boston. WSBK-TV's transmitter is located on Cedar Street in Needham, Massachusetts, on a tower site that was formerly owned by CBS and is now owned by American Tower Corporation (which is shared with transmitters belonging to WBZ-TV, WCVB-TV, WGBH-TV, WBTS-CD, and WGBX-TV).
WSBK is also available via satellite throughout the United States on Dish Network as part of its superstation package (which since September 2013, is available only to existing subscribers of the tier). Otherwise, it enjoys cable coverage throughout much of the New England region, though this has been limited compared to the past when it was more widely distributed.
History Origins (1955–1966) The first construction permit for channel 38 in Boston was granted in October 1955 to Ajax Enterprises, headed by Herbert Mayer, a former New York City attorney who had founded Empire Coil, a New Rochelle, New York–based manufacturer of RF coils for television stations and receivers. Mayer went on to own stations in Portland, Oregon (KPTV, the country's first licensed UHF station), and Cleveland (WXEL). He sold the cable manufacturer and both television stations to Storer Broadcasting in 1954. Channel 38 was originally slated to have the call sign WHMB; however, after Storer changed the call letters of the Cleveland property to WJW-TV in April 1956, Mayer quickly reclaimed WXEL for the Boston station. WXEL's proposed transmitter in Melrose was never built, and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) revoked the construction permit and deleted the call sign in November 1960.
The current station signed on the air on October 12, 1964.FCC History Cards for WSBK-TV. Federal Communications Commission. It was first licensed to the Boston Catholic Television Center under the call letters WIHS-TV, with the call letters standing for the "IHS" initialism for the Christogram. The station employed a general entertainment format, along with broadcasts of the daily and Sunday Mass. As WIHS, the station initially programmed a "hybrid" schedule—educational (for the Catholic schools in the Boston area) and religious programs during the morning, and syndicated programs and movies (and by 1966, some shows that the Boston area's network affiliates declined to air) in the afternoon and evening. The station also carried two 15-minute local newscasts each weekday, at 5:45 and 10 pm, which consisted of an announcer reading news headlines into a camera.
The station also made an initial foray into sports, carrying ten regular season away games and all playoff road games from the Boston Celtics that were not carried on network television during the 1964–65 season. However, team management was worried about the lack of penetration of the UHF band, leading to playoff away games being simulcast on WHDH-TV (channel 5) in 1965 (that station had previously aired select Celtics telecasts, including playoff away games starting in 1962); the following season, the team moved back to WHDH outright. Some college sports (mostly hockey and basketball games) were carried during the WIHS era, which were carried over during the early Storer Broadcasting years.
WSBK-TV (1966–present)
The station was purchased by Storer Broadcasting in 1966. A few months after the purchase, the station's call sign was changed to the present WSBK-TV, named after the company's ticker symbol on the New York Stock Exchange, "SBK". General manager Bill Flynn moved quickly to improve the station's technical facilities, investing $350,000 in color cameras and a color mobile unit.Back Stage (New York), December 16, 1966, p. 3.
Early success with sports Storer scored its biggest coup in 1967, when it secured broadcast rights to the Boston Bruins from WKBG-TV (channel 56, now WLVI), and eventually owned the team for a three-year period from 1972 to 1975. During the next few years, as the Bruins became a contender for the National Hockey League's Stanley Cup championship (led by young superstar Bobby Orr), the popularity of these games led to a spike in UHF antenna purchases, and helped make channel 38 one of the leading independent stations in the country. For much of the time between 1970 and 1984, WSBK would televise between 70 and 72 of the Bruins' 80 regular season games, as well as all playoff games not shown on network television.
In 1975, WSBK acquired television rights to the Boston Red Sox; during the team's first year on channel 38, the Red Sox won the American League pennant. The team remained on WSBK until 1995, and returned for another three-year period from 2003 to 2005. WSBK had broadcast between 90 and 110 Red Sox games a year between 1975 and 1983; about 75 games a year from 1984 to 1995, and a limited number of games (usually 28 to 30 a year) between 2003 and 2005. Although WSBK carried Celtics road playoff games in 1969 (the team having abandoned WKBG at the end of the regular season after seeing the number of regular-season games broadcast by channel 56 during the 1968–69 season shrink compared to the previous year), the station would not carry the NBA team's games on a regular basis until 1993. During that time, WSBK broadcast road games of the Celtics; it continued to do so through 1998.
