KCDO-TV (channel 3) is an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

television station A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity, such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the earth ...

licensed to Sterling, Colorado, United States, serving the

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

area. It is owned by the

E. W. Scripps Company The E. W. Scripps Company is an American broadcasting company founded in 1878 as a chain of daily newspapers by Edward Willis "E. W." Scripps and his sister, Ellen Browning Scripps. It was also formerly a media conglomerate. The company is he ...

alongside

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

affiliate

KMGH-TV KMGH-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Denver, Colorado, United States, affiliated with ABC. It is owned by the E. W. Scripps Company alongside Sterling-licensed independent station KCDO-TV, channel 3 (and its Denver-licensed translato ...

(channel 7). Both stations share studios on East Speer Boulevard in Denver's Congress Park neighborhood, while KCDO-TV's transmitter is located in rural southwestern Morgan County, east of

Frederick Frederick may refer to: People * Frederick (given name), the name Nobility Anhalt-Harzgerode *Frederick, Prince of Anhalt-Harzgerode (1613–1670) Austria * Frederick I, Duke of Austria (Babenberg), Duke of Austria from 1195 to 1198 * Frederick ...

History

The McCracken family, owners of

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

affiliate KFBC-TV (channel 5, now

KGWN-TV KGWN-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Cheyenne, Wyoming, United States, affiliated with CBS and The CW Plus. The station is owned by Gray Television, and maintains studios on East Lincolnway/East 14th Street/ I-80 BUS/US 30 in Cheyen ...

) in

Cheyenne, Wyoming Cheyenne ( or ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Wyoming, as well as the county seat of Laramie County, with 65,132 residents, per the 2020 US Census. It is the principal city of the Cheyenne metropolitan statistical ...

, applied for a

construction permit Planning permission or developmental approval refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. It is usually given in the form of a building perm ...

in February 1962 to build a television station on channel 3 in Sterling. The permit was granted a year later, and channel 3 came to air on December 28, 1963, as KTVS, operating it as a

satellite station A broadcast relay station, also known as a satellite station, relay transmitter, broadcast translator (U.S.), re-broadcaster (Canada), repeater (two-way radio) or complementary station (Mexico), is a broadcast transmitter which repeats (or tran ...

of KFBC. In September 1999,

Newsweb Corporation Newsweb Corporation is a printer of ethnic and alternative newspapers in the United States, based in Chicago, Illinois. The company also owns several radio stations in the Chicago area. Newsweb was founded in 1971 by Chicago entrepreneur, political ...

, operating under the licensee Channel 20 TV Company (CTTC), acquired KTVS from

Benedek Broadcasting Benedek Broadcasting was a television broadcasting company, who owned and operated 22 network-affiliated television stations throughout the United States, all affiliated with major television networks, serving mainly small and medium-size markets. ...

, then-owners of KGWN, with the intent of making KTVS a satellite of Newsweb's Denver

UPN The United Paramount Network (UPN) was an American broadcast television network that launched on January 16, 1995. It was originally owned by Chris-Craft Industries' United Television. Viacom (through its Paramount Television unit, which pr ...

affiliate KTVD (channel 20, after which the Channel 20 TV Company received its name). It became one of very few satellite stations in the United States that predated the existence of the television station that its signal relayed, as KTVD had signed on in April 1988. On January 8, 2002, Channel 20 TV Company changed the station's call letters to KUPN, to reflect the UPN affiliation held by its parent station at the time. CTTC sold KTVD to the

Gannett Company Gannett Co., Inc. () is an American mass media holding company headquartered in McLean, Virginia, in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area.America One America One was an American television network established in 1995 by USFR Media Group through its America One Television subsidiary.

. On July 21, 2008, Channel 20 TV Company changed the station's call letters to KCDO. To increase its signal coverage to reach a wider range of viewers, the station applied to build a new transmitter facility located southwest of

Fort Morgan Fort Morgan can apply to any one of several places in the United States: *Fort Morgan (Alabama), a fort at the mouth of Mobile Bay *Fort Morgan, Alabama, a nearby community *Fort Morgan (Colorado), a frontier military post located in present-day Fo ...

. The new location and increased transmitter power added most of the Denver metro area as well as

Fort Collins A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...

, Greeley,

Longmont The City of Longmont is a home rule municipality located in Boulder and Weld counties, Colorado, United States. Longmont is located northeast of the county seat of Boulder and north-northwest of the Colorado State Capitol in Denver. Longmont's ...

and Loveland to the station's service area. Construction on the new tower was completed in January 2010. On December 31, 2008, satellite provider

Dish Network DISH Network Corporation (DISH, an acronym for DIgital Sky Highway) is an American television provider and the owner of the direct-broadcast satellite provider Dish, commonly known as Dish Network, and the over-the-top IPTV service, Sling TV. A ...

began carrying KCDO on its lineup for subscribers in the Denver market.

