KUAC-TV (channel 9) is a PBS member television station in Fairbanks, Alaska, United States. It is owned by the University of Alaska Fairbanks alongside NPR member KUAC (89.9 FM). The two stations share studios at the Fine Arts Building/Complex on the UAF campus on Tanana Drive; KUAC-TV's transmitter is located on Bender Mountain. KUAC-TV is the only PBS station in Alaska that is not part of Alaska Public Media, which was established on July 1, 2012.
History
KUAC-TV signed on for the first time on December 22, 1971, as an early Christmas present to the Interior. It was the first public television station in Alaska, and the only one until KAKM in Anchorage signed on in 1975. It originally aired for only five hours a day, from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. As the difficulties associated with bringing PBS programming decreased, channel 9 increased its schedule, and now operates 24 hours a day.
In 1995, KUAC-TV joined with KTOO-TV in Juneau and KYUK-TV in Bethel to form AlaskaOne, a network of PBS stations serving all of Alaska outside of Anchorage. The three stations formed the Alaska Public Broadcasting Service to air a common PBS schedule. This move was made in hopes of sharing administrative costs.[1] KTOO and KYUK occasionally broke off from the AlaskaOne feed to air programming relevant to their areas, while KUAC-TV used its massive translator network to deliver AlaskaOne programming across the Interior.