Early programming At the very beginning of its tenure, WSBK did not sign on until 11:30 a.m. on weekday mornings (with the Jack LaLanne exercise program), and would present programming that the Boston NBC affiliate, then WBZ-TV, declined to air.The Boston Globe, February 21, 1967, p. 63. WSBK acquired many syndicated film series that were available very cheaply, because the film prints were old and had already been heavily used by other stations (like The Saint, I Led 3 Lives, Science Fiction Theater, and The Ann Sothern Show). During these early years WSBK was not yet buying blocks of feature films from major studios, and instead was airing cheaper, independently produced Hollywood films of the 1940s, mostly in late-night time slots (the primetime slots were usually reserved for sporting events).
WSBK made an unusual deal with Columbia Pictures: a 50-year contract for local broadcast rights to the Three Stooges comedy shorts, effective January 1, 1972. The station programmed these immediately, beginning on January 3, 1972, in a one-hour slot on weekday afternoons (usually at 4:30 p.m., later 4 p.m. or 5 p.m.).The Boston Globe, Jan. 3, 1972, p. 32. After-school viewers could not get enough of these slapstick comedies, and the popular Stooge hour ran until January 10, 1976. Then the films were scheduled for Saturdays only, at 5 p.m.The Boston Globe, Jan. 11, 1976, p. 9. Viewers who tuned in the following Monday were surprised to find children's cartoons, followed by Lassie.The Boston Globe, Jan. 13, 1976, p. 43. This appears to have been an attempt to compete with rival UHF station WKBG-TV, which devoted its weekday afternoons largely to cartoons. But Stooge fans wanted to see the films regularly, and protested the rescheduling. The weekday showings resumed nine months later, on September 13, 1976,The Boston Globe, Sept. 13, 1976, p. 37. and lasted just over one year. The Stooges returned to weekends only, settling into a Sunday-morning slot on October 2, 1977.The Boston Globe, Oct. 2, 1977, p. F14. For many years, on WSBK's weekly Ask the Manager forum inviting viewers to air their comments, the question asked most often was "When are you going to bring back The Three Stooges?"
During the 1970s the station inaugurated an annual New Year's Eve marathon of Stooge comedies, which became a Boston tradition until 2021. At the height of the marathon's popularity, many local performing artists were seen in live or videotaped segments between the films. WSBK promoted the marathons heavily, sometimes showing certain Stooge films in 3D or stereophonic sound.
As the station prospered, it acquired an increasingly stronger lineup of syndicated programs. During the late 1960s through (to a lesser extent) the 1990s, WSBK's staples included Perry Mason, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, The Andy Griffith Show, The Dick Van Dyke Show, McHale's Navy, Hogan's Heroes, Cheers (itself set in Boston and now owned by CBS), M*A*S*H, and Frasier. WSBK continued to run some network programs that were preempted by the local NBC (WBZ-TV), ABC (first WNAC-TV, then WCVB-TV), and CBS (first WHDH-TV, then WNAC-TV) affiliates until 1981.
Children's programming Every Boston station had a children's-show personality: cowboy entertainer Rex Trailer, circus clown Bozo (played by Frank Avruch), astronaut Major Mudd (played by Ed McDonnell), train conductor Bunker Hill (played by Gene Meyle until May 1970).The Boston Globe, May 28, 1970, p. 62. WSBK's contender was Willie Whistle, a sailor-hatted clown who used a bird-whistle in his mouth to create a distinctive speaking voice. Willie was played by a station executive, program director Dick Beach.
WSBK acquired a library of Warner Bros.' Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons, which aired on weekday mornings and afternoons. The Three Stooges were already established as a mainstay of children's programming.
Film library The station also ran several movies a day (one during the day, in primetime, and late night). By the mid-1980s WSBK was airing several major-name movie franchises on a weekly basis, among them Sherlock Holmes, Charlie Chan, Mr. Moto, Blondie, Abbott and Costello, and The Bowery Boys.
Boston audiences were fond of vintage films, already being celebrated on rival Boston station WCVB-TV, with staff announcer Frank Avruch hosting prestigious Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer features on weekend nights. Avruch, dressed in formal wear, would stand in front of a movie-theater set and offer historical commentary about the films being presented. This prompted WSBK to try a different spin on the Avruch broadcasts. The Movie Loft, aired weeknights, had WSBK's own house announcer Dana Hersey in casual attire instead of formal wear, seated in a comfortable room instead of standing before a theater front. The program aired syndicated movies with interstitial program elements hosted by Hersey. Once the show was firmly established with Boston's adult movie buffs, it experimented with showing only "unedited" movies. The Movie Loft tested the boundaries of commercial broadcasting, airing movies such as The Deer Hunter, The Boys in the Band, and 48 Hrs. without editing for inappropriate content or length.
Becoming a superstation