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1976 in American television

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This is a list of American television-related events in 1976.

Events

Date		Event
January 1
January 11–12
January 17
January 24
January 31
February 1
February 2
February 10
February 16
February 19
February 28
February 29
CBS affiliates KRSD-TV in Rapid City, South Dakota and KDSJ-TV in Lead both shut down after a 5-year struggle over their unsatisfactory technical operations, which had rendered complaints from viewers, NBC (its former affiliation before 1970), and the Federal Communications Commission. Dakota Broadcasting Company assumes a construction permit for new stations on KRSD-TV's channel 7 and KDSJ-TV's channel 5, which respectively sign-on as KEVN and KIVV-TV on July 11. This in turn will give the Rapid City area its first full-time ABC affiliate (A full-time CBS affiliate will return to Rapid City in 1981 when the network's Sioux Falls affiliate KELO-TV signs-on translator station K15AC (now KCLO-TV)).
March 4
March 29
April 1–2
April 12
April 18
April 24
May 11
May 17
June 4
June 7
June 15
June 21
June 26
July 1
July 4
July 11
July 12
September 6
September 16
September 23
October 4
October 6
October 11
The [1976 Country Music Association Awards](1976-country-music-association-awards) air from the Grand Ole Opry House on CBS.
October 15
October 22
October 29
November 7–8
November 9
November 13
December 10
December 14
December 17
December 31
Also in 1976
The Olympics, broadcast from Montreal, Quebec, Canada, draw an estimated one billion viewers worldwide.
Matsushita introduces the VHS home video cassette recorder to compete with Sony's Betamax system.

Programs

signifies that this show has a related event in the Events section above.

Debuting this year

Date	Show	Network
January 5	Mobile One	ABC
January 14	The Bionic Woman	ABC
January 20	The Adams Chronicles	PBS
January 21	Dance in America	PBS
January 27	Laverne & Shirley	ABC
January 28	The Dumplings	NBC
January 30	The Practice
February 2	Jigsaw John
February 13	Sara	CBS
March 9	Family	ABC
May 3	Joe Forrester
May 31	Viva Valdez
June 14	The Gong Show	NBC
July 12	Family Feud	ABC
July 26	Comedy Theatre	NBC
August 5	What's Happening!!	ABC
August 14	Clue Club	CBS
August 30	New Howdy Doody Show	Syndication
August 31	Alice	CBS
September 6	In Search of...	Syndication
September 9	Delvecchio	CBS
September 11	Ark II
Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle
Way Out Games
Big John, Little John	NBC
The Kids From C.A.P.E.R.
McDuff, the Talking Dog
Monster Squad
Muggsy
Jabberjaw	ABC
The Krofft Supershow
The Mumbly Cartoon Show
The Scooby-Doo Show
The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour
September 17	Spencer's Pilots	CBS
September 19	Cos	ABC
September 20	All's Fair	CBS
The Muppet Show	Syndication
September 21	Rich Man, Poor Man Book II	ABC
Baa Baa Black Sheep	NBC
Bronk	CBS
September 22	The Quest
Ball Four	CBS
Charlie's Angels	ABC
September 23	The Tony Randall Show
Gemini Man	NBC
September 24	Serpico
September 25	Holmes & Yo-Yo	ABC
Mr. T and Tina
September 30	The Nancy Walker Show
October 3	Quincy, M.E.	NBC
October 4	[50 Grand Slam](50-grand-slam)
Stumpers
October 16	Most Wanted	ABC
November 11	Gibbsville	NBC
December 1	C.P.O. Sharkey
The McLean Stevenson Show
Sirota's Court
December 6	The Feather and Father Gang	ABC
December 13	Double Dare	CBS

Ending this year

Date		Show		Debut
January 5
January 25
February 20
February 25
March 3
March 12
March 28
March 30
March 31
April 4
April 13
April 29
May 7
June 14
July 9
July 29
September
September 6
Medical Center
Viva Valdez
October 16
October 28
October 30
December 4
December 10
December 11
December 18
December 18
December 30
December 31
December 31

Networks and services

Launches

Network	Type	Launch date
Mobil Showcase Network	Cable television	Unknown
Showtime	Cable television	July 1
WTCG-TV	Cable television	December 17

Conversions and rebrandings

There are no conversions and rebrandings for Cable and satellite television channels in this year.

