Montana PBS is the

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 Member may refer to: * Military jury, referred to as "Members" in military jargon * Element (mathematics), an object that belongs to a mathematical set * In object-oriented programming, a member of a class ** Field (computer science), entries in ...

public television Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...

network for the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sover ...

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 ...

. It is a

joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acces ...

between

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 ...

(MSU) and the

University of Montana The University of Montana (UM) is a public research university in Missoula, Montana. UM is a flagship institution of the Montana University System and its second largest campus. UM reported 10,962 undergraduate and graduate students in the fal ...

(UM). The network is headquartered in the Visual Communications Building on the MSU campus in Bozeman, with a separate studio on the UM campus in

Missoula Missoula ( ; fla, label=Salish language, Séliš, Nłʔay, lit=Place of the Small Bull Trout, script=Latn; kut, Tuhuⱡnana, script=Latn) is a city in the U.S. state of Montana; it is the county seat of Missoula County, Montana, Missoula Cou ...

. The network comprises six stations —

flagship A flagship is a vessel used by the commanding officer of a group of naval ships, characteristically a flag officer entitled by custom to fly a distinguishing flag. Used more loosely, it is the lead ship in a fleet of vessels, typically the fi ...

KUSM-TV (channel 9) in Bozeman and full-power satellites KUFM-TV (channel 11) in Missoula, KBGS-TV (channel 16) in

Billings Billings is the largest city in the U.S. state of Montana, with a population of 117,116 as of the 2020 census. Located in the south-central portion of the state, it is the seat of Yellowstone County and the principal city of the Billings Met ...

KUHM-TV KUHM-TV, virtual channel 10 (UHF digital channel 29), is a Public Broadcasting Service ( PBS) member television station licensed to Helena, Montana, United States. Owned by Montana State University (MSU), the station is operated as part of the Mo ...

(channel 10) in Helena, KUGF-TV (channel 21) in

Great Falls Great may refer to: Descriptions or measurements * Great, a relative measurement in physical space, see Size * Greatness, being divine, majestic, superior, majestic, or transcendent People * List of people known as "the Great" *Artel Great (born ...

and KUKL-TV (channel 46) in Kalispell — and a network of 60 low-power

repeaters ''Repeaters'' is a 2010 Canadian thriller film directed by Carl Bessai, written by Arne Olsen, and starring Dustin Milligan, Amanda Crew, and Richard de Klerk as young drug addicts who find themselves stuck in a time loop. Plot Kyle, Sonia, and ...

in Montana. KUSM and KUHM are licensed to MSU, KUFM to UM, and KBGS, KUGF and KUKL to The Board of Regents of the Montana University System.

History

In 1983, several

Gallatin Valley Gallatin County is located in the U.S. state of Montana. With its county seat in Bozeman, Montana, Bozeman, it is the List of counties in Montana, second-most populous county in Montana, with a population of 118,960 in the 2020 United States cen ...

residents led by Nancy Fikkema formed Montanans for Children's Television (MCT) to press for a PBS station in the area. They wanted to give the few residents without access to

cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

a way to watch public television, especially PBS children's programming. Montana PBS historical timeline
/ref> At the time, Montana viewers had to rely on

translators Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transla ...

for PBS programming. Depending on the location, cable systems in western Montana piped in

KSPS-TV KSPS-TV (channel 7) is a PBS member television station in Spokane, Washington, United States, owned by KSPS Public Television. The station's studios are located on South Regal Street in the Southgate neighborhood of Spokane, and its transmitter ...

Spokane Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Ca ...

or KRMA-TV in

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 ...

, while cable systems in eastern and central Montana piped in

Prairie Public Television Prairie Public Television is a state network of public television stations operated primarily by Prairie Public Broadcasting. It comprises all of the PBS member stations in the U.S. state of North Dakota. The state network is available via fla ...

from

North Dakota North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the Native Americans in the United States, indigenous Dakota people, Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north a ...

KUED KUED (channel 7), branded on-air as PBS Utah, is a PBS member television station in Salt Lake City, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States. The station is owned by the University of Utah, and has studios at the Eccles Broadcast Center on Wasatch Dr ...

Salt Lake City 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 ...

. KRMA–now known as

Rocky Mountain PBS Rocky Mountain PBS is a network of PBS member television stations serving the U.S. state of Colorado. Headquartered in Denver, it is operated by Rocky Mountain Public Media, Inc., a non-profit organization which holds the licenses for most of the ...

