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KMSP-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, serving the Twin Cities area. It is owned and operated by the Fox network through its Fox Television Stations division alongside WFTC (channel 9.2), which broadcasts MyNetworkTV. The two stations share studios on Viking Drive in Eden Prairie; KMSP-TV's KMSP Tower is located in Shoreview, Minnesota.
KMSP-TV also serves the Mankato market (via K35KI-D in nearby St. James through the local municipal-operated Cooperative TV (CTV) network of translators), even though that area already has a Fox affiliate of its own. KMSP is also carried on the main channel of KFTC (channel 26), a satellite station of WFTC licensed to Bemidji which serves the northernmost reaches of the Minneapolis–St. Paul television market.
KMSP-TV is also carried in Canada on the Rogers Cable system in Thunder Bay, Ontario, on Tbaytel, and on Bell MTS Fibe TV in the province of Manitoba. Since October 2022, the station is also carried on Westman Communications, replacing Rochester, New York's WUHF.
Channel 9 changed its call letters to KMGM-TV on May 23, 1956. At the time, the station was in negotiations with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to acquire the Twin Cities television rights to the company's films, along with selling a 25 percent stake in KMGM-TV to the studio. Negotiations broke down later that month over the cost of the films; additionally, Loew's, MGM's parent company at the time, filed a petition with the FCC against the call sign change, claiming that the use of KMGM was unauthorized and a violation of MGM's trademark. The FCC ruled against Loew's that October, saying that its call sign assignment policies were limited to preventing confusion between stations in a given area. The agreements to lease MGM's pre-1949 films and sell 25 percent of the station to Loew's were both completed that November; KMGM was the third station, after future sister station KTTV in Los Angeles and KWGN-TV in Denver, to enter into such an arrangement.
National Telefilm Associates, which later purchased WNTA-TV in the New York City area, purchased the 75 percent of United Television not owned by MGM for $650,000 in November 1957, joining it to the NTA Film Network until it ended in 1961. After taking control, NTA expanded KMGM-TV's hours of operation as part of an overhaul of channel 9's schedule that also included the addition of newscasts. A few months later, on February 10, 1958, NTA bought MGM's stake for $130,000 and announced that it would change channel 9's calls to KMSP-TV; and IMDB the call sign change took effect that March over the objections of KSTP-TV (channel 5). National Theatres, a theater chain whose broadcast holdings already included WDAF AM-WDAF-TV in Kansas City, began the process of acquiring NTA in November 1958; in April 1959, it purchased 88 percent of the company. 20th Century-Fox, the former parent company of National Theatres, bought KMSP-TV for $4.1 million on November 9, 1959, retaining the United Television corporate name. The KMSP call letters were featured on prop television cameras in the May 29, 1963, episode of the CBS sitcom The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, produced by 20th Century Fox Television; the show was loosely set in the Twin Cities area. The episode was titled "The Call of the, Like, Wild".
During its early years until 1972, the station's studios and offices were located in a lower level of the Foshay Tower in downtown Minneapolis; the transmitter was located on top of the building, the tallest structure in the area until 1971, along with WCCO-TV (channel 4) and WTCN-TV (channel 11, now KARE).
In the late 1970s, ABC steadily rose to first place in the network ratings. Accordingly, the network sought to upgrade its slate of affiliates, which were made up of some stations that either had poor signals or poorly performing local programming. In December 1977, ABC warned United that it would yank its affiliation from channel 9 unless improvements were made and fast. In early 1978, to cash in on ABC's improved ratings, KMSP re-branded itself "ABC9" (approximately 20 years before the use of a network's name in a station's on-air branding became commonplace among U.S. affiliates), and retooled its newscast. Despite the changes, KMSP's news department remained in the ratings cellar.
The affiliation switch occurred on March 5, 1979, and KMSP debuted its new independent schedule featuring cartoons, syndicated shows and even the locally based American Wrestling Association, with much of the station's programming having been acquired from WTCN-TV. To emphasize that the station's programming decisions would be influenced by viewers instead of a network, KMSP rebranded itself as "Receptive Channel 9", and an antenna was shown atop the station's logo in station identifications. The station became quite aggressive in acquiring programming, obtaining broadcast rights to several state high school sports championships from the MSHSL, the NHL's Minnesota North Stars and the Minnesota Twins baseball team.
As it turned out, KMSP's transition into an independent station turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It was far more successful than the station ever had been as an ABC affiliate. It became a regional superstation, available on nearly every cable television system in Minnesota as well as large portions of North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Wisconsin. Over time, it became one of the most successful and profitable independent stations in the country.
