The history of WTTV, Channel 4, Indianapolis

[electra225]

This is a good video on WTTV and Sarkes Tarzian. "Sarkie" was one of the heroes of my youth. The first rich man I ever knew. Mom worked for him for almost 20 years. She started out on the stick line, winding Channel 3 tuner sticks. She later went into test and started rebuilding TV tuners at home. She would do the mechanical work at home on the kitchen table, then take the tuners in to work in her dinner bucket and "run 'em down the line" for final test.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGobbOQdy4Q

[19&41]

I remembered the station always identified with Sarkes Tarzian. I didn't know that was just one man 'til you brought it up, Greg. We had a popular roller rink near where I grew up and there were stacks of S-T R2R tapes at the rink's sound system. There was something that a kid could do that would make him go blind. For me it was trying to watch WTTV from across the horizon in mid-northern Indiana. Our reception was horrible, but it had the coolest shows and best reruns.

[electra225]

We were lucky. We got four channels. WISH-TV channel 8 the CBS station, WFBM channel 6 the NBC station, WLW-I channel 13 which was the ABC station, broadcast out of Cincinnatti, but with a repeater in Indianapolis. And, of course, WTTV, channel 4. Now channel 4 is CBS, Channel 6 is ABC. I don't know if WISH-TV is even still on the air. Nor do I know who the NBC station would be. I know Channel 13 is now WTHR, it may be NBC. Channel 59 was an independent station in the vein of Channel 4 last I knew.

[19&41]

I believe WFBM is now WRTV. WTHR streams on my ROKU device. It had a nice news story about a gent who moved from London to Gas City and opened a restaurant near I-69.