Great American Living (formerly Ride TV and GAC Living) is an American cable television network. Owned by

Great American Media GAC Media, LLC, doing business as Great American Media, is a Fort Worth, Texas-based media company, and owner of the U.S. cable networks Great American Family and Great American Living. History The company was announced on June 7, 2021, thro ...

, it primarily broadcasts programming devoted to the lifestyles of the

American South The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...

. Established in 2014, the network was originally focused on

equestrianism Equestrianism (from Latin , , , 'horseman', 'horse'), commonly known as horse riding (Commonwealth English) or horseback riding (American English), includes the disciplines of riding, Driving (horse), driving, and Equestrian vaulting, vaulting ...

History

The channel originally launched as Ride TV, a high-definition channel focused on the non-

racing In sport, racing is a competition of speed, in which competitors try to complete a given task in the shortest amount of time. Typically this involves traversing some distance, but it can be any other task involving speed to reach a specific goa ...

aspects of

equestrian sports Equestrian sports are sports that use horses as a main part of the sport. This usually takes the form of the rider being on the horse's back, or the horses pulling some sort of horse-drawn vehicle. General * 4-H * Equitation *Horse show * Iceland ...

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...

s, and the associated

lifestyle Lifestyle often refers to: * Lifestyle (sociology), the way a person lives * ''Otium'', ancient Roman concept of a lifestyle * Style of life (german: Lebensstil, link=no), dealing with the dynamics of personality Lifestyle may also refer to: Bus ...

. Ride TV was stated to be targeting both a rural, "

Heartland Heartland or Heartlands may refer to: Businesses and organisations * Heartland Bank, a New Zealand-based financial institution * Heartland Inn, a chain of hotels based in Iowa, United States * Heartland Alliance, an anti-poverty organization i ...

" audience and a wider general audience, with an executive explaining that "horses are universal. Everyone recognizes the beauty and the power of this animal. We try to cater to anyone who gets that feeling when they see a horse running." On June 8, 2021, it was announced that both Ride TV and

Discovery Inc. Discovery, Inc. was an American multinational mass media factual television conglomerate based in New York City. Established in 1985, the company operated a group of factual and lifestyle television brands, such as the namesake Discovery Chann ...

Great American Country Great American Family is an American cable television network. Owned by Great American Media, it broadcasts family-oriented general entertainment programming, including television series and made-for-TV movies. It was originally established in ...

would be acquired by GAC Media, an investment group led by

Tom Hicks Thomas Ollis Hicks Sr. (born February 7, 1946), is an American private equity investor and sports team owner living in Dallas, Texas. ''Forbes'' magazine estimated Hicks' wealth at $1 billion in 2009, but it dropped to $700 million in 2010 ...

and former

Crown Media Holdings Hallmark Media (formerly Crown Media Holdings) is an American media production company with corporate headquarters located in Studio City, California, and is a subsidiary of Hallmark Cards. Hallmark Media consists of Crown Media Productions and ...

CEO Bill Abbott. In August 2021, GAC Media announced that Great American Country and Ride TV would be relaunched as

GAC Family Great American Family is an American cable television network. Owned by Great American Media, it broadcasts family-oriented general entertainment programming, including television series and made-for-TV movies. It was originally established in ...

and GAC Living on September 27, with the GAC initials re-

backronym A backronym is an acronym formed from an already existing word by expanding its letters into the words of a phrase. Backronyms may be invented with either serious or humorous intent, or they may be a type of false etymology or folk etymology. The ...

ed to stand for "Great American Channels". GAC Living will focus on non-scripted lifestyle programming pertaining to the

(with GAC Family shifting to a family-oriented general entertainment format akin to

Hallmark Channel The Hallmark Channel is an American television channel owned by Crown Media Holdings, Inc., which in turn is owned by Hallmark Cards, Inc. The channel's programming is primarily targeted at families, and features a mix of television movies and ...

), effectively assuming GAC Family's previous format. In July 2022, GAC Media announced that GAC Living would be renamed Great American Living on August 20, 2022, as part of their corporate rebranding as Great American Media.

Programming

Its schedule was originally focused on horse sports such as equestrian,

rodeo Rodeo () is a competitive equestrian sport that arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain and Mexico, expanding throughout the Americas and to other nations. It was originally based on the skills required of the working va ...

, and

bull riding Bull riding is a rodeo sport that involves a rider getting on a bucking bull and attempting to stay mounted while the animal tries to buck off the rider. American bull riding has been called "the most dangerous eight seconds in sports." To recei ...

(such as the

PBR Velocity Tour PBR may refer to: Science and technology * Passive bistatic radar * Partition boot record * Pebble bed reactor, a type of nuclear reactor * Peripheral benzodiazepine receptor, another name for translocator protein * Phosphorus bromide * Photobio ...

), purposefully excluding horse racing, whose niche was already filled by the

TVG Network FanDuel TV is an American sports-oriented digital cable and satellite television network owned by FanDuel Group, the U.S. subsidiary of Irish bookmaker Flutter Entertainment. Formerly known as TVG and specializing in coverage of live horse rac ...

s. The channel has also produced original series, such as ''Cowgirls'' (a documentary-style series following women in rodeo) and ''This Old Horse'' (a documentary series chronicling notable horses, which was described as the network's equivalent to

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

's ''

30 for 30 ''30 for 30'' is the title for a series of documentary films airing on ESPN, its sister networks, and online highlighting interesting people and events in sports history. This includes three "volumes" of 30 episodes each, a 13-episode series un ...

'' franchise).

Carriage

In October 2021,

Frndly TV Frndly TV is an American streaming television service that offers live TV, on demand video and cloud-based DVR for over 40 live television networks. Frndly TV curates a channel lineup with a focus on being family-friendly, and includes U.S. netwo ...

reached a carriage agreement for GAC Family and GAC Living. In November 2021, GAC Media reached a deal with Philo to add GAC Living and GAC Family.

References

External links

GAC Living website
Television channels and stations established in 2014 English-language television stations in the United States {{US-tv-station-stub