WKTV then became an exclusive NBC station resulting in the channel being one of the oldest affiliates of the network today. WKTV enjoyed a monopoly in the Utica television market until Februwhen WUTR signed-on as an ABC affiliate. Eventually, Dick Clark would anchor the evening newscasts on WKTV replacing Robert Earle who would later host the GE College Bowl. To avoid confusion, Dick Clark became known on-air as "Dick Clay". Clarkâs father was the manager of Utica radio station WRUN-FM (now WAMC-FM in Albany) and the son wanted to avoid the name recognition factor. He was a talented good looking announcer and quickly gathered a following. In the mid-1950s, a young local radio announcer named Dick Clark joined the staff of announcers at WKTV. With the change, WKTV upgraded its signal and began to cover a fairly wide area stretching from as far south as the Catskills, as far east as the Berkshires, and into Canada. This in turn allowed a relocation of a channel 13 in Albany. This change involved a station located on channel 13 in Hamilton, Ontario switching channel positions to add a channel 13 allotment in Rochester. On New Year's Day 1959, WKTV moved to VHF channel 2 in a dial realignment. WHEN-TV (now WTVH) in Syracuse would become the default affiliate for the Utica area. The DuMont affiliation ended in the mid-1950s with that network's closure and, due to a dispute with CBS, that affiliation ended soon after. Soon after, it also picked up CBS and ABC giving it the interesting situation of being a local network affiliate for all major television networks for a period of time. This made Utica one of the smallest cities in the nation with its own television station. It was the 93rd television station in the country to sign-on. WKTV began broadcasting on Decemon VHF channel 13 affiliated with NBC and DuMont. WKTV-DT2 gets all of its programming from The CW Plus. This can also be seen on Time Warner channel 11 (hence the Central New York CW 11 branding). It operates the area's CW affiliate on a second digital subchannel.
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