General TV History

That was when Disney was on Nine in Sydney and Seven in Melbourne, a situation that continued to around the early 1980s I think!? I distinctly remember Mike Walsh doing an interview about the late 1970s The New Mickey Mouse Club on his show as it was going to be on TCN-9, but he made a joke about it being on Seven elsewhere.

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A promo for Ten Eyewitness News! I almost forgot what they look like :stuck_out_tongue:

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Yep as TCN9 and HSV7 were affiliates in those days, and GTV9 was with ATN7. Then Frank Packer who owned TCN9 bought up GTV9 in 1960. But it was still not until 1962 before the 9s and 7s matched up as networks and even then it still took a while for some shows to follow suit, pending existing advertiser contracts etc. But for some reason Disney stayed with their respective channels in Sydney and Melbourne until well into the 1980s.

For years Disney was a 6.30 Sunday fixture on TCN9 and HSV7. GTV9 had talent quest New Faces with Bert Newton at that time on Sundays but because of Disney TCN9 ran New Faces on Friday nights at 7.30.

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Here’s something that I don’t think we’ve ever seen here before… a Nine closedown! (NWS, to be exact) From 1983:

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Ten Brisbane bulletin from that night with Anna McMahon and Geoff Mullins crossing to Ken Burslem in the US. Not the best recording but it show the presentation style, graphics etc from that time. The earthquake was the worst in North America since 1906 and a huge story at the time with a large section of the Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge collapsing producing some iconic images of cars hanging over the edge of the pavement. The other classic scene was the upper deck of a double-decker freeway collapsing onto the lower deck.

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TV History enthusiasts might be interested in Australian Story presented by Brian Henderson in his “final television appearance”.

http://forums.mediaspy.org/t/australian-story/611/26?u=tv.cynic

With 7 Brisbane using the Love You Brisbane theme for their latest station ident, I have uploaded the original version from 1982. It had a number of different versions over the years but the original is probably the best remembered. The “on show for the world to see” line referred to the Commonwealth Games of that year.

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Unfortunately I don’t know anything more about this Italia News opener than the title. I think it was a special news program produced by RAI but not sure.

TVW7 adapted it as Love You Perth and even NTD8 did Love You Darwin.

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And Sunshine Television adopted “Love You Quuensland” in the first few years after aggregation began across the state. (Early 1990s)

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Though neither Love You Perth or Hello Perth managed to make “Perth” fit the music - probably why neither survived long.

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However they did manage to make ‘Perth’ fit in this little ditty.

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I don’t know if they had the song for Love You Darwin or just used the slogan.

Did HSV7 dump Disney when the Eagles came into the VFL in 87(hence later starts for some Sunday telecasts?) When the Crows came into the league, maybe that’s when Disney was dumped.

I remember watching Disney on Saturday or Sunday evenings in the 90’s - I think on Seven (or ten?)

No. Seven lost rights to VFL at the end of 1986. ABC in Victoria (via Broadcom) had VFL in 1987.

HSV kept running Disney at 6.30 Sunday during 1987 but i think later in the year bumped it to make room for Sons And Daughters to play out its remaining episodes (in Sydney the show had already finished up months ahead of Melbourne). From memory i think HSV bumped Disney to 5.00. It later resurfaced on Ten on Sunday nights.

Bu tin later years, HSV7 often carried two live AFL games on Sundays from interstate, then a movie, then the full replay of a game from the MCG or wherever the Sunday game from Melbourne was.

7 in Brisbane had Wonderful World of Disney at 6.30pm on Sunday nights.

I think we used to watch Wild Kingdom at that time possibly on TVQ. I’m sure I had no idea at the time what “Mutual of Omaha” was

Yes Network Ten did take The Wonderful World of Disney on Sunday nights from 1994-98, it took over from the failed “Take 40 TV” music programme and Ten were desperate to find a ratings hit programmes to boost its Sunday night lineup, so they decided to poach Disney away from Seven. I think Ten had a couple of other Disney programmes as well, but not Home Improvement, Saturday Disney, The Golden Girls/The Golden Palace, and the majority of Disney/Touchstone movies available for television all remained on Seven.

By the time HSV7 dumped Disney from 6.30 Sunday it had occupied that timeslot for nearly 30 years with barely an interruption except maybe for Christmas Day. It was probably the single most consistent program on Melbourne TV… i can’t speak for other cities.