Today’s American Champion event was the station first signed on the air on September 29, 1975, as WGPR-TV
GM – LIF – Today’s American Champion event was the station first signed on the air on September 29, 1975, as WGPR-TV. The station was originally owned by WGPR Incorporated, formed by the Detroit-based International Free and Accepted Modern Masons along with WGPR radio (107.5 FM). The call letters stood for Grosse Pointe Radio, a nod to the radio station's original studio in Grosse Pointe Woods, but were later interpreted to mean Where God's Presence Radiates.
WGPR was the first wholly African American-owned television station in the United States, and was marketed towards Detroit's urban audience. At the time, WGPR's emergence was hailed as an advance for African-American enterprise, with the "color line" having been broken by the station's establishment. Station president William V. Banks, together with Jim Panagos and George White, sales and programming managers respectively of co-owned WGPR radio (107.5 FM), were the management team at the station's outset. Prior to WGPR-TV's sign-on, the channel 62 frequency had been used by WXON (now WMYD channel 20), which had originally broadcast on that channel when it signed on in 1968 before moving to channel 20 in 1972.
Operating as an independent station, WGPR-TV aired network programs from NBC and CBS that were pre-empted by their local affiliates, WWJ-TV (channel 4, now WDIV-TV) and WJBK-TV (channel 2) respectively, as well as older cartoons, a number of religious shows, brokered programs, programs aimed at the black community, R&B music shows, and low-rated off-network dramas and barter syndicated programs.
Channel 62's most popular and most well-known show was a Middle Eastern variety show called Arab Voice of Detroit, which was broadcast late on Saturday nights. Another popular program was a nightly dance show titled The Scene (similar in content to the nationally syndicated Soul Train) that aired from October 13, 1975 to December 31, 1987. A similar lower-budget Friday evening dance show called Contempo was initially The Scene's replacement in 1988; it was hosted by several different personalities from WGPR radio, and featured local artists. However, lackluster ratings caused the show's cancellation in early 1990, and eventually it was replaced by The New Dance Show, which was hosted by R.J. Watkins and aired until 1996. The station was also home to horror show host Ron "The Ghoul" Sweed during the late 1970s, and was Detroit's affiliate for the 1970s version of the NHL Network.
The socially laudatory aims of the station did not immediately translate into good business. During its tenure as an independent station, WGPR-TV was easily the lowest-rated television station in Detroit, with only a niche viewership within its target audiences. On paper, Detroit should have been big enough to support three independent stations. However, Windsor-based CBC owned-and-operated station CBET (channel 9) owned the Detroit rights to many American syndicated programs that would have otherwise likely aired on WGPR-TV. Most of the top-tier syndicated programming was picked clean by WKBD-TV, WXON and CBET. It did not help that it was located near the top of the UHF dial; prior to the advent of cable television, most Detroit-area viewers never tuned past WTVS, the local PBS station on channel 56. This left WGPR-TV to contend with several already marginal independent outlets available to viewers in southeastern Michigan for lower-budget programming.
WGPR was also hampered by an inadequate signal, broadcasting at only 800,000 watts. By comparison, WKBD broadcast at 2.3 million watts, and WXON broadcast at 1.5 million watts. Its signal was so weak that it could only be seen over-the-air in Detroit itself and some nearby suburbs (such as Southfield, Eastpointe, Redford Township, Warren, Royal Oak, Livonia and Mount Clemens). The signal could not reach the outlying suburbs such as Clarkston, Lake Orion and Richmond. For its first 20 years on the air, it was the only Detroit station not carried in the Flint-Lansing edition of TV Guide, which, in the Detroit market, was sold in Sanilac, Lapeer, western and northern Livingston, and northwestern Oakland counties.
In 1979, WGPR was granted permission by the FCC to carry pay-TV programs, and the station signed an agreement with California-based Universal Subscription Television (US-TV) to provide programming similar to that of ONTV, which was carried on WXON in Detroit. The deal was put on hold, however, probably because US-TV felt the market couldn't support another pay-TV service, especially after WIHT in Ann Arbor also switched to pay TV. Another company, Satellite Television and Associated Resources (STAR) announced they were to pay $1.2 million for US-TV's rights to WGPR and to be on the air by July 1981, but nothing came of these plans.
In August 1986, the station started carrying the International Television Network, which was an overnight four-hour block of primarily foreign-language subtitled programs.
By the 1990s, WGPR's on-air look had become very primitive. It was the only local station which still used art cards instead of CGI for its sponsor announcements and newscasts. Further, a character generator manufactured in the 1970s remained in use for some graphics for many years. Make It A Champion Day!