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...KTBC Story. The cornerstone of Johnson holdings is KTBC, an Austin radio-TV operation that was bought in 1943 with a $17,500 certified check from Lady Bird Johnson. At that time, KTBC was an unsuccessful 250-watt radio station that had been in trouble with the Federal Communications Commission over regulatory violations. As Johnson family lore has it, it is the President's wife who has parlayed an inheritance of $67,000 and some Alabama land into the present family fortune by masterminding both purchase and management of KTBC. But other people recall it differently...
...syndicate of Texas businessmen had been trying to buy KTBC long before the Johnsons entered the scene, but the FCC refused to approve the sale. In December 1942, a member of the syndicate, Austin Businessman E. G. Kingsbery, met with Lyndon Johnson, then a 34-year-old Congressman. As Kingsbery remembered that meeting, Lyndon first reminded him that Kingsbery's son had obtained an appointment to the Naval Academy through Johnson's office. Said Lyndon: "Now, E.G., I'm not a lawyer or a newspaperman. I have no means of making a living. At one time...
Kingsbery suggested to Johnson that he "make his peace" with heirs of the late Austin Publisher J. M. West, who had originally headed the syndicate. Recalled Kingsbery: "Lyndon told me he was going up to the West ranch to talk business, and he did, and he came away with KTBC...
...Monopoly. By 1952, when Lyndon Johnson was a U.S. Senator, television arrived, and the FCC gave KTBC the only very high frequency (VHF) channel in Austin. The station quickly picked up highly profitable contracts to carry programs from all three major networks-CBS, NBC and ABC. Unlike most single-channel cities, there is no "overlap" from stations in nearby cities-which means that the Johnsons own a television advertising monopoly in the whole Austin area...
...Waco. The FCC had just given a VHF license to a proposed Waco TV outlet, KWTX. CBS, which had been negotiating with KWTX, quickly decided to award its contract to KANG instead. Shortly thereafter, so did ABC. Then, with FCC approval, the Johnsons increased the transmitting power of their Austin station and made a costly swath across KWTX's viewing and advertising market. KWTX pushed an unsuccessful federal antitrust action against the Johnsons, finally gave up and agreed to sell them 29.05% of its stock in a trade for KANG-including the major network franchises that KANG had sewed...