Launch and early years Launched on 3 January 1982 by print media editor Edilio Rusconi, Italia 1 was born from the idea of a network supported by twenty regional broadcasting stations, some owned by Rusconi himself and others simply affiliated to broadcast throughout Italian territory on the 'ploy' of
interconnection. The lead broadcasting station is Milan-based Antenna Nord, but Rome's Quinta Rete also played an important role. Lillo Tombolini was the executive director, and the channel's presenter was a young Gabriella Golia, who was already the face of Antenna Nord. During its early years, Rusconi's growing national channel started its programming at noon, with a segment dedicated to children's programming, during which various animated shows (particularly
western cartoons) were broadcast, as well as successful original television series such as
Star Trek. In the early afternoon, air-time was then given to region-specific broadcasts, and later on, more television series and a mid-afternoon children's programming block called
Bim Bum Bam, which offered numerous cartoons and animated series over the years, mostly American imports, such as
The Smurfs,
Snorks,
Count Duckula,
Police Academy,
Iznogoud,
Inspector Gadget,
Batman: The Animated Series,
Spiff and Hercules, and
Alvin and the Chipmunks among others. In the late afternoon hours, the channel again broadcasts from local stations, alongside airing an episode of a television series the following hour (such as
Paper Moon. Generally in the early evening hours, two movies and one television series was broadcast. The network also offered plenty of air-time to sport programs dedicated to soccer, boxing, basketball and motor racing, including
Andrea De Adamich's
Grand Prix. Primetime hours on Italia 1 were dedicated to predominantly American imports such as
Falcon Crest,
Kojak,
The Big Valley,
Project UFO, and
Mork & Mindy. On 23 April 1982, an official agreement was made between Gruppo Rusconi and the American network
CBS for technical assistance and program sharing. However, only a few months after its appearance on a national scale, funds began to dwindle, mostly due to exorbitant costs of managing broadcast transmission systems, something a print editing house such as Rusconi probably wasn't aware of, but also due to the aggressive advertising policy from its main rival network,
Canale 5. In fact, Rusconi's network relied on an external advertising provider, La Publikompass, to sell advertising space while
Berlusconi's channel took advantage of owning its own advertising provider, Publitalia, which could easily personalise ad packages to clients using
dumping practices. On 6 September 1982, Rusconi signed a collaboration agreement with
Silvio Berlusconi, the owner of
Canale 5, mainly focusing on a common policy for the management of advertising limits but also concerning the communal use of high frequency networks and the sharing of some programs. However, on 30 November of that same year, the Rusconi group were forced to sell the network for about 29 billion lire (approximately €15 million) to Berlusconi, who merged it with "Rete 10", also owned by Berlusconi, to found the new Italia 1, which, according to the
Fininvest company, is geared towards a young audience. == Audience ==