1939–1959 The Taft family's involvement in broadcasting began in 1939, when the
Cincinnati Times-Star purchased
WKRC radio from
CBS. The paper formed
Radio Cincinnati, Inc. as a subsidiary to operate the station. In April 1949, Taft's first TV station,
WKRC-TV in Cincinnati, began broadcasting. In 1951, in its first expansion outside Ohio, Radio Cincinnati acquired a 20 percent interest in WBIR-
AM-
FM in
Knoxville, Tennessee from father-and-son owners J. Lindsay and Gilmore Nunn. A year-and-a-half later, the Taft family increased its stake to 30 percent when the Nunns sold additional shares in that station to Martha and Robert Ashe, John P. Hart, and Radio Cincinnati. In 1953, Radio Cincinnati purchased WTVN-TV (now
WSYX) in
Columbus, Ohio, from Picture-Waves, Inc., controlled by
Toledo attorney and broadcaster
Edward Lamb. In 1954, the company bought WHKC radio in Columbus from United Broadcasting, then-owners of
WHK in
Cleveland; WHKC is renamed
WTVN. In August 1956,
WBIR-TV in Knoxville began broadcasting, under the same ownership structure as the WBIR radio stations. In 1957, Radio Cincinnati purchased WBRC-
AM-
FM-
TV in
Birmingham, Alabama, from
Storer Broadcasting. In 1958, the
Cincinnati Times-Star was merged into the
Cincinnati Post, published by the
E.W. Scripps Company. Radio Cincinnati also purchased WKXP-TV in
Lexington, Kentucky, from local interests and changed its call letters to
WKYT-TV. In 1959, the company acquired the remaining 70 percent of WBIR-AM-FM-TV in Knoxville. Also in 1959, the Taft family merged its broadcasting subsidiaries into one, using the
Taft Broadcasting Company name. Subsidiaries WBRC, Inc. (WBRC-AM-FM-TV), WTVN, Inc. (WTVN-TV), Radio Cincinnati, Inc. (WKRC-AM-FM-TV and WKYT-TV), and Radio Columbus, Inc. (WTVN-AM-FM) were merged on June 23, 1959 and WBIR, Inc. (WBIR-AM-FM-TV) was merged on February 1, 1960.
1960–1979 In 1960, Taft launched WTVN-FM in Columbus (it is now
WLVQ). A year later the company sold the WBIR stations in Knoxville to
Multimedia Inc. of
Greenville, South Carolina. In 1961, Taft signed a group affiliation deal with
ABC, converting all of the stations Taft had owned at that time, to the network. With WTVN-TV already an ABC affiliate, WBRC-TV, WKYT, and WKRC-TV switched to the network. This came after that network's founder
Leonard Goldenson persuaded Taft president Hulbert Taft Jr., a longtime friend, to switch several of the company's stations to ABC. In 1963, Taft purchased several stations from Transcontinent Television Corporation:
WDAF-AM-
FM-
TV in
Kansas City, Missouri,
WGR-AM-
FM-
TV in
Buffalo, New York, and
WNEP-TV in
Scranton, Pennsylvania. The sale was completed on April 1, 1964. In October 1966, Taft purchased the
Hanna-Barbera cartoon studio from its founders,
Joseph Barbera,
William Hanna and
George Sidney. Several months later in April 1967, the firm sold WKYT-TV to a subsidiary of
Kentucky Central Life Insurance Company. On November 10, 1967, Taft Broadcasting president and chairman Hulbert Taft Jr. died in liquid propane gas-related explosion in a bomb shelter he had built on his property in the Cincinnati suburb of Indian Hill. Days after his death, his son Dudley S. Taft replaced him on the firm's board of directors, and he eventually became head of the company. In 1969, Taft purchased WIBF-TV in
Philadelphia and changed its call letters to
WTAF-TV. The FCC initially granted Taft a waiver to keep both WTAF-TV and WNEP-TV, but later reversed itself in 1973 (four years later), and Taft sold the Scranton outlet to the station's management, who formed NEP Communications. Also that year, the broadcasting group formed The Sy Fischer Company to produce television programming. In 1970, Taft formed
Rhodes Productions, a television syndication arm for various independent TV programs, including those of Hanna-Barbera. In 1972, Taft opened its first theme park,
Kings Island, outside of Cincinnati. Taft owned five other theme parks through its
KECO Entertainment division. WBRC radio and WBRC-FM in Birmingham are sold to Mooney Broadcasting. Taft's Rhodes Productions subsidiary has hired John Pearson International as international backer of its programming. In 1973, Taft sold WNEP-TV in Scranton to its management, called NEP Communications. In 1974, Taft acquired
Top 40 station
KQV and
rock outlet
WDVE, both in
Pittsburgh, from
ABC Radio. In 1975, a second theme park based on Kings Island,
Kings Dominion, opened outside of
Richmond. Rhodes Productions was renamed to Taft, H-B Program Sales while Taft, H-B International was established as the new overseas television distribution arm for the company. Rhodes was eventually revived two weeks later under
Filmways.