Closures

Network	Type	Launch date	Notes	Source
MGM Family Network	Cable and satellite	September 9

Television stations

Station launches

Date	City of License/Market	Station	Channel	Affiliation	Notes/Ref.
January 20	Wausau/Rhinelander, Wisconsin	WHRM-TV	20	PBS	Part of Wisconsin Public Television
January 30	Pierre, South Dakota	KPRY-TV	4	PBS	Part of South Dakota Public Broadcasting
March 9	Lowry, South Dakota	KQSD-TV	11	PBS
March 17	Eau Claire/La Crosse, Wisconsin	WHLA-TV	31	PBS	Part of Wisconsin Public Television
May 31	Chicago, Illinois	WCFC-TV	38	CTN
July 11	Lead, South Dakota	KIVV-TV	5	ABC	Satellite of KEVN-TV/Rapid City
Rapid City, South Dakota	KEVN-TV	7
September 4	San Francisco, California	KTSF-TV	26	Multicultural independent
September 8	Monroe, Louisiana	KLTM-TV	12	PBS	Part of Louisiana Public Broadcasting
September 10	Memphis, Tennessee	WPTY	24	Independent
September 16	Tallahassee, Florida	WECA-TV	27	ABC
September 18	Fayetteville, Arkansas	KAFT	13	PBS	Part of the Arkansas Educational Television Network
October 2	Arkadelphia, Arkansas	KETG	9	PBS
October 3	Crossville, Tennessee	WCPT-TV	55	Independent	url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39035683/	title=Can You Believe A TV Station In Crossville?	date=March 13, 1977	pages=1-F, [3-F](https://www.newspapers.com/clip/39035973/)	work=The Tennessean	first=Max	last=York	access-date=November 14, 2019}}
October 29	Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan	WGTQ	8	ABC	Satellite of WGTU/Traverse City, Michigan
November 25	Allentown, Pennsylvania	WFMZ-TV	69	Independent
December 15	Park Falls/Superior, Wisconsin
(Duluth, Minnesota)	WLEF-TV	36	PBS	Part of Wisconsin Public Television

Network affiliation changes

Date	City of License/Market	Station	Channel	Old affiliation	New affiliation	Notes/Ref.
February 19	Spokane, Washington	KREM-TV	2	ABC	CBS
KXLY-TV	4	CBS	ABC
March 1	Salem, Oregon	KVDO-TV	3	Independent (commercial)	PBS/OEPBS	Not effective until September 20 because tower was deliberately collapsed
July 11	Cheyenne, Wyoming	KYCU-TV	5	NBC (primary)
ABC (secondary)	ABC (exclusive)

Station closures

Date	City of License/Market	Station	Channel	Affiliation	First air date	Notes/Ref.
February 29	Lead, South Dakota	KDSJ-TV	5	CBS	January 1960	Satellite of KRSD-TV/Rapid City
Rapid City, South Dakota	KRSD-TV	7	CBS	January 21, 1958	Channels of KRSD-TV and KDSJ-TV reoccupied that July by KEVN and KIVV
June 30	Columbus, Ohio	WGSF	31	PBS	March 18, 1963

