Network Cartoons Not Seen in Your Area

When I was a child growing up in the 1960s to the 1980s, there were 3 major commercial tv networks in the US- NBC, CBS, and ABC....showing programming nationally across the country.

I was born and raised in San Francisco, CA and my local tv stations were notorious for not carrying some network programming in favor of locally-produced or syndicated "off-network" shows and reruns in the same time slot. My local newspaper tv guides then had combined listings for Sacramento and Salinas/Monterey tv stations and noticed the network tv shows those stations had carried...but not on my local San Francisco station. My family did not have cable tv until 1983 so receiving tv stations outside of San Francisco city only resulted in snowy reception on those over the air channel numbers...even with cable, 1990s-era regulations prevented carriage of out of market tv stations with the same network affiliations as those channels received locally with PBS stations as exceptions.

My local ABC station KGO-TV is owned and operated by the ABC network so every ABC show daytime and night time was carried on the schedule.

My CBS and NBC stations were not owned by their respective networks and some NBC and CBS network programs were not shown locally. One long-term example was my CBS station KPIX did not carry "The Price Is Right" for close to ten years from 1977 to around 1986 in favor of a local talk show "People Are Talking". A local non-CBS independent station KTZO (now KOFY) carried the "Price Is Right" feed for the 1980s run but the late 1970s run was never shown in the San Francisco market at all. KPIX resumed carrying "The Price Is Right" from 1986 to current. Bob Barker's hair turned shockingly white when he returned to KPIX's schedule.
(KPIX was owned by GroupW/Westinghouse Broadcasting and then CBS purchased Group W in the late 1990s and now KPIX is a CBS owned and operated station with every CBS show being aired). KTZO/KOFY carried some CBS ("Get Along Gang", "Saturday Supercade") and NBC programs ("Alvin and the Chipmunks" and the game shows "Classic Concentration", "Just Men!" and the 1980 and 1987 versions of "Blockbusters") that KPIX and KRON did not.

KRON, the NBC affiliate, also opted to show local shows or syndicated shows instead of some NBC daytime programming ("The Fun Factory", "Mindreaders", 1980 "Chain Reaction", "Wordplay", 1990s "To Tell The Truth" game shows were never shown) and a few NBC primetime shows (the short-lived Joe Namath sitcom "The Waverly Wonders" and the short-lived Scott Baio comedy "Who's Watching The Kids?" for example). KRON had pre-empted the Friday showing of the weekday "Price is Right" game with Bill Cullen in the early 1960s in favor of local programming but viewer complaints caused KRON to change their mind. NBC was angered by KRON's frequent pre-emptions (exacerbated further when KRON carried local Oakland A's baseball games instead of the NBC prime time schedule in the 1990s) that the network purchased competing tv station KNTV in 2000 and moved the NBC shows to that station after KRON's network affiliation contract expired. KRON is currently a My Network TV affiliate.

Ironically...KNTV currently carries San Francisco Giants evening baseball games once or twice a week and the pre-empted NBC primetime feed is shown on KNTV's COZI tv digital subchannel.


In terms of network cartoons, KPIX did not carry the CBS cartoon schedules on Sunday mornings in the 1970s. "Trollkins", "Drak Pack", "Cadillacs and Dinosaurs", and "The CBS Children's Film Festival" were not shown in favor of local kids programming.

KRON pre-empted "Alvin and the Chipmunks", "Space Stars", "The Kid Super Power Hour with Shazam", "Mr. T", "Kidd Video", "Kissyfur", "The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley", and "The Gary Coleman Show" in favor of local shows. KRON did sporadically show some episodes of the above like "Mr. T", "Kidd Video", and "Space Stars" for a few weeks but never for an entire season run.

Also when CBS and NBC carried sports programming on the West Coast usually starting at 9am Pacific and ending around 4pm...both channels did not carry the pre-empted Saturday AM schedule.

My ABC station carried College Football doubleheaders from 9am to 4pm and then aired the rest of the Saturday AM schedule from 4pm to 6pm (new Saturday Morning cartoons like Richie Rich, Scooby Doo, Thundarr the Barbarian, and Super Friends before dinner...that was cool!) during the Fall.


What network cartoon shows do you remember "not seeing" because your local tv network affiliate never carried the run of the series in favor of other programming?

The network tv stations in major markets (highest number of tv viewers in a city area) like New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago were all network owned and operated so every network show was carried. Even if the shows get pre-empted for special programming like news reports, local shows, and reruns there...those pre-empted shows would find room in the schedule for broadcast in other time slots.

The San Francisco market is in the top ten tv markets but local programmers can pre-empt shows and not reschedule them elsewhere. The network brass might not be happy about it...but they couldn't really do much, then.

Around '67 or '68, our local ABC affiliate (in Moline,Illinois) pre-empted H-B's ''Fantastic Four'',in favor of their locally produced ''Bozo the Clown'' show.They also bumped "George of the Jungle'',though I can't remember what took its place. Never was too crazy about Bozo after that.

WEWS (Cleveland's ABC's Affiliate) would show "Mouse Works" and "House of Mouse" earlier...NOT at 11 a.m. when it would be shown, but then again...WEWS is owned by Scripps, which owns "The Food Network" rather than ABC.

cartoon network is a most popular channel in whole world. it seems everywhere in the whole world.

Those without cable tv or satellite receivers do not get Cartoon Network. Have to pay monthly charges to receive it.

most of the times we watch it online, if not available, then we have to wait

Tampa's NBC station, WFLA, didn't air "Baggy Pants and the Nitwits", though I can't remember what aired in place of it. I saw a single episode while visiting grandparents who lived near Orlando.

I know, after the Season 2 premiere of "The Richie Rich/Scooby-Doo Show", WVII, an ABC affiliate in Bangor, Maine, blocked it out until January 1982 in favor of back-to-back episodes of local syndicated reruns of "The Archies". When WVII lost the rights to "The Archies", Richie and Scooby returned to WVII and aired Episode 2 on the first weekend of January 1982.

I also find it bizarre that WVII had a history of blocking out Scooby-Doo cartoons for the most part in the 1980s. They blocked out "The Scooby and Scrappy-Doo/Puppy Hour" (replaced by local syndicated reruns of the older version of "The Jetsons" and another show) and "13 Ghosts" too! I am not sure if the backlash against Scrappy-Doo had anything to do with it, though I had no problem with Scrappy myself.

"The Scooby and Scrappy-Doo/Puppy Hour" did air on WVII by January 1983, and by that point, the "Mork & Mindy" cartoon spinoff was the casualty to WVII; and reruns of "Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!" started airing on ABC, but not on WVII.

WVII normally didn't resume ABC programming until "ABC Weekend Specials" and later "American Bandstand" came on.

Ironically, WVII did air local syndicated reruns of Scooby-Doo on weekday afternoons in the fall of 1985.

Also, WJBK in Detroit (CBS affiliate) blocked out "Popeye and Son" right from the get-go,. and replaced it with some kind of live-action wrestling show (not "Hulk Hogan's Rock & Wrestling"). The premiere of "Popeye and Son" was listed in my local TV listings for September, but the replacement with local programming must have been a last-minute change on the affiliate's part.