The Weather Channel is an American basic cable and satellite television channel owned by Byron Allen's Entertainment Studios that focuses on national and international weather information - although in recent years, the channel has also incorporated entertainment-based programs related to weather on its schedule. This article details the history of the channel, which dates back its founding to around 1980.
Prelaunch Prior to the channel's launch, the original concept for providing continuous weather reports to the public over television stations stretched as far back as the late 1950s and early 1960s on the varying incarnations of CATV. Through those systems, which typically brought in up to a dozen stations to the viewer from across the region, twelve slots on a cable dial would frequently leave a few vacancies.
To take advantage of the unused bandwidth early cable providers devised a system where a single black and white camera, often one that had seen former service in local news production but was unused after an upgrade, would be placed on a rotating pedestal, capturing various dials and gauges on different stations. These channel feeds (to which the camera would pan automatically, remaining in a given view for a few seconds before moving on) largely featured the time, temperature, barometric pressure, wind speed, wind direction, and wind chill factor. Slides with the day's complete forecast, brief news headlines, and community events often drawn up by the station's art department rounded out the package. This was à similar system to that used by early devotional channels for the "Stations of the Cross" during the Christmas season.
The Weather Channel itself was the brainchild of veteran television meteorologist John Coleman (former chief meteorologist at WLS-TV in Chicago and Good Morning America forecaster), who took his idea to Frank Batten, the then-chief executive officer of Landmark Communications. A major part of the plan for the new network was that it would be able to provide localized weather information to its viewers. This would be done through the use of specialized computer units, known as WeatherStars ("STAR" being an acronym for "Satellite Transponder Addressable Receiver"), which would be installed at the headends of cable providers that agreed to carry the channel. These WeatherStars were able to insert current local conditions, forecasts and weather warnings over the national feed, with the weather data being received from the vertical blanking interval of the TWC video feed and via satellite, which is then transmitted to the WeatherStar unit; the WeatherStar systems would also be capable of adding or removing segments seen during each local forecast segment, and providing other forms of non-forecast data (primarily local contact and address information for businesses advertised on the channel's national feed, which the STAR unit overlaid on a static graphic seen after certain commercials). The Weather Channel, Inc. was founded in Atlanta, Georgia on July 18, 1980.USPTO filings: First Use (not First Use in Commerce date on various filings, including filing w/ serial number 73369821)
The early years (May 1982–March 1986) The Weather Channel launched on Sunday, May 2, 1982. Programming began with an introduction to the channel by Batten and Coleman, which led into an inauguration ceremony that launched the channel's first official broadcast at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time that evening, anchored by meteorologists Bruce Edwards and André Bernier. The channel originally focused on strictly providing weather reports and other meteorological information for the United States and other countries. The Weather Channel originally gathered its national and regional forecasts from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and its local forecasts were sourced from the various National Weather Service Weather Forecast Offices around the country. After only one year in the role, in 1983, John Coleman was forced out as the channel's president and CEO; at that time, he returned to his previous occupation as a television weather anchor, first becoming employed at WCBS-TV in New York City.
The original Weather Star I model often interfered with the channel 2 signal at the cable headend; this issue was fixed with the upgrade to the Weather Star II in January 1984. The channel later rolled out Weather Star III, the third-generation STAR unit, to cable providers – which began upgrading to the system in early 1986; the Star III included additional hardware improvements, and also added several extra forecast and observation features.
"You Need Us, The Weather Channel, For Everything You Do" (June 1986–March 1991) On June 29, 1986, The Weather Channel switched to an anchor format, and was relaunched as The New Weather Channel. Meteorologist Charlie Welsh said "Good afternoon everyone and welcome to The New Weather Channel. We're covering the weather for you everything you do". The campaign included a custom lyrical theme (which was remixed in 1989) – two versions of which were created: a full one-minute theme that was rarely seen on-air, and a more commonly seen 30-second version. In 1989, the channel introduced Prime Time Tonight, a three-minute segment that appeared eight times daily from 7:57 to 11:27 p.m., which served as guide to programs airing on other cable channels and provided airtime information and video clips.
