Early years
Interest in establishing an educational television station in Grand Rapids manifested as early as 1953, with the formation of a local group.[1] With no local station, schools made limited use of educational programming. The Midwest Program on Airborne Television Instruction (MPATI) service of Purdue University, beamed from aircraft flying above northern Indiana, began in 1961 and was received in some of the region.[2] Other schools utilized the Classroom 10 programs broadcast from WMSB (channel 10), a service of Michigan State University primarily broadcast to areas east of West Michigan.[3] By 1967, WMSB was one of just four educational TV stations on the air in Michigan.[4] On August 5, 1968, the Wolverine Educational Television Corporation began a campaign for donations to fund the construction of a community-operated educational TV station in Grand Rapids, which it proposed to call WETC and have on the air by 1970.[5] In September 1970, the director of WUCM-TV at Delta College agreed to take a leave of absence from that station to help start Wolverine's channel 35.[6]
Wolverine announced on December 2, 1970, that it had agreed to partner with Grand Valley State College in Grand Rapids, which would now be the owner and operator of channel 35, with Wolverine continuing in an advisory capacity. The MPATI had shuttered, leaving a gap in instructional television programming available to West Michigan schools.[7] The new effort received offers of transmitter facility space and other support from the two commercial TV stations in Grand Rapids, WOOD-TV and WZZM.[8] Though the station was initially approved to set up at the WZZM tower at Grant,[9] it was moved before launch to a site on the Grand Valley State College campus in Allendale, where studios were built inside Manitou Hall.[10]
WGVC-TV began broadcasting on December 17, 1972.[11] The inaugural program, an interview with Grand Valley State College president Arend Lubbers, was filmed at WZZM because channel 35 did not yet have its own camera.[12] In addition to evening PBS programs, it supplied seven hours each weekday of instructional programs to schools[13] and aired Sesame Street and The Electric Company, both previously seen on WZZM in the absence of a local public TV station.[14] Initially, the station was unable to carry live PBS programming; by 1974, when it was interconnected, it was one of 16 non-interconnected stations among PBS's roster of 245 members.[15] While some shows aired on a one-month delay, more timely programs, such as Wall Street Week and Washington Week in Review, either went unaired or were out of date: general manager Gordon Lawrence noted, "It was sort of embarrassing. We had a program speculating on Richard Nixon's resignation two days after he resigned."[16]
In 1974, the station doubled its effective radiated power,[17] improving reception and enabling the station to be added to the cable system serving Battle Creek.[18] The station aired a number of local programs in the mid-1970s, including a community affairs show, a weekly arts program, replays of Grand Valley State College football games, and Thinking of Holland, presenting Dutch culture and media.[19] It acquired a mobile unit and a color video tape machine in 1976 using federal grants,[20] though the mobile unit was expensive and required half the station's staff to run, limiting its use.[21] A high school quiz show debuted in January 1978.[22]
Initial station manager Gordon Lawrence departed in 1979 to set up WFUM-TV in Flint, Michigan.[23] By this time, increased production costs and staff issues had led the station to reduce its local programming output by one-fourth compared to 1976.
