We've cleaned up the typography quite a bit here, and extended the type treatment into the station's call-sign. The call-letters align with the letterforms TV, leading the eye across and through. The 3 calls attention to itself through sheer size, leading the eye to the type, where we naturally reset to the left end of that string, reading back rightward to encode the information.
The majuscule T and V letterforms formed the basis for almost all the rest of the type; the D was created from the stem stroke of the T and a clipped O, which was simply composed of two ellipses. The stem was again borrowed as the basis of the K, and the hairline and leg strokes for the K were kept simple so it could all be augured in by sight.
To cap off this trip down Oregon broadcast memory lane, the studio building for KVDO still stands, only, of course, it hasn't been used as a TV studio since the day it was one. The address was–appropriately–3000 Portland Rd NE, in Salem (Google Maps View). It's the rectangular building on the NE corner of Portland Road and Beach Ave NE there.
Sadly, with the exception of whatever mention one can find about the 1976 tower vandalism, about the only thing in Oregon broadcast history is that KVDO existed. There's no record I can find about who any personalities were, what programs they broadcast (other than old movies and syndicated reruns) and precious little print (which is where I got the visual source to produce this). It's a shame. I remember enjoying the fact that Salem had its own full power TV for a while.
I wonder if there's anyone out there who remembers working at/for the old KVDO?
For now, KWVT, Channel 17, keeps the faith for Salem and the surrounding area. It counterprograms Portland by keeping it heavy local, which in these days where everything's desperately trying to look like everything else, is laudatory.
Adobe Illustrator CS3, for what that's worth.
Update: Just found this schedule from 18 Nov 75, recounted by a poster at this thread in the RadioInsight forums:
- 5pm Valley View
- 6:00 News
- 6:30 Movie: TBA
- 8:00 700 Club
- 9:30 Practical Christian Living
- 10:00 News
- 10:30 Public Pulse
- 11:00 sign-off
This was less than a year before KVDO quit being independent, and it shows. Umm, hmmm. Nothing like a two-hour block of syndicated electronic church after a TBA movie to get the folks to tune in, uh huh.
1 comment:
KVDO channel 3 was the first TV station licensed to Salem and was well known in the area. One of KVDO was the lack of available programming. This was in the days prior to Sat's and small format tape. Master control consisted of three quad 2" machines and a film chain of 3 16mm and one dual 35mm slide drum. This was also Salem’s only news cast until KECH 22 for a short time ran news. News was a three man cast, two talent and a MCR operator. The "talent" did double duty in that when not on the air they were the camera operators so when one was on air the other ran camera.
One must remember in those days news was all on film and in B&W. I have been told but other in the know KVDO demise happened in a major part with something good for them bad got a Portland station. When a tower was cut in Portland KVDO became a network during the repair. The network rating went way up because KVDO not only covered Portland but the Eugene (at the time there was only 2 networks in Eugene). This got the attention of some people and they did everything they could do remove this potential problem. About 1 to 2 years later KVDO was sold to KEZI Eugene and then to OEPBS (now OPB). OEPBS ran channel 3 for a couple of years and then had the channel moved to Bend Oregon in exchange moving channel 32 allocation to Salem (now KRCW).
Even today with the right aged crowd if you say KVDO a vast majority say “oh I remember it” main in that this was a “SALEM station” vs. a “Portland” station. Programming was not the best but in the late 60’s and 70’s it was something to watch/ whether it was TV shows, news Salem “live” wrestling, roller derby or movies it was one of only 4 stations to watch.
Ken
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