KDOC-TV
KDOC-TV (channel 56) is an independent television station licensed to Anaheim, California, United States, serving the Los Angeles area. It is owned by Ellis Communications and operated by Titan TV Broadcast Group under a local marketing agreement (LMA). KDOC-TV's studios and offices are located on East First Street in Santa Ana, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson. History. KDOC-TV signed on the air on October 1, 1982; the station was initially owned by locally based Golden Orange Broadcasting, whose investors included entertainer Pat Boone. The station's original studio facilities were located  on South Clementine Street in Anaheim, just blocks east of the Disneyland resort. At the time of its original sign-on it was the seventh independent station in the Los Angeles market, alongside KTLA (channel 5), KHJ-TV (channel 9, now KCAL-TV), KTTV (channel 11), KCOP-TV (channel 13), KSCI (channel 18), and KWHY-TV (channel 22). KDOC carried programs from conservative commentator Wally George and televangelist Dr. Gene Scott until their respective deaths in 2003 and 2005. During this period, the station was also popular for weekend broadcasts of Asian programming, which gained a significant non-Asian audience  with the broadcast of the 1984–1985 (subtitled) Japanese television series "Miyamoto Musashi". The station also was popular for its weekend block of professional wrestling and roller derby including World Class Championship Wrestling, Mid-Atlantic Wrestling's syndicated show "World Wide Wrestling" and Los Angeles Thunderbirds roller games. The station also offered some live sports programming, such as UNLV Runnin' Rebels men's basketball during the height of the Jerry Tarkanian era (with play-by-play for many years called by Chick Hearn), plus Loyola Marymount University men's basketball, and a syndicated package of Western Athletic Conference men's basketball  games. In 2004, KDOC (with KPXN-TV) carried selected Anaheim Angels games, as then-new owner Arte Moreno wanted to broadcast more games beyond the slate of telecasts already contractually obligated to air on Fox Sports West and the team's then-primary over-the-air carrier KCAL-TV. In the fall of 1988, KDOC embarked on the station's first brief foray in television news. KDOC began producing "NewsWatch 56", a prime time newscast at 8:00 p.m. anchored by Michelle Merker (also the station's public affairs director) and Pat Matthews (then a radio newscaster from New Orleans). The  program was moved frequently: first to 7:00 p.m., then to 9:00 p.m., and finally to 11:00 p.m. During that time, the station rebranded the program as "Orange County NewsWatch", and then "KDOC NewsWatch". In 1992, KDOC stopped producing full-fledged newscasts; the station produced local news updates instead. The station also stopped producing any original in-house programming, except for the minimum amount required by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Much of the station's programming through the years has been situation comedy and dramatic reruns that were seen on other Los Angeles area stations in years past, after those  stations either relinquished or shared the rights with KDOC. Among those shows were: "The Mary Tyler Moore Show", "The Dick Van Dyke Show", "The Beverly Hillbillies", "The Cosby Show", "Saved by the Bell", "The Doris Day Show" and "My Three Sons". Reruns of the iconic courtroom drama "Perry Mason" had been on the station since 1988, where it aired weekdays at noon for about 20 years, and aired early mornings on KDOC's main channel until September 2011 (several of the aforementioned shows currently air on the station's MeTV subchannel on digital channel 56.3). On April 4, 2006, Bert  Ellis, along with Anaheim Ducks owners Henry Samueli and his wife Susan, bought KDOC for $149.5 million from Golden Orange Broadcasting. The sale closed in May 2006, placing KDOC under the ownership of Ellis Communications, Inc., a subsidiary of Atlanta-based Titan Broadcast Management. In September 2006, KDOC made changes to its programming schedule and debuted a new slogan ("Endless Classics", a reference to the Beach Boys album and the 1966 film "The Endless Summer") and logo. The lineup included more current syndicated repeats, Anaheim Ducks hockey, some movies, as well as hours of paid programming. In 2008, the  station's programming began moving away from the "Endless Classics" format adding more recent comedies, and talk and court shows that have ended production. In September 2008, KDOC launched a new website. It brought a new look, promoting the station's new programming format, and removing the forum section for viewers to post questions and comments on KDOC-TV programming that many stations provide. The "Endless Classics" logo was replaced in late 2009. In the fall of 2009, the station added ESPN Plus' syndication package of Southeastern Conference football and men's