Carowinds in
Charlotte, North Carolina was acquired by the company in 1975 from the Carowinds Corporation. In 1979, Taft purchased
WDCA-TV in
Washington, D.C. from the Superior Tube Company. Around this same period, Taft also acquired independent distributor
Worldvision Enterprises (formerly a division of ABC) and production company
QM Productions.
1980–1987 In 1980, Taft acquired
Sunn Classic Pictures and two additional
Schick divisions. Sunn Classic was reincorporated as
Taft International Pictures. In 1981, two Taft executives launched Jensen Farley Pictures to purchase the company's distribution assets, while in 1982, Taft had reinstated the Sunn Classic Pictures name as a unit in order to produce TV movies and miniseries. In 1981, Taft acquired
Ruby-Spears Productions from
Filmways. Around this time, in the early 1980s, Taft split its operation into two "subdivisions": the "
Taft Entertainment Company" (which included Hanna-Barbera, Ruby-Spears, Worldvision, the theme parks, Taft International Pictures, and Taft Entertainment Television), which was headed by Sy Fischer. Taft also bought television producer Titus Productions, run by
Herbert Brodkin later that year as part of the Taft Entertainment Company. In 1982, KQV in Pittsburgh was sold to its general manager Robert W. Dickey and newspaper publisher
Richard Mellon Scaife, under the "Calvary, Inc." banner. In 1983, Taft exchanged WGR-TV in Buffalo to General Cinema Corporation's Coral Television subsidiary in return for
WCIX in
Miami. In 1984, the Taft Entertainment Company was reorganized, in order to set up various theatrical projects that was made by the studio, such as
On Wings with Eagles. Also that year, it formed a partnership with
Keith Barish to start out a joint venture, with a worldwide distribution alliance at
20th Century Fox to distribute the films. During that year, Taft decided to rename the former QM Productions unit as Taft Entertainment Television, with
The Lucie Arnaz Show being the first show to be produced under that name. On August 20, 1986, Taft/Barish Productions, the feature film joint venture between the broadcasting group and Keith Barish Productions had inked a ten-picture distribution deal with
Tri-Star Pictures for $200 million, to handle domestic distribution of the films at a rate of four to six films per year. In 1985, Taft purchased Gulf Broadcasting, which included
KTXA in
Fort Worth;
KTXH in
Houston;
WTSP in
St. Petersburg, Florida; KTSP-TV (now
KSAZ-TV) in
Phoenix;
KESQ-TV in
Palm Springs, California; and
WGHP in
High Point, North Carolina. As a result, Taft sold several radio stations to
CBS to comply with FCC rules. KESQ-TV was spun off to former Gulf Broadcasting executive E. Grant Fitts. In October 1986, WTAF-TV in Philadelphia and WCIX in Miami became
charter affiliates of the
Fox Broadcasting Company. One month later, Taft announced the sale of both of those stations along with its three
independent stations (WDCA-TV, KTXA, and KTXH) to the
TVX Broadcast Group; the sale was completed in April 1987. Taft also sold WGR radio and WRLT-FM (the former WGR-FM) in Buffalo to Rich Communications, a subsidiary of Buffalo-based
Rich Products. In 1987, Taft, wanting to purchase more network-affiliated television stations, is looking to sell Taft Entertainment Group, the entertainment subsidiary of the Taft Broadcasting company to a different buyer, with estimates cost $300 million, and the group had a record production year in 1986 out of 334 animated half hours and 63 live-action half hour programs, to the three networks, to the cable networks, to first-run syndication. Taft Broadcasting Company was purchased by TFBA Limited Partnership, which included
Robert M. Bass as a partner, in April 1987 for $1.43 billion, taking the company private.
