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Was it once common to find “The Little Rascals”, “The Andy Griffith Show”, “Gilligan’s Island”, “I Love Lucy”, “Gunsmoke”, and other shows like that on Canadian TV, even in Quebec?
Yes, totally common for all of those for the past 50 or 60 years or whatever. From the time they were first produced onwards. Many of them are still commonly viewable today as reruns just as in the states. In Canada we get both Canadian and American station broadcasts on TV.
Don't forget Beverly Hillbillies, Wagon Train, Perry Mason, Rifleman, Bonanza, Green Acres, Leave it to Beaver, Father Knows Best, Dragnet, Lassie, Alfred Hitchcock show, Paladin, Twilight Zone, Outer Limits, Batman, The Big Valley, 77 Sunset Strip, Route 66, Daniel Boone, Death Valley Days, etc., etc. - we got them and more.
Yes, totally common for all of those for the past 50 or 60 years or whatever. From the time they were first produced onwards. Many of them are still commonly viewable today as reruns just as in the states. In Canada we get both Canadian and American station broadcasts on TV.
Don't forget Beverly Hillbillies, Wagon Train, Perry Mason, Rifleman, Bonanza, Green Acres, Leave it to Beaver, Father Knows Best, Dragnet, Lassie, Alfred Hitchcock show, Twilight Zone, Outer Limits, Batman, The Big Valley, 77 Sunset Strip, Route 66, Daniel Boone, Death Valley Days, etc., etc. - we got them and more.
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Yeah, I'd even say that back then in the early decades of television you'd have an even more comprehensive availability of American programming given that Canadian TV was quite slow getting out of the gate. So American shows were what filled up most of the airtime. (Some people say that that conditioning of Canadian viewers is one of the reasons that Canadian TV often has so much trouble attracting viewers today.)
By the time the 70s and 80s rolled around there was more Canadian TV and especially more broadcast regulation, and so my sense is that there started to be more U.S. stuff Canadians might not have been exposed to. (But there was still a huge amount shown here.) The U.S. TV scene exploded with new networks and specialty channels and in Canada things moved more slowly and there were restrictions to protect Canadian TV properties. For example - Canada never got MTV, or at least for a very long time (think decades). Though Canada's music network MuchMusic did show MTV programs, they didn't show everything.
And now in the age of the Internet, basically everything is available anywhere to anyone.
Was it once common to find “The Little Rascals”, “The Andy Griffith Show”, “Gilligan’s Island”, “I Love Lucy”, “Gunsmoke”, and other shows like that on Canadian TV, even in Quebec?
In Quebec from what I recall of reruns from this era in the 70s, it was hit and miss. Of that list I only recall seeing Gilligan's Island and Gunsmoke in French.
Now, all of these American shows were available in the original English in Quebec too, as both the CBC Montreal station and the CTV Montreal station had repeaters all over the province. But most people did not watch very much due to the language barrier or even out of a lack of interest - contrary to Anglo-Canadian TV, original French language TV in Quebec was very quick out of the gate and became instantly popular. So that's what people in Quebec primarily watched - and have ever since really.
Was it once common to find “The Little Rascals”, “The Andy Griffith Show”, “Gilligan’s Island”, “I Love Lucy”, “Gunsmoke”, and other shows like that on Canadian TV, even in Quebec?
Eventually. Here in Vancouver before Cablevision, back in the early 1960's we only had 2 channels. They didn't carry any of those shows as far as I remember. The only way we could see some, but not all, was to have a TV antenna where you could get KVOS a joint US/Canadian station in Bellingham.
In Quebec from what I recall of reruns from this era in the 70s, it was hit and miss. Of that list I only recall seeing Gilligan's Island and Gunsmoke in French.
Now, all of these American shows were available in the original English in Quebec too, as both the CBC Montreal station and the CTV Montreal station had repeaters all over the province. But most people did not watch very much due to the language barrier or even out of a lack of interest - contrary to Anglo-Canadian TV, original French language TV in Quebec was very quick out of the gate and became instantly popular. So that's what people in Quebec primarily watched - and have ever since really.
When I lived in Montreal I remember a few old US shows I watched in french....
Ma Sorciere Bien Aimee .....Bewitched
Tes Filles, Mes Garcons......The Brady Bunch
Patrouille de Cosmos......Star Trek
Jinny .....I Dream of Jeannie
Croisiere S’amuse......Love boat
Ile Fantastique ....Fantasy Island
Watching American shows in french was a good way to learn french,
I already knew the shows well and the dubbed french was very clearly spoken.
The advent of cable TV made American channels more accessable. However, before that, if you were fairly close to the U.S. border, you could pick up American TV channel signals with a roof antenna.
I remember KCND in Pembina, North Dakota whose target market was Winnipeg, Manitoba:
Quote:
Startup preparations for the station began in March 1959, at an estimated cost of $150,000 according to Community Radio Corporation partner Robert Lukkason. The station was initially expected to be a semi-satellite of KNOX-TV in Grand Forks (now defunct), but would have its own studios.
KCND's original construction permit was based on plans to operate from a 310-foot (94-metre) tower with a power of 21,000 watts. However, this plan changed and one of the tallest broadcast towers in North America was constructed—1,450 feet—100 feet short of the height of the Empire State Building in New York City. The tower was located seven miles west of Pembina and less than a half-mile south of the Canada/U.S. border. The station initially operated at a power of 220,000 watts, later increasing power to 288,000 watts.
According to the 1960 U.S. census, the population of Pembina the year KCND went on the air was a mere 625 people, making Pembina one of the smallest non-suburban municipalities in the U.S. to have its own TV station.
KCND operated as a semi-independent station. It was affiliated with both NBC and ABC for periods, but was not compensated by the networks due to the station's insignificant U.S. audience and thus never showed all of either network's schedule.
Historically (60s through 80s), Canada had two TV networks, CTV and CBC. Only a few shows, mostly public affairs and variety, were actually produced in Canada. The rest of the prime time schedule was the top network shows from the three (then) USA networks, which the Canadian networks purchased the rights to air. Most aired on different nights, sometimes before in the USA, which as I recall was the case with Bonanza. But Canada didn't transmit in color until about 1972, about a decade after US color transmission.
When US networks went to summer reruns, the CBC aired episodes of the popular British shows, instead of repeating American snows.
Besides Pembina, there was also al TV station in Bellingham, Washington, aimed at Vancouver, and one in Poland Spring, Maine, that could be received in Quebec City but the Poland Spring station was also a prime network carrier for the Portland Bangor markets.
The advent of cable TV made American channels more accessable. However, before that, if you were fairly close to the U.S. border, you could pick up American TV channel signals with a roof antenna.
Bingo. As a child in Toronto, I recall that we got six channels with rabbit ears:
We could get many more with cable, but my Dad refused to subscribe, because with his directional antenna, he could pull in Toronto Argos games (blacked out in Toronto) from Peterborough. The best we could manage was a UHF antenna that brought in PBS Buffalo (channel 17), Channel 19 (which tried to make us into good Ontarians), Channel 29 (Buffalo), which showed cheesy monster movies Sunday afternoons, and Channel 79 (Toronto), which showed Baby Blue Movies Friday nights at midnight. The movies were indeed blue--if showing a bare boob was blue.
Now? I've got 570 channels, and there's nothing on.
Last edited by ChevySpoons; 01-13-2018 at 05:08 AM..
Montreal close enough to the US border to pull in
WCAX channel 3 Burlington, VT CBS
WPTZ channel 5 Plattsburgh, NY NBC
ABC was tougher to get ...received on UHF channel 22
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