–and KSPS still operate translators in Montana. Additionally, some commercial stations in Montana, including

KTVQ KTVQ (channel 2) is a television station in Billings, Montana, United States, affiliated with CBS and The CW Plus. Owned by the E. W. Scripps Company, it is part of the Montana Television Network, a statewide network of CBS-affiliated station ...

in Billings and

KFBB KFBB-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Great Falls, Montana, United States, affiliated with American Broadcasting Company, ABC, Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox and MyNetworkTV. Owned by the Cowles Company, the station maintains studios and ...

in Great Falls, carried ''

Sesame Street ''Sesame Street'' is an American educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Workshop until June 2000) a ...

'' and may have carried other PBS programs. 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 ...

, owner of KUED, was willing to bring a KUED satellite station to Bozeman if there was enough local support. However, the only viable facilities for such a station were at MSU, and school officials balked at using educational funds for public benefit. With this in mind, MCT published a survey in the ''

Bozeman Chronicle The ''Bozeman Daily Chronicle'' is a daily newspaper published in Bozeman, Montana. Founded in 1883, the paper was originally a weekly. Since 1996, the ''Chronicle'' has been published each morning, and its first Saturday edition was published in ...

'' asking if at least 2,000 people were willing to contribute $2 per month for a local public television station. After the survey found there was sufficient public support, KUSM signed on for the first time on October 1, 1984. The transmitter was donated by Montana broadcasting pioneer Joe Sample. MSU didn't have enough funding at the time to support a public television station, and the Gallatin Valley didn't have nearly enough people at the time for viewer-supported public television. Station engineers switched to and from the signal of

for most PBS programming until 1987, giving MSU time to train its staff and build local financial support. With KUSM's debut, Montana became the last state with an educational station within its borders, 14 years after

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

became the last state east of the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...

with its own PBS station. In 1987, KUSM became a full member of PBS. In 1988, KUSM was added to TCI's cable systems in the eastern two-thirds of Montana, 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. KUED had been carried on TCI and its various predecessors since 1965. TCI began phasing out KUED on its systems in the summer of 1988, with KUSM completely replacing KUED in that part of the state by 1990. Early on, UM partnered with MSU to extend KUSM's reach to western Montana. By 1991, KUSM began branding as Montana Public Television, reflecting its new statewide reach. UM had won a construction permit for KUFM-TV in 1992. The station signed on for the first time in 1996, and the two stations began broadcasting as a network on

New Year's Day New Year's Day is a festival observed in most of the world on 1 January, the first day of the year in the modern Gregorian calendar. 1 January is also New Year's Day on the Julian calendar, but this is not the same day as the Gregorian one. Wh ...

1997. In 1999, the network rebranded as Montana PBS. Montana PBS's third full-powered station, KBGS-TV in Billings, signed on in late 2009. The fourth full-powered satellite, KUGF in Great Falls, signed on in fall 2010. KUKL-TV in Kalispell followed in 2011. The network has expanded rather slowly, relying on cable and satellite coverage for most of its viewership. This didn't pose as much of a problem as it may seem at first glance due to a partnership with the state's cable systems. Even in the digital era, cable and satellite are all but essential for acceptable television in most of Montana. On July 1, 2015,

Gray Television Gray Television, Inc. is an American publicly traded television broadcasting company based in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1946 by James Harrison Gray as Gray Communications Systems, the company owns or operates 180 stations across the United St ...

announced that it would donate the license assets of Helena CW affiliate KMTF to Montana State University for integration into the Montana PBS system as its sixth full-power station (the station's

CW Plus CW may stand for: Science and technology * centiwatt (cW), one hundredth of a watt * Cω, a programming language * CW complex, a type of topological space * Carrier wave, in radio communications * CodeWarrior, an integrated development environm ...

programming will continue to be carried on a subchannel of NBC affiliate

KTVH KTVH-DT (channel 12) is a television station in Helena, Montana, United States, affiliated with NBC and The CW Plus. It is owned by the E. W. Scripps Company alongside CBS affiliate KXLH-LD (channel 9). Both stations share studios on West Ly ...

, which Gray sold to

Cordillera Communications Evening Post Industries is a privately held American media company, based in Charleston, South Carolina, United States. It has been led by four generations of the Manigault family. On August 6, 2013, the company changed its name from the Evening ...

in correlation to the deal). The station, re-called

, will improve reception in areas around Helena unable to receive that city's local translator, K49EH-D.

Programming

Most of the local programs such as ''Backroads of Montana'', ''11th and Grant'', and ''Montana Ag Live'', as well as Montana historical documentaries and current event programs, are created by independent producers for Montana PBS. Due to a strong program for journalism and radio/television at UM and for documentary filmmaking at MSU, many of the network's local programs are produced by students. Some of the Montana-made programming is also available online.