basketball (later branded as SEC TV), and added  its coverage of Big 12 Conference men's basketball during the 2010–11 season. The SEC TV syndication package ended in 2014 because of the launch of the new SEC Network as part of a 20-year deal between the Southeastern Conference and ESPN. On July 4, 2011, KDOC launched a new, revised website, as well as a new station logo (minus the "-TV" after the KDOC call letters), a new color scheme, programming promotions for KDOC's main channel (56.1) and MeTV subchannel (56.3), videos, and news headlines for both Los Angeles and Orange counties. On December 3, 2012, the  station unveiled a new branding campaign, this time rebranding itself as "LA 56". On May 11, 2015, KDOC dropped the "LA 56" branding after more than two-and-a-half years of use and reverted to identifying by its call letters. This also includes the branding on the KABC-TV-produced newscasts, which have since been rebranded as "ABC 7 Eyewitness News on KDOC-TV". MeTV affiliation. On April 4, 2011, Ellis Communications parent company Titan Broadcast Management announced, along with other television station groups (such as Hearst Television, Capitol Broadcasting Company, Gray Television, Cox Media Group and Nexstar Media  Group among others) to be among the station owners that signed affiliation agreements with MeTV, a network focusing on classic television programming that is owned by Weigel Broadcasting. The network was launched on KDOC 56.3 on June 13, 2011, as "Me-TV Los Angeles". On September 19, 2011, KDOC's main channel adopted a new contemporary programming format, thus positioning MeTV Los Angeles to be the network for classic television programs that once aired on KDOC. Although KDOC continues to carry MeTV on subchannel 56.3, KVME in Bishop was affiliated with MeTV on April 30, 2012, until January 15, 2018 . That station carried MeTV on their primary digital channel 20 (virtual channel 20.1), which made it available on the DirecTV and Dish Network local packages tier for the Los Angeles market. Both stations marketed themselves as "Me-TV Hollywood", changing from KDOC's previous brand of "Me-TV Los Angeles". Local advertising for MeTV Hollywood is sold by a jointly managed ad sales team for both stations. However, KVME's MeTV feed did not carry the full schedule of programming, electing to carry Spanish-language religious and paid programming during the early morning weekday hours of 5:00 a.m. to 8:00  am, blocking-out regularly-scheduled programming in those hours. Unlike the KVME feed, the KDOC version continues to air all MeTV programming intact. On February 1, 2012, Verizon FiOS began carrying MeTV Hollywood in the Los Angeles area on channel 462. In October 2012, Time Warner Cable (now part of Charter Communications' Spectrum TV service) added MeTV Hollywood on its Southern California systems on channel 1232, carrying a time-shifted national feed instead of either the KVME or KDOC versions. On January 3, 2018, due to the purchase of Los Angeles station KAZA by Weigel Broadcasting, KAZA became a MeTV  owned-and-operated station, in addition to continual coverage via KDOC channel 56.3. Both affiliates are separately owned and operated, broadcasting to specific areas within the Los Angeles region due to signal strength. Before a signal upgrade in late 2018, KAZA's over-the-air signal was not available in much of western and southern Los Angeles County, due to its channel-sharing agreement with low-powered Class A UHF station KHTV-CD, which necessitated the continual co-affiliation through KDOC. In addition, each feed was known by a different station identification; MeTV Los Angeles and MeTV KDOC. On January  15, 2018, KVME discontinued their MeTV affiliation to become an affiliate of Weigel-owned Heroes and Icons (also available over-the-air in Los Angeles, over KCOP-DT4), but sometime in 2020, KVME-TV changed its affiliation from Heroes & Icons to Jewelry Television, with the H&I affiliation moving to the station's second digital subchannel; on February 1, 2018, Spectrum discontinued its MeTV feed, and began offering KAZA as the sole MeTV channel for its Los Angeles area customers. Programming. General programming. Syndicated programs that are broadcast on KDOC's main channel (as of September 2020) include "The Steve Wilkos  Show", "Maury", "Forensic Files", "The First 48", "Protection Court", "Personal Injury Court", "Lauren Lake's Paternity Court", "Couples Court with the Cutlers", "Judge Jerry", "Pawn Stars", "The Goldbergs", "Seinfeld", "Impractical Jokers", and two animated series, "Bob's Burgers" and "Family Guy" (the latter produced by Seth MacFarlane). Sports programming. KDOC held the broadcast rights to games from the Anaheim Ducks of the NHL. During the 2020–21 NHL season, KDOC broadcast four Ducks games and one Los Angeles Kings game (which was a matchup against the Ducks, whose broadcast aired on Bally Sports