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WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Covers all of Northern Lower Michigan (from Ludington to Tawas northward), as well as the Straits Area and Soo Region.
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TVC_DX5678
Posts: 65
Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2018 7:08 am
Location: Traverse City, MI
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WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by TVC_DX5678 »

Today I was at a thrift store in Honor and found a sold-as-blank VHS tape. I brought it home and to my surprise... whoever recorded the tape left it on Fox 33 (back in the Gary Knapp era) THE WHOLE TIME. The whole 8 hours. The tape is from around 1994, and I'll be uploading commercial breaks from the tape as soon as I get them captured, but for now... here's some clips of what I've found:

https://youtu.be/n8Q2vpA-CaY
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Jim Sofonia
Posts: 58
Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2018 7:35 am
Location: Traverse City

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by Jim Sofonia »

Surprisingly, I could get Vanderbilt better than the other UHF signals here on the East side of Traverse City, probably due to close in terrain.
Milk
Posts: 127
Joined: Sat Apr 26, 2014 9:30 pm

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by Milk »

I remembered WGKI's early days watching them on cable. Talk about low, low budget! The sound was muddy, the picture was shaky and the graphics resembled what 7&4's looked like from 1980. But, Gary never gave up and the station only grew more and more under his leadership!
organman95
Posts: 626
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 9:49 pm

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by organman95 »

I vaguely remember the cable signal (channel 2 on TCI Cheboygan) wasn't very stable during severe weather in the early-90s. There were a few times I remember getting a signal out of the Pickford translator, and it was better than Vanderbilt!
CJ
Posts: 36
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2008 11:09 pm
Location: West Michigan

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by CJ »

I remember moving to the Evart/Reed City area in the early 90s and barely got the Cadillac signal with a rooftop antenna. It’s wasn’t even viewable. We must of been contending with some bad terrain issues with that signal. Not having Fox Kids in the afternoon while you were in elementary school in the 90s was about as bad as it gets. After getting cable, I was surprised with how low budget the channel looked compared to moving from the Bay City area and Fox 66’s look.
ftballfan
Posts: 930
Joined: Thu Sep 17, 2009 6:38 pm

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by ftballfan »

I barely remember having to witness my great-grandma try to adjust her antenna rotor to get a snowy Fox 33 for Lions games (she lived near Onekama). After the upgrade around 2000, Fox 33 was much easier to get.

The clips were from before its short-lived superstation run in the mid 1990s, when it had widespread cable carriage in a good chunk of Michigan, including almost the entire UP, and into Wisconsin.
organman95
Posts: 626
Joined: Mon Aug 31, 2015 9:49 pm

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by organman95 »

ftballfan wrote: Mon Apr 26, 2021 7:53 pm I barely remember having to witness my great-grandma try to adjust her antenna rotor to get a snowy Fox 33 for Lions games (she lived near Onekama). After the upgrade around 2000, Fox 33 was much easier to get.

The clips were from before its short-lived superstation run in the mid 1990s, when it had widespread cable carriage in a good chunk of Michigan, including almost the entire UP, and into Wisconsin.
I remember my grandfather in Frederic adjusting the rotor for the Lions games. Sometimes he'd pull in 45, other times 33. Then he got satellite in '98 and never worried about it again.
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rugratsonline
Posts: 496
Joined: Sat Dec 04, 2004 1:20 pm

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by rugratsonline »

ftballfan wrote: Mon Apr 26, 2021 7:53 pm The clips were from before its short-lived superstation run in the mid 1990s, when it had widespread cable carriage in a good chunk of Michigan, including almost the entire UP, and into Wisconsin.
This was following the Detroit affiliation changes in 1995, which saw WKBD swapping Fox for a new network, UPN. To keep Fox available in the UP (where there were no affiliates), the distributor replaced WKBD with WGKI. This, in consequence, got them on cable in areas where WKBD was previously available, including Grand Rapids, Bay City, Saginaw, Lansing, and the Thumb region. However, it was not long until WKBD replaced WGKI on many downstate systems, mainly due to the fact that WGKI was otherwise blacked out most of the time, due to syndex and exclusivity with local Fox affiliates, as well as the fact that the Flint / Tri-Cities market had no UPN outlet.
ftballfan
Posts: 930
Joined: Thu Sep 17, 2009 6:38 pm

Re: WGKI/WGKU footage found at last!

Unread post by ftballfan »

rugratsonline wrote: Tue Apr 27, 2021 11:37 pm
ftballfan wrote: Mon Apr 26, 2021 7:53 pm The clips were from before its short-lived superstation run in the mid 1990s, when it had widespread cable carriage in a good chunk of Michigan, including almost the entire UP, and into Wisconsin.
This was following the Detroit affiliation changes in 1995, which saw WKBD swapping Fox for a new network, UPN. To keep Fox available in the UP (where there were no affiliates), the distributor replaced WKBD with WGKI. This, in consequence, got them on cable in areas where WKBD was previously available, including Grand Rapids, Bay City, Saginaw, Lansing, and the Thumb region. However, it was not long until WKBD replaced WGKI on many downstate systems, mainly due to the fact that WGKI was otherwise blacked out most of the time, due to syndex and exclusivity with local Fox affiliates, as well as the fact that the Flint / Tri-Cities market had no UPN outlet.
I know Grand Rapids had WKBD until around 2000, when WXSP came on. It would be very interesting to see a cable conversion chart from 1995 from downstate areas.

Side note: WGKI -> WFQX replaced WKBD on most of its cable systems. For example, in Traverse City, WKBD was on cable channel 3, which is now home to WFQX
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