Stations

The six full-service television licenses comprising Montana PBS include: Notes:

Translators

Montana PBS is additionally rebroadcast over a network of nine low-power digital translator stations, operating one of the largest translator networks in the state of Montana. MSU acquired the West Glacier transmitter from Canyon TV in 2014 for the nominal purchase price of one dollar. In 2018, it acquired the five translators led by KSKC-CD (now K27MS-D), the public television station of

Salish Kootenai College Salish Kootenai College (SKC) is a private tribal land-grant community college in Pablo, Montana. It serves the Bitterroot Salish, Kootenai, and Pend d'Oreilles tribes. SKC's main campus is on the Flathead Reservation. There are three satellite ...

, and incorporated them into the network. Not owned by the network are additional translators run by TV districts. The following translators rebroadcast KBGS-TV: *

: K20HB-D * Bridger: K26NN-D The following translators rebroadcast KUFM-TV: * Arlee: K17NE-D * Drummond: K22MI-D * Ferndale: K33OH-D *

Heron The herons are long-legged, long-necked, freshwater and coastal birds in the family Ardeidae, with 72 recognised species, some of which are referred to as egrets or bitterns rather than herons. Members of the genera ''Botaurus'' and ''Ixobrychus ...

: K13ZN-D *

Hot Springs A hot spring, hydrothermal spring, or geothermal spring is a spring produced by the emergence of geothermally heated groundwater onto the surface of the Earth. The groundwater is heated either by shallow bodies of magma (molten rock) or by circ ...

: K29ND-D *

Pablo Pablo is a Spanish form of the name Paul. People * Pablo Alborán, Spanish singer *Pablo Aimar, Argentine footballer *Pablo Armero, Colombian footballer * Pablo Bartholomew, Indian photojournalist *Pablo Brandán, Argentine footballer * Pablo Bren ...

/ Ronan: KSKC-CD * Philipsburg: K15KW-D *

Plains In geography, a plain is a flat expanse of land that generally does not change much in elevation, and is primarily treeless. Plains occur as lowlands along valleys or at the base of mountains, as coastal plains, and as plateaus or uplands. In ...

: K08OY-D *

: K21CA-D *

: K34PQ-D * St. Ignatius: K33OR-D * Thompson Falls: K23NP-D *

Townsend Townsend (pronounced tounʹ-zənd) or Townshend may refer to: Places United States *Camp Townsend, National Guard training base in Peekskill, New York *Townsend, Delaware *Townsend, Georgia *Townsend, Massachusetts, a New England town ** Townsend ...

: K11WM-D The following translators rebroadcast KUGF-TV: * Big Sandy: K13OQ-D * Loma: K29LD-D The following translators rebroadcast KUKL-TV: * Kalispell: KEXI-LD * West Glacier: K12LU-D The following translators rebroadcast KUSM-TV: * Belgrade, etc.: K17KB-D *

Boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In c ...

: K27CD-D *

: K36CX-D *

: K24MP-D * Chinook: K22LD-D * Circle, etc.: K18CR-D * Conrad: K16KB-D *

Ekalaka Ekalaka is a town in and the county seat of Carter County, Montana, United States. The population was 399 at the 2020 census. History Ekalaka was named after a Sioux girl, Ijkalaka, who was the wife of David Harrison Russell, a scout. Ijka ...

: K23DJ-D *

Emigrant Emigration is the act of leaving a resident country or place of residence with the intent to settle elsewhere (to permanently leave a country). Conversely, immigration describes the movement of people into one country from another (to permanentl ...

: K27LO-D * Helena: K33OP-D * Joplin: K35OF-D *

Livingston Livingston may refer to: Businesses * Livingston Energy Flight, an Italian airline (2003–2010) * Livingston Compagnia Aerea, an Italian airline (2011–2014), also known as Livingston Airline * Livingston International, a North American custom ...

: K48NS-D * Plevna: K34DP-D

Network map

Technical information

Subchannels

The digital signals of Montana PBS' stations are

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 ...

Analog-to-digital conversion

Montana PBS' stations shut down their analog signals on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television station's in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital channel allocations post-transition are as follows: * KUSM-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 9; the station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition VHF channel 8. 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 9. * KUFM-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 11; the station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 27 to VHF channel 11.

Satellite

Montana PBS is available

free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the FTA Receiver, appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring ...

AMC 21 AMC may refer to: Film and television * AMC Theatres, an American movie theater chain * AMC Networks, an American entertainment company ** AMC (TV channel) ** AMC+, streaming service ** AMC Networks International, an entertainment company *** AM ...

(125°W)

Ku-band The Ku band () is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum in the microwave range of frequencies from 12 to 18 gigahertz (GHz). The symbol is short for "K-under" (originally german: Kurz-unten), because it is the lower part of the ori ...

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna comm ...

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Montana Pbs PBS member networks Broadcast media of the University of Montana Montana State University Television stations in Montana 1984 establishments in Montana Television channels and stations established in 1984