West) due to overflow issues with Bally Sports  and KCOP-TV. KDOC also airs the locally produced wrestling program "Championship Wrestling from Hollywood". In September 2014, it was announced that KDOC would air the final six games of the Los Angeles Dodgers' 2014 season. The team's new broadcaster, SportsNet LA (now Spectrum SportsNet LA), had been afflicted by poor carriage throughout the season. KDOC produced two telecasts of UC Irvine basketball games during the 2015–16 season in a partnership with UC Irvine, although it is unclear if that partnership is still in progress or has ended. KDOC would later air UC Irvine's final regular season game  of their 2018–19 season. In January 2019, KDOC started airing a weekly high school basketball game on Friday or Saturday nights, branded as the "Pacific Surfliner Game of the Week". In the partnership with Pacific Surfliner, the Big West Conference and UC Irvine, select Big West games are also televised. In June 2019, KDOC showed the Formula One Canadian Grand Prix due to KABC-TV having scheduling conflicts. Past sports programming. KDOC carried select NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament games featuring Southern California teams when more than one team in the viewing area played in the tournament at the exact  same time (for example, while a first round UCLA game aired on KCBS, Cal State Fullerton aired on KDOC) so that all teams could be shown over-the-air. This practice ended in 2011 when all games were televised nationally through a partnership between CBS and Turner Sports. From 2009 until 2014, KDOC carried Southeastern Conference college football and basketball and Big 12 college basketball games supplied by ESPN Plus-operated services SEC TV and Big 12 Network, respectively. Both SEC TV and Big 12 Network were dissolved in August 2014, the first of which was caused by the 2014  launch of the pay-TV-only SEC Network, whose name was previously on the ESPN Plus syndicated SEC service. From 2014 until 2019, KDOC also broadcast Atlantic Coast Conference football and basketball games from the ACC Network syndication service of Raycom Sports, which was previously on Oxnard-licensed KBEH in the 2013–2014 season. The station carried games of former Major League Soccer team Chivas USA from 2010 until the club's final season. Special programming. In May 1990, KDOC broadcast live coverage of the Strawberry Festival Parade in Garden Grove, California. Coverage moved from KHJ-TV (now KCAL-TV) after  the Walt Disney Company (which then owned KCAL-TV) decided against broadcasting the parade that year. On December 31, 2012, KDOC broadcast a live New Year's special hosted by comedian and actor Jamie Kennedy. Following its broadcast, the special gained infamy due to a large number of technical issues, dead air, unedited fleeting profanity, and a fight breaking out on-stage. A montage of clips from the special went viral after it was discovered by fellow comedian Patton Oswalt. Newscasts. In January 2014, KDOC-TV started airing an hour-long 8:00 p.m. newscast produced by KABC-TV, titled "ABC  7 Eyewitness News on LA56" (currently rebranded as "ABC 7 Eyewitness News on KDOC-TV"); the newscast airs seven nights a week. Concurrently, the station has also added a midnight rebroadcast of KABC's 11:00 p.m. newscast. As of November 17, 2014, the 8:00 p.m. newscast has moved to the 7:00 p.m. timeslot, while the midnight rebroadcast of the 11:00 p.m. newscast has not been affected. Section::::"Daybreak OC". On September 10, 2007, KDOC-TV in partnership with the "Orange County Register", launched a morning newscast named "Daybreak OC". The show initially covered Orange County-specific weather, traffic and news headlines ; the program was broadcast in high-definition from its launch, after the station's studios moved to the "Register"s headquarters in Santa Ana, California. On September 8, 2008, the program was cut to one hour, moved to late morning and focused less on news. On October 14, 2008, the program was cancelled by KDOC following that day's show. Technical information. Subchannels. The station's digital signal is multiplexed: Analog-to-digital conversion. KDOC began digital broadcast operations on February 18, 2004, at 12:19 p.m. The station shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 56, at noon on February  17, 2009, (the original deadline for full-power stations to shut down prior to the extended June 12 deadline) as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 32, using PSIP to display KDOC-TV's virtual channel as 56 on digital television receivers, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the transition. As part of the SAFER Act, KDOC kept its analog signal on the air until later in the afternoon  on February 18 to inform viewers of the digital television transition through a loop of public service announcements from the National Association of Broadcasters.