KMSP went through another ownership change on June 9, 1981, when 20th Century-Fox spun off United Television as an independent company owned by Fox shareholders; the transaction was approved alongside the $700 million sale of 20th Century-Fox to Marvin Davis. Chris-Craft Industries, which in 1977 had acquired an interest in 20th Century-Fox that by 1981 comprised 22 percent of Fox's stock, received a 19 percent stake in United Television; later in June, it filed with the FCC for control of United, as it now owned 32 percent of its stock. Two years later, Chris-Craft, though its BHC subsidiary, increased its stake in United Television to 50.1 percent and gained majority control of the company.
However, the station did not remain a Fox affiliate for long. By 1988, KMSP was one of several Fox affiliates nationwide that were disappointed with the network's weak programming offerings, particularly on Saturday nights, which were bogging down KMSP's otherwise successful independent lineup. That January, channel 9 dropped Fox's Saturday night lineup; the move did not sit well with Fox, and in July 1988 the network announced that it would not renew its affiliations with KMSP and Chris-Craft sister station KPTV in Portland, Oregon. Fox then signed an agreement with KITN (channel 29, now WFTC) to become its new Twin Cities affiliate, and KMSP reverted to being an independent station full-time. In 1992, the station relocated to its current studio facilities on Viking Drive in Eden Prairie. Along with the other United Television stations, KMSP carried programming from the Prime Time Entertainment Network from 1993 to 1995.
UPN launched on January 16, 1995, (with the two-hour premiere of ), with channel 9 becoming a UPN owned-and-operated station due to Chris-Craft/United's ownership stake in the network (later part-ownership in 1996 when Viacom bought a 50% stake of the network)—making it the second network-owned station in the Twin Cities (alongside CBS-owned WCCO-TV). Over time, KMSP became one of UPN's most successful affiliates in terms of viewership. In addition to UPN's prime-time schedule and the network's daytime children's blocks (such as UPN Kids from 1995 to 1999, and Disney's One Too from 1999 to 2003), the station was still enjoying success with local sports programming featuring the Minnesota Twins, as well as the MSHSL championships. KMSP was stripped of its status as a UPN owned-and-operated station in 2000 after Viacom exercised a contractual clause to buy out Chris-Craft's stake in the network, although the station remained with UPN as an affiliate for another two years. Around this time, Viacom bought CBS (and in turn, WCCO).
The affiliation switch, officially announced in May 2002, occurred on September 8, 2002 (accompanied by a "Make the Switch" ad campaign that was seen on both stations), as Fox programming returned to KMSP-TV after a 14-year absence, while WFTC took the UPN affiliation; KMSP was the only former Chris-Craft station that was acquired and kept by Fox that did not retain its UPN affiliation. The station began carrying Fox's entire programming schedule at that time, including the FoxBox children's block (which later returned to WFTC as 4KidsTV, until the block was discontinued by Fox in December 2008 due to a dispute with 4Kids Entertainment). The affiliation swap coincided with the start of the 2002 NFL season; KMSP effectively became the "home" station for the NFL's Minnesota Vikings as a result of Fox holding the broadcast rights to the National Football Conference (from 1994 to 2001, most Vikings games were aired on WFTC). Finally, in 2014, with the launch of Xploration Station which replaced Weekend Marketplace which WFTC carried, KMSP-TV began clearing the entire Fox network schedule for good.
Since Fox has affiliates in most and the Federal Communications Commission's syndication exclusivity regulations normally require cable systems to only carry a given network's local affiliate, and Fox prefers only an area's affiliate be carried as opposed to a distant station for rating tabulation purposes, KMSP was eventually removed from most cable providers outside the Twin Cities. By this time, these areas had enough stations to provide local Fox affiliates. KMSP thus effectively lost the "regional superstation" status it had held for almost a quarter-century, dating back to when it was an independent station. Due to the advent of digital television, many stations in smaller markets previously served by KMSP began operating UPN-affiliated digital subchannels towards the end of the network's run to replace that network's programming in those markets, which in turn became MyNetworkTV or The CW affiliates.
On December 14, 2017, The Walt Disney Company, owner of KSTP-TV's affiliated network ABC, announced its intent to buy KMSP-TV's parent company, 21st Century Fox, for $66.1 billion; the sale, which closed on March 20, 2019, excluded KMSP-TV and sister station WFTC as well as the Fox network, the MyNetworkTV programming service, Fox News, Fox Sports 1, the Big Ten Network and the Fox Television Stations unit, which were all transferred to the newly formed Fox Corporation. Fox Sports North would be divested in a separate deal to Diamond Sports Group, made up of a joint venture of WUCW owner Sinclair Broadcast Group and Entertainment Studios.