DirecTV DirecTV (trademarked as DIRECTV) is an American multichannel video programming distributor based in El Segundo, California. Originally launched on June 17, 1994, its primary service is a digital satellite service serving the United States. It ...

also added the channel on January 28, 2009. KCDO affiliated with the

Retro Television Network Retro TV (stylized as retrotv), formerly known as Retro Television Network, is an American broadcast television network owned by Get After It Media. The network mainly airs classic television sitcoms and drama series from the 1950s through th ...

in 2009. The network was previously seen in Denver on KQDK-CA, before RTV severed its ties with

Equity Media Holdings Equity Media Holdings Corporation was a broadcasting company based in Little Rock, Arkansas that owned and operated television stations across the United States. Prior to March 30, 2007, the company was known as Equity Broadcasting, a name later ...

. For a time, the station also simulcast KGWN-TV's newscasts for the Colorado side of the Cheyenne market (carried by that station's second

digital subchannel In broadcasting, digital subchannels are a method of transmitting more than one independent program stream simultaneously from the same digital radio or television station on the same radio frequency channel. This is done by using data compress ...

), branded as ''Northern Colorado 5 News'', which was co-produced by KGWN and the

Independent News Network News HUB (formerly known as Independent News Network) is a production company based in Little Rock, Arkansas, which syndicates "localized" news programs for broadcast television stations in the United States, that have budgets limiting their ...

. On November 1, 2010, KCDO dropped its affiliation with the Retro Television Network, in favor of converting into an

independent station An independent station is an independent radio or terrestrial television station which is independent in some way from broadcast networks. The definition of "independence" varies from country to country, reflecting governmental regulations, market ...

with a focus on locally produced programming.

Sale to Scripps

On September 22, 2020, the

announced it was buying KCDO-TV and KSBS-CD for an undisclosed price, pending approval of the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction ...

(FCC), making them

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

s to

affiliate

(channel 7). The sale was completed on November 20.

Programming

Syndicated programs broadcast by KCDO include ''

Family Feud ''Family Feud'' is an American television game show created by Mark Goodson. It features two families who compete to name the most popular answers to survey questions in order to win cash and prizes. The show has had three separate runs, the ...

'', ''

Monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedica ...

'', ''

Right This Minute ''Right This Minute'' (alternatively abbreviated as ''RTM'') was an American syndicated television program that debuted on September 12, 2011. Produced by MagicDust Television in conjunction with television station groups Cox Media Group, Gray ...

'', and ''

Impractical Jokers ''Impractical Jokers'' is an American hidden camera Reality television#Hidden cameras, reality show with improvisational elements. Produced by NorthSouth Productions, ''Impractical Jokers'' premiered on truTV on December 15, 2011 starring the m ...

'', among others. In early August 2020, KCDO replaced

Buzzr Buzzr is an American digital terrestrial television, digital broadcast television network owned by Fremantle North America, a unit of the Fremantle (company), Fremantle subsidiary of RTL Group. The network serves as an outlet for the extensive li ...

programming with

NewsNet NewsNet (stylized as NEWSnet) is an American news-oriented free-to-air television network and newscast production company owned by Bridge News, LLC, which itself is owned by Bridge Media Networks. The network is structured to broadcast a tight ...

. KCDO-TV may air ABC network programming should it be preempted by KMGH-TV for long-form breaking news or severe weather coverage or other special programming.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital signal is

multiplexed In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource - a ...

Translators

Analog-to-digital conversion

KCDO-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 3, on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 23. Through the use of

PSIP The Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP) is the MPEG (a video and audio industry group) and privately defined program-specific information originally defined by General Instrument for the DigiCipher 2 system and later extended for the AT ...

, digital television receivers display the station's

virtual channel In most telecommunications organizations, a virtual channel is a method of remapping the ''program number'' as used in H.222 Program Association Tables and Program Mapping Tables to a channel number that can be entered via digits on a receiver's ...

as its former VHF analog channel 3.

References

External links

* {{EWS CORP CDO-TV E. W. Scripps Company television stations Independent television stations in the United States Grit (TV network) affiliates TheGrio affiliates This TV affiliates Television channels and stations established in 1963 1963 establishments in Colorado Low-power television stations in the United States Sterling, Colorado