KUED (channel 7), branded on-air as PBS Utah, is a
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...
member
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 ...
in
Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...
, United States. The station is owned by the
University of Utah
The University of Utah (U of U, UofU, or simply The U) is a public research university in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is the flagship institution of the Utah System of Higher Education. The university was established in 1850 as the University of De ...
, and has studios at the
Eccles Broadcast Center
The Dolores Doré Eccles Broadcast Center (often shortened to Eccles Broadcast Center) is headquarters of three broadcast stations and a statewide educational consortium. The center houses KUED, KUER, KUEN and the Utah Education Network. The fa ...
on Wasatch Drive in the northeastern section of Salt Lake City; its transmitter is located on
Farnsworth Peak
Farnsworth Peak is a peak located on the northern end of the Oquirrh Mountain range, approximately south west of Salt Lake City, Utah, United States. The mountain is named for Philo Farnsworth, the inventor of the first completely electronic te ...
in the
Oquirrh Mountains
The Oquirrh Mountains is a mountain range that runs north-south for approximately 30 miles (50 km) to form the west side of Utah's Salt Lake Valley, separating it from Tooele Valley. The range runs from northwestern Utah County–centr ...
, southwest of Salt Lake City. KUED has a large
network of broadcast translators that extend its over-the-air coverage throughout Utah.
Prior to July 2018, KUED was one of two PBS member stations serving Utah, the other being
Provo-licensed
KBYU-TV
KBYU-TV (channel 11) is a non-commercial educational independent television station licensed to Provo, Utah, United States, serving Salt Lake City and the state of Utah. The station is owned by Brigham Young University (BYU), an arm of the Church ...
(channel 11), owned by
Brigham Young University
Brigham Young University (BYU, sometimes referred to colloquially as The Y) is a private research university in Provo, Utah. It was founded in 1875 by religious leader Brigham Young and is sponsored by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day ...
. In October 2017, it was announced that KBYU would drop PBS programming on June 30, 2018 in favor of its own
BYUtv
BYU TV (stylized as BYUtv) is a television channel, founded in 2000, which is owned and operated as a part of Brigham Young University (BYU). The channel, available through cable and satellite distributors in the United States, produces a number ...
service, leaving KUED as the sole PBS station for the state.
History
The station first signed on the air on January 20, 1958, with an episode of ''
The Friendly Giant
''The Friendly Giant'' was a children's television program that aired on CBC Television from September 30, 1958 through to March 1985. It featured three main characters: a giant named Friendly (played by Bob Homme), who lived in a huge castle, alo ...
''. The station originally broadcast from improvised studios set up in the basement of the old student union building on the University of Utah campus. The station had humble beginnings with no props, primitive equipment, and a donated transmitter, courtesy of
Time-Life Inc., then-owners of KTVT (channel 4, now
KTVX
KTVX (channel 4) is a television station in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States, affiliated with ABC. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside Ogden-licensed CW owned-and-operated station KUCW (channel 30). Both stations share studios o ...
). A $100,000 grant from the
Ford Foundation
The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a US$25,000 gift from Edsel Ford. By 1947, after the death ...
made it possible from KUED to sign on the air.
Early programming was purely educational, in some cases consisting of nothing more than a teacher standing in front of a chalk board and lecturing. About half of the programs aired were locally produced, with the rest coming from
National Educational Television
National Educational Television (NET) was an American non-commercial educational, educational terrestrial television, broadcast television network owned by the Ford Foundation and later co-owned by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It o ...
(NET) and other sources. When PBS succeeded NET in 1970, the focus of programming changed to educational and entertainment programming.
For most of the time from 1965 to 1988, KUED was the default NET/PBS member station for most of
Montana
Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...
; cable systems in most of the state from
Butte
__NOTOC__
In geomorphology, a butte () is an isolated hill with steep, often vertical sides and a small, relatively flat top; buttes are smaller landforms than mesas, plateaus, and tablelands. The word ''butte'' comes from a French word mea ...
eastward piped in KUED. When
KUSM
Montana PBS is the PBS member public television network for the U.S. state of Montana. It is a joint venture between Montana State University (MSU) and the University of Montana (UM). The network is headquartered in the Visual Communications B ...
signed on from
Bozeman
Bozeman is a city and the county seat of Gallatin County, Montana, United States. Located in southwest Montana, the 2020 census put Bozeman's population at 53,293, making it the fourth-largest city in Montana. It is the principal city of th ...
as the first public television station in Montana, it simulcast KUED for PBS programming for its first three years on the air as part of a partnership between the U of U and KUSM's owner,
Montana State University
Montana State University (MSU) is a Public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Bozeman, Montana. It is the state's largest university. MSU offers baccalaureate degrees in 60 fields, master's degrees in 6 ...
. This gave KUSM time to train its staff and build local support. In 1988,
TCI Cable, which by then had become the dominant cable provider in most of Montana, began phasing out KUED, with KUSM completely replacing KUED across TCI's footprint by 1990.
After having branded with its call letters and channel number for virtually its entire history, KUED announced on November 4, 2019 that it would rebrand as "PBS Utah" on November 25, adopting the updated national PBS logo and branding that was unveiled the same day.
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 ...
:
On March 7, 2017, KUED replaced
V-me
V-me (, a pun on ''veme'', "watch me") is an American Spanish-language television network, formerly carried as an over-the-air public broadcasting network in association with public television stations created for the United States Hispanic marke ...
on digital 7.3 with
PBS Kids
PBS Kids is the brand for most of the children's programming aired by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States. Some public television children's programs are not produced by PBS member stations or transmitted by PBS. Instead, ...
.
On December 29, 2017, KUED added
Create on digital subchannel 7.4.
Analog-to-digital conversion
KUED shut down its analog signal, over
VHF
Very high frequency (VHF) is the ITU designation for the range of radio frequency electromagnetic waves (radio waves) from 30 to 300 megahertz (MHz), with corresponding wavelengths of ten meters to one meter.
Frequencies immediately below VHF ...
channel 7, on June 12, 2009, as part of the
federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.
[List of Digital Full-Power Stations](_blank)
The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition
UHF
Ultra high frequency (UHF) is the ITU designation for radio frequencies in the range between 300 megahertz (MHz) and 3 gigahertz (GHz), also known as the decimetre band as the wavelengths range from one meter to one tenth of a meter (on ...
channel 42,
_Congress_delays_digital_TV_switch_until_June;_Utah_sticks_to_original_cutoff,_Vince_Horiuchi,_Salt_Lake_Tribune
_February_4,_2009_using_Program_and_System_Information_Protocol.html" "title="Salt Lake Tribune"> Congress delays digital TV switch until June; Utah sticks to original cutoff, Vince Horiuchi, Salt Lake Tribune
February 4, 2009 using Program and System Information Protocol">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 A ...
to display KUED's virtual channel as 7 on digital television receivers.
KUED has two full power broadcast relay station#Satellite stations, satellites serving rural areas of Utah, both digital-only:
Notes:
*1. KUES used the callsign KAVT during its construction permit from September 15 to November 3, 1997.
Aside from their transmitters, KUES and KUEW do not maintain any physical presence in their cities of license.
Additionally, KUED can be seen on over 85
.