In April 2025, KMSP-TV announced a deal with the Minnesota Twins to simulcast ten of the team's games produced by MLB Local Media under the Twins.tv banner on the station, in addition to Twins games broadcast via Fox's national MLB package.
The station's first news director and news anchor was Harry Reasoner when KMSP signed on (as KEYD-TV) in 1955. Despite the station's focus on live coverage of news and sports, as well as awards from the University of Minnesota Journalism School and the Northwest Radio–TV News Association, KEYD's newscasts were generally in fourth place in the ratings. After channel 9's ownership changed in 1956, the news operation was closed down. News programming returned to the station after NTA bought KMGM-TV in 1957.
The station, which had long been a distant third to WCCO-TV and KSTP-TV in the Twin Cities news ratings, began an aggressive campaign in 1973 to gain ground against its competition. After a nationwide search, management hired Ben Boyett and Phil Bremen to anchor a newscast with a new set and format, known as newsnine. The new format did not really draw many new viewers, and the station's low news budget, ill-conceived promotion, and frequent technical glitches, along with its network's news division's overall struggles and wire service before Roone Arledge took control, didn't help matters. One botched campaign for a news series on venereal disease, in the spring of 1974, resulted in lawsuits from two young women that claimed that their likenesses were used in promos without their permission, thus damaging their reputations. By the fall of 1975, Boyett and Bremen would be gone, replaced by respected veteran newsman Don Harrison and the station's first female anchor, Cathie Mann. These changes did little to take channel 9 out of third place, and despite ABC becoming the #1 network by 1977 and Arledge's moves to increase ABC News's prestige, KMSP's newscasts still struggled.
After KMSP lost the ABC affiliation in 1979, the station's news operation reduced to a more scaled-down 9 p.m. or post-sports-only newscast which was more manageable for KMSP to maintain at the time. It was paired with the syndicated Independent Network News in the early-to-mid-1980s. The newscast's budget and ratings would increase by the end of that decade, with re-expansions of the news department into the morning and early evenings occurring in the mid-1990s.
By the end of the decade, Minnesota 9 News was competitive with the other stations in the market, especially with its all-local morning newscast doing well against the network morning shows. This was despite KMSP being hamstrung by its UPN affiliation, which had seen several affiliates of the network cut or close their news departments through its decade of existence, due to the network's overall and prime time ratings failing to meet expectations. Outside of UPN's Star Trek series, the rest of the network's programming schedule struggled outside of cities, a particular issue that affected KMSP as a statewide superstation with a wide rural footprint. This played into the station's decision to eschew their owner-mandated "UPN 9" branding for the more neutral statewide branding of "Minnesota 9" (later, 9 News) to promote their news department.
When KMSP rejoined Fox in 2002, the station's prime time newscast, now with the stronger aid of Fox's prime time lineup and sports coverage, frequently outrated the newscasts on KSTP-TV. Following Fox's acquisition of WFTC in 2001, that station's existing news operation was moved into an auxiliary studio of KMSP as part of a slow merger (including limited story-sharing); after Fox canceled channel 29's newscast in 2006, some of WFTC's staff moved in full to KMSP.
On May 11, 2009, KMSP became the second station in the Twin Cities (behind KARE-TV) to broadcast local newscasts in high-definition.
| +Subchannels of KMSP-TV and WFTC ! scope = "col" | Channel ! scope = "col" | Station ! scope = "col" | Res. ! scope = "col" | Aspect ! scope = "col" | Short name ! scope = "col" | Programming |
The WFTC transmitter also broadcasts two subchannels of WUCW (23.2 Comet and 23.6 Antenna TV), the market's ATSC 3.0 (NextGen TV) host station.
In November 2009, KMSP was added to a subchannel of WFTC and vice versa, to aid viewers that had difficulty receiving KMSP's signal on the VHF band. Beginning June 24, 2014, subchannels of WFTC began using major channel 9, with 29.1 changed to 9.2, and KMSP-TV began broadcasting in high definition from the WFTC transmitter on channel 9.1.
| +Subchannels of KFTC ! scope = "col" | Channel ! scope = "col" | Res. ! scope = "col" | Aspect ! scope = "col" | Short name ! scope = "col" | Programming |
KFTC also broadcasts 23.2 Comet and 23.6 Antenna TV from WUCW.
KFTC began providing high-definition service for the main KMSP and WFTC subchannels in October 2014. Translators of KMSP in Brainerd and Walker were switched to KFTC, making WFTC available over-the-air in those communities for the first time.
The following translators rebroadcast WFTC:
The following translators rebroadcast KMSP-TV:
The following translators rebroadcast KFTC:
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