Births

Date		Name		Notability
January 1
Dan Kloeffler
January 2
January 3
January 6
Johnny Yong Bosch
Isha Sesay
January 7
Alfonso Soriano
January 8
Jenny Lewis
Josh Meyers
January 9
January 10
January 13
January 15
Dorian Missick
January 16
Derek Richardson
January 17
January 19
Drew Powell
Marsha Thomason
January 20
January 23
Nigel McGuinness
January 26
January 28
January 30
January 31
February 2
February 3
Tim Heidecker
February 4
February 7
February 8
February 9
February 10
February 11
February 12
Aarón Sánchez
February 14
February 15
February 16
Eric Byrnes
February 19
February 20
February 23
February 24
February 25
February 28
February 29
March 1
March 2
March 5
Lucian Msamati
March 8
Hines Ward
March 11
March 13
March 14
Corey Stoll
Brian Quinn
March 15
March 16
Daniel Gillies
Paul Schneider
Kyle Newman
Jason Johnson
March 17
March 18
Marnie Stern
March 19
Nicholas Stoller
March 21
March 22
Kellie Shanygne Williams
March 23
Keri Russell
Angela Kang
March 26
March 27
March 30
March 31
April 1
April 2
April 4
April 5
April 6
April 7
Eric Wareheim
April 13
Jonathan Brandis
April 16
Lukas Haas
April 18
Sean Maguire
Kevin Rankin
April 19
April 20
April 25
April 26
April 28
May 1
James Murray
May 5
May 8
May 10
May 17
May 19
May 25
Erinn Hayes
May 26
May 27
May 28
May 30
May 31
June 2
June 3
June 5
Joe Gatto
Aesop Rock
June 6
Jonathan Nolan
June 7
June 8
June 16
June 17
June 18
Blake Shelton
Christina Pazsitzky
June 19
June 20
June 21
Nathan Darrow
June 22
June 23
June 26
June 27
Wagner Moura
June 28
Jason J. Lewis
June 29
July 1
Haaz Sleiman
July 1
July 2
July 3
July 4
July 5
July 7
July 9
Elliot Cowan
July 10
July 12
Alison Wright
July 15
Gabriel Iglesias
Jim Jones
Seth Gordon
July 16
July 17
Luke Bryan
Dagmara Domińczyk
Eric Winter
Eddie Shin
July 19
Benedict Cumberbatch
July 20
July 21
July 27
Seamus Dever
Chad Fischer
July 28
July 29
July 31
Rod Monroe
August 2
August 4
August 6
Josh Schwartz
Soleil Moon Frye
August 8
Drew Lachey
Tawny Cypress
August 9
Rhona Mitra
August 11
August 12
August 17
Natalie Gold
August 19
August 20
August 22
August 23
August 24
August 26
August 27
RonReaco Lee
August 30
August 31
September 3
September 5
September 6
Rodrigo Amarante
Naomie Harris
September 7
September 9
September 15
September 18
September 19
Carter Oosterhouse
September 20
Jon Bernthal
Ainsley Earhardt
September 24
Stephanie McMahon
October 1
October 2
October 3
October 4
October 5
October 7
October 8
October 9
Nick Swardson
October 11
Dave Briggs
October 15
October 17
October 19
Omar Gooding
October 20
October 21
October 23
Jon Huertas
Cat Deeley
October 26
Thurop Van Orman
October 29
October 31
November 1
November 4
November 5
November 6
November 9
November 11
November 12
November 17
Diane Neal
November 18
Steven Pasquale
Jessi Alexander
November 19
November 20
November 23
November 26
November 27
November 28
Ryan Kwanten
November 29
Chadwick Boseman
Ehren McGhehey
Julian Ovenden
November 30
December 1
December 5
December 6
December 7
T. J. Lavin
Georges Laraque
December 8
December 14
December 16
December 17
December 26
December 27
December 28
Joe Manganiello
December 29
December 31
Clayton Morris

Deaths

Date		Name		Age		Notability
June 25
August 28
December 12

Television debuts

Rick Moranis – SCTV
Kim Cattrall – Dead on Target
Jane Pauley – Today
Jeffrey Jones – The Adams Chronicles
Kim Basinger – Gemini Man
Dave Thomas – SCTV
Ray Winstone – The Sweeney
Jonathan Banks – Barnaby Jones
Harold Ramis – SCTV

References

(1976-03-03). "CBS Plans to Terminate KXLY-TV Affiliation". [[Spokane Daily Chronicle]].
(1976-03-29). "KREM-TV to Join CBS Chain". [[Spokane Daily Chronicle]].
(1976-08-06). "On Sunday: TV Stations Switching". [[Spokane Daily Chronicle]].
(1976-03-30). "Timing decided for TV shift". [[The Spokesman-Review]].
(1976-05-05). "'Early Summer': KXLY Set to Join ABC". [[Spokane Daily Chronicle]].
(March 1, 1976). "In Brief". Broadcasting.
(November 8, 1971). "It was a bad day at Black Hills". Broadcasting.
(May 5, 1975). "In Brief". Broadcasting.
(June 28, 1976). "ABC-TV adds two". Broadcasting.
(August 31, 1981). "For the Record". Broadcasting.
"The Greatest Game Ever".
(June 4, 1976). "Greatest Game Ever Played". nba.com.
"35 Years Ago: The Celtics and the Suns Play the Greatest NBA Finals Game Ever Played".
(November 16, 2008). "The Phoenix Suns: The Unluckiest Franchise In Professional Sports". Bleacher Report.
(June 14, 1976). "Ch. 2 folks in festive mood: WDTN will be born Tuesday". [[Dayton Daily News]].
"TV Guide's Top 100 Episodes". Rev/Views.
York, Max. (March 13, 1977). "Can You Believe A TV Station In Crossville?". The Tennessean.
Cox, Jim (2008). ''This Day in Network Radio: A Daily Calendar of Births, Debuts, Cancellations and Other Events in Broadcasting History''. McFarland & Company, Inc. {{ISBN. 978-0-7864-3848-8.

Info: Wikipedia Source

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1976-in-american-television

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