1990 saw the introduction of the first Weather Star 4000 models, which similar to the Weather Star III, originally generated only text-based products. Radar imagery was added to the units in June of that year, with graphical backgrounds being introduced in July, making the 4000 the first STAR to be capable of generating graphics and the first to incorporate the channel's logo in the forecast segments. Also in 1990, The Weather Channel began including snow condition reports at five minutes after the hour.
"Weather You Can Always Turn To" (March 1991–February 1996)
Largely considered the height of the classic TWC by enthusiasts, The Weather Channel underwent a major graphical revamp (with the introduction of a new slogan, "Weather You Can Always Turn To") on March 6, 1991.USPTO filing for Weather You Can Always Turn To, First Use in Commerce date; Serial number 74229581 Graphic elements included heavy use of gradients and the Caxton typeface. On July 3,First Use in Commerce date for The Weather Channel Connection trademark, serial number 74192763 on USPTO The Weather Channel Connection, a toll-free phone service providing weather information, was launched. Originally 1-900-288-8800, the phone number was reassigned in 1992 to 1-900-WEATHER (or 1-900-932-8437), a number was also used to promote the service in on-air and print advertisements. On November 1, The Weather Channel filed for a trademark on TWC, a common shortening of the name that was sometimes seen on-air.USPTO trademark filing for TWC, First Use in Commerce date. Registration number 1925906
By 1993, The Weather Channel was available to 90% of U.S. households with cable television service. On January 10, 1994, TWC placed an order to build 1,000 units for a new STAR model known as the Weather Star Jr, a budget model developed by Wegener Communications, which builds equipment for cable headends.
1995 brought a variety of changes to TWC, setting the stage for more changes that occurred the following year. Minor graphical tweaks were made, while local forecast segments began incorporating Short Term Forecasts issued by local National Weather Service offices as the "Local Update" (which in turn destabilized flavor lineups and caused the discontinuation of narration). The 30-Day Outlook was discontinued by the National Weather Service (which required TWC to discontinue the product). New programs included the introductions of WeatherScope (a top/bottom of the hour weather discussion) and a special on how weather affected the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7. That year also featured the premiere of Sky on Fire, a documentary on lightning. The music of Trammell Starks, used on Weatherscan and emergency cases since 2000, premiered at the end of the year with Starks' various other music pieces being used by the channel until early 2012.
Major modernization (February 1996–March 1998)
In two years, The Weather Channel dramatically changed its on-air presentation. The first wave of change came on February 15, 1996, with the introduction of a new slogan ("No Place on Earth Has Better Weather"), that was heralded with a trio of humorous spots promoting the accuracy of TWC's weather coverage. On April 15 of the same year, The Weather Channel received its biggest graphical overhaul since 1991, the modernization of TWC's presentation included the introduction of a newer, flatter logo (although its previous logo remained in use on some segments, and some specialty segments retained narration by Dan Chandler and/or the previous TWC logo into late 1997Videos posted on twcdan.com), as well as a new graphics package featuring rotating globes and compass points for introductions, and new music. 1996 also saw the launch of The Weather Channel's website, weather.com. "Local on the 8s", a concept in which local forecasts aired in ten-minute intervals at times ending in "8," beginning at eight minutes past the hour, also made its debut. The first iteration of "Local on the 8s" was somewhat short-lived, only lasting until early 1998. The concept was later revived in December 2001, and remains in use by TWC to this day.
On October 15, 1996, Landmark Communications purchased a building at 300 Interstate North (near the junction of Interstates 75 and 285 in Atlanta) to house The Weather Channel's operations. Landmark had been looking for new studio facilities for the channel, and requirements included 18-foot ceilings. Improvements were made to bring the building up to code before TWC moved into its new headquarters at the end of 1996 (but it did not begin broadcasting from the facility until early 1997). By 1996, The Weather Channel reached 63 million homes, with average ratings totaling at 130,000 viewers at that time.
On March 31, 1997, the channel revised its programming schedule with the introduction of a news wheel format. On August 25, the channel debuted a memorable advertising campaign, The Front, created by ad agency TBWA Chiat/Day. The promos (which used the slogan, "Weather Fans, You're Not Alone") were set in something akin to a sports bar, with the major difference being that weather was the central focus. That October, 1997 World Series became the first major event that TWC covered with live reporters. New title bars were introduced for national segments on January 6, 1998.
The second wave of change (March 1998–June 2001)