Successor companies Later in 1987, Cincinnati-based businessman
Carl Lindner, Jr. staged a hostile takeover and acquired controlling interest in Taft Broadcasting. Lindner renamed the company
Great American Broadcasting (also known as
Great American Communications) following a major restructuring of its operations. The new name came from Linder's insurance company,
Great American Insurance. Since Taft Broadcasting was legally dissolved and replaced by Great American, the FCC considered this restructuring to be an ownership change. It ordered Great American to sell either WTVN-TV or WKRC-TV. The Cincinnati station provided at least secondary coverage to the Columbus area, and the common ownership had been "grandfathered" when the FCC enacted its "one to a market" rule in the 1970s. With the restructuring, however, they lost this protection. As a result, Great American spun off WTVN-TV to Anchor Media, a new firm composed of former Taft Broadcasting board members led by Robert Bass. (The two stations have since been reunited under the
Sinclair Broadcast Group, with cross-ownership rules having since been relaxed.) Another new company, led by former Taft Broadcasting president Dudley S. Taft Sr., took the Taft Broadcasting name. This new company retained WGHP and later purchases another Philadelphia station,
WPHL-TV. In 1988, Great American Broadcasting sold Worldvision to
Aaron Spelling Productions. Included with Worldvision were outright ownership of all of Great American's programming assets (including the remnants of Taft International Pictures and Taft Entertainment Television), except for the Hanna-Barbera and Ruby-Spears libraries, which remained owned by Great American for the time being. However, Worldvision continued to hold syndication rights until the two animation studios found new owners. In 1991, Hanna-Barbera, along with much of the original Ruby-Spears library, was acquired by
Turner Broadcasting System, which became part of
Time Warner in 1996. As part of this deal, syndication rights to the libraries were passed to
Turner Program Services (via
Turner Entertainment Co.) prior to Time Warner's purchase of Turner. Eventually, TPS was folded into
Warner Bros. Television Distribution. The Ruby-Spears studio was spun off and bought back by Joe Ruby and Ken Spears, and operated as an independent operation from then forward. In 1992, KECO Entertainment, Great American's theme park division, was sold to Paramount Communications (the parent of
Paramount Pictures; the parent company was formerly known as
Gulf+Western) and became
Paramount Parks, later to be acquired by
Viacom. (These parks were sold to
Cedar Fair Entertainment Co. by CBS in 2006.) Great American also reacquired WGHP from Dudley Taft. In 1993, Great American filed for
Chapter 11 bankruptcy and renamed to Citicasters Communications in 1994. It also sold WKRC radio to
Jacor and shut down
Electra, a teletext service operated as a joint venture between Taft,
Zenith, and Turner Broadcasting's WTBS (now
WPCH-TV) in
Atlanta. In 1994, Citicasters sold most of its TV stations, including WDAF-TV and KSAZ-TV to
New World Communications, and WBRC and WGHP to the
News Corporation's
Fox Television Stations unit, which would later acquire the New World chain. Around the same time, when two of the markets switched to ABC via Scripps, Citicasters agreed to a two-station deal with
CBS to affiliate with
WTSP and
WKRC. In 1996, Citicasters, by then the owner of two television stations, five AM radio stations and 14 FM radio stations, merged with Jacor, which became a subsidiary of Citicasters. Three months after the merger was completed, Jacor exchanged WTSP to Gannett in return for Gannett's radio stations in
Los Angeles,
San Diego and Tampa. In 1997, as a condition of the merger, Jacor sold WKRQ and the original WDAF-FM (by then KYYS, now KCKC) to
American Radio Systems, which would become acquired by
Infinity Broadcasting (later renamed
CBS Radio) in 1998. Also in 1997, Jacor sold WDAF (AM) (now KCSP) to
Entercom. In 1997, the Worldvision properties that had previously been under Taft and Great American (with the exception of the Hanna-Barbera and most of the Ruby-Spears material) were incorporated into
Republic Pictures (today part of
CBS Studios). In 1999,
Clear Channel Communications acquired Citicasters and Jacor. The Citicasters name lived on as a holding company and licensee under the Clear Channel corporate structure until 2020, when the Citicasters and Jacor names were eliminated as part of a reorganization of iHeartMedia's subsidiaries. == Former stations ==