The station signed on for the first time on July 13, 1953, as KCSJ-TV, owned by the Star-Chieftain Publishing Corporation, owners of Pueblo's two major newspapers, the morning
Pueblo Chieftain and evening
Pueblo Star-Journal, along with
KCSJ radio. It is Colorado's second-oldest station outside of
Denver. During the 1950s, KCSJ-TV was one of two full-time NBC affiliates serving Southern Colorado—the other being
KRDO-TV (channel 13) in Colorado Springs, about to the north. In 1960, the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) collapsed all of southern Colorado into a single television market. At this point, KCSJ-TV moved its transmitter closer to Colorado Springs and became the area's sole NBC affiliate, with KRDO-TV switching to
ABC. In 1962, Star-Chieftain sold KCSJ-TV to Metropolitan Broadcasting, owners of
KOA-AM-
FM-
TV in Denver. KCSJ-TV then became KOAA-TV in March of that year, but remained a free-standing station programmed separately from Denver's KOA-TV (now KCNC-TV). The two stations did, however, occasionally do cross-promotion, and both were NBC affiliates (its former sister station in Denver is now a CBS
O&O). With much wealthier ownership, KOAA was able to add videotape in 1962. In 1967, it became the first television station in Southern Colorado to broadcast local programming in
color. When the Denver stations were sold off to General Electric in 1968, Metropolitan sold KOAA to local owner Sangre De Cristo Broadcasting Corporation (with shares owned by William Grant, Helen T. White, and Mahlon T. White) in a separate deal. KOAA floundered through the early and mid-1970s, largely because of reception problems in the northern part of the market. When channel 5 moved its transmitter closer to Colorado Springs, it had to conform its signal to protect KFBC-TV (now
KGWN-TV) in
Cheyenne, Wyoming. As a result, while most of Colorado Springs received the channel 5 signal very well, it was barely viewable in northern Colorado Springs and that city's northern suburbs because of the area's rugged terrain. Most viewers in the northern portion of the market could not get a clear signal from KOAA until cable arrived in the market in the 1970s. This posed a problem for KOAA, as the Colorado Springs area began an unprecedented period of growth that continues to this day while Pueblo remained relatively unchanged. It did not help matters that NBC spent most of the 1970s at the bottom of the ratings. KOAA finally rebounded in 1977 when the
Evening Post Publishing Company of
Charleston, South Carolina, bought the station and brought in former ABC executive John Gilbert as general manager (the licensee would be renamed Sangre De Cristo Communications Incorporated). Evening Post's broadcasting arm eventually evolved into
Cordillera Communications and continued to be a subsidiary of Evening Post Publishing Company. Soon after Gilbert's arrival, KOAA opened a studio and sales office in Colorado Springs and steadily beefed up its news operation. In 1980, KOAA signed on K30AA, a 132,500-
watt translator on channel 30 in Colorado Springs, bringing a clear signal to the northern part of that city for the first time ever. For the next three decades, it branded itself as "5/30" (denoting both the main and Colorado Springs translator channels). It was also during this time that KOAA adopted the
Eyewitness News format that was popular with TV stations nationwide during the 1970s and 1980s. The station's resurgence came around the same time that NBC rebounded to become the highest-rated network in the country. Cordillera announced on October 29, 2018, that it would sell most of its stations, including KOAA, to the
E. W. Scripps Company. The sale was completed on May 1, 2019. For the second time in its history, channel 5 became a
sister station to a Denver station, this time with
KMGH-TV, and as such KOAA shares news sources and certain reporters with KMGH. ==News operation==