that horrible BEEP

[Scott Fybush]

A. Joseph Ross wrote:

> Since I distinctly recall a later article indicating that channel 19 
> would return to the air as part of Hudson Valley Broadcasting, which 
> I knew at the time to be WROW-WCDA-WCDB, the takeover by Capital 
> Cities could not have happened by this time.  Whether it happened 
> later, before we left the area in May 1957, I can't say for sure.

Oddly enough, I've just been reading an obscure little book called, 
"Capital Cities/ABC The Early Years 1954-1986: How the Minnow Came to 
Swallow the Whale."

And from it we learn that Hudson Valley Broadcasting and Capital Cities 
were the same company, at least after 1954, when the existing (and 
failing!) shell of Hudson Valley Broadcasting was sold by WROW founder 
Harry Goldman to a consortium led by Frank Smith and Lowell Thomas. The 
"new" Hudson Valley Broadcasting became Cap Cities in December 1957, as 
it grew beyond Albany to acquire WTVD Durham NC and KTRK Houston - but 
it was essentially the same company from 1954 through the eventual sales 
of WTEN and WROW-AM/FM and, ultimately, the 1986 acquisition of ABC (and 
the later sale to Disney.)

s