The following is a historical overview television coverage provided the National Wrestling Alliance's territories. The NWA began in 1948 as a governing body for a group of independent professional wrestling promotions.
1948–1993 Promotional headquarters (A–M) Amarillo's Western States Sports aired an hour-long television program on KFDA-TV (Channel 10) each Saturday afternoon. The program aired in West Texas along with New Mexico and Colorado. It was hosted by Steve Stack. The program featured a combination of matches recorded in the KFDA studios in Amarillo, matches recorded at house shows, interviews, and clips of matches from other territories. Buffalo, New York's National Wrestling Federation's show Championship Wrestling aired on Channel 43 in Cleveland on Saturday nights. Briefly a second show, All-Star Wrestling, aired on Sunday Mornings. That show was filmed in the studios of WUAB-TV in Parma, Ohio. The television hosts were Johnny Powers, Jack Reynolds, and Ron Martinez (son of Pedro Martinez). The film from each show was erased and reused to save money, hence few of the shows are available now on video or YouTube. Calgary's Stampede Wrestling was the basis for a long-running weekly sports broadcast produced in Calgary showcasing many of the promotion's most popular wrestlers. Hosted by Ed Whalen most of its run, which went from 1957 to 1989, the series was syndicated around the world and reruns continue to be shown in some countries to this day. At the time Stampede was revived in 1999, a second Stampede Wrestling TV series was attempted, hosted by Bad News Allen and play by play commentator Mauro Ranallo, but it was short-lived and Whalen was not involved. Chicago's Fred Kohler Enterprises Inc.'s first television program, Wrestling From Rainbo Arena, began airing on Wednesday evenings on July 10, 1946 on the regional television network WBKB. Hosted by Russ Davis, the program featured matches recorded in Chicago's Rainbo Arena. In 1948, Wrestling from Marigold began airing on the regional network WGN. In 1949, Kohler secured new television deals with ABC and WJZ-TV. Later that year, he reached a deal with the recently founded national television network DuMont. Wrestling from Marigold began airing on Thursdays and Saturdays in September 1949. The program was inexpensive to produce, and Kohler's membership of the NWA gave him access to some of the country's best performers. Wrestling from Marigold quickly became popular, with both broadcasts ranking amongst the top DuMont programs. In Dallas, World Class Championship Wrestling's weekly shows were staged there on Tuesday nights until August 1978, then were moved to Sunday nights until the early '80s, and finally were held on Friday nights until the promotion's demise. In the early 1980s, WCCW began its hour-long weekly syndicated television show which introduced numerous innovative production techniques, many of which are still commonly used today. The promotion was also the first to use familiar rock songs as entrance music for its wrestlers. The show was syndicated across the United States, and at one point arguably scored higher ratings than Saturday Night Live. By the 1950s Harry Light – along with his business partners Jack Britton and Bert Ruby – controlled professional wrestling in Detroit and Big Time Wrestling on WXYZ-TV Channel 7 was one of the most popular programs airing in Detroit. By the 1960s, the promotion was airing two to three television programs per week and staging weekly house shows at the Cobo Arena. The promotion's TV program was unique in that it would occasionally air local collegiate wrestling matches alongside worked angles, in a segment called "Am-Pro Wrestling". In 1988 WCOV-TV owner David Woods bought the controlling interest in Southeastern Championship Wrestling out of Dothan, Alabama from Ron Fuller, and he renamed it Continental Wrestling Federation in a further attempt to compete with Vince McMahon and appear to resemble a nationwide promotion, even to the point of getting an odd national TV deal with Financial News Network. Their last TV episode aired on November 25, 1989. The promotion closed after their final show on December 6, 1989. On July 10, 1953, Don Owen started what was the first regular professional wrestling program on television. Eugene, Oregon's Pacific Northwest Wrestling aired a weekly 60-minute live program originally called Heidelberg Wrestling, named for its sponsor, Heidelberg Brewing Co. of Tacoma, Washington. The show was initially broadcast on KPTV, but moved to rival KOIN-TV in 1955. Along with the move came the show's new name, Portland Wrestling. In 1967, Portland Wrestling returned to KPTV. That year, management changed within CBS Television and PNW's regionally broadcast wrestling show was dropped which subsequently led to Harry Elliott's retirement in 1968. Frank Bonnema, an on-air personality in KPTV's sports department, took over the announcing duties at that time, serving as the voice of Portland Wrestling until shortly before his untimely death on October 5, 1982, at age 49. In 1991, Pacific Northwest Wrestling's main television sponsor (Tom Peterson's) declared bankruptcy. Despite remaining the highest-rated, locally produced show aired in the Portland television market, Portland Wrestling was canceled in December 1991 after 38 continuous years as a weekly program. When the show was canceled, it was the longest-running non-news show on television, and the third longest overall behind Meet the Press and the CBS Evening News. It still is one of the top 20 longest-running shows on television. Halifax's Eastern Sports Association's nightly cards were almost identical for the week, so they could be promoted by one TV show. The week would start Saturday nights in New Glasgow, with their main stop at the Halifax Forum every Tuesday night, followed by a TV taping on Wednesday morning at the CJCH-TV studios on Robie Street in Halifax. This show would be broadcast across the Maritimes Saturday on the ATV network. Host Clary Fleming would announce the matches, do the play by play and interview the wrestlers. Eight events a week, including the TV show, was a heavy schedule, but it was for only about six months a year (May–October). Ed Francis secured a Saturday afternoon live television slot on KHVH-TV for 50th State Big Time Wrestling out of Honolulu. As the promotion increased in popularity, it moved to KGMB and increased its output to two programs a week: a taped show featuring interviews, vignettes and replays on Friday nights and a live show on Saturday afternoons. Hosted by Francis and Blears, 50th State Wrestling was at one point the most watched television program in Hawaii. Television tapings rotated between Hawaii, Kauai, and Maui. Worldwide Wrestling Associates out of Los Angeles pioneered the use of closed-circuit television to show matches to fans who were unable to secure tickets for live events, an early precursor to the pay-per-view model that emerged in the 1980s. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the Minneapolis Boxing and Wrestling Club's television production was headquartered at Minneapolis independent station WTCN-TV, then owned by Metromedia. The ring announcer was longtime Minneapolis - Saint Paul sports broadcaster Marty O'Neill, who also conducted the post-match interviews. O'Neill announced the matches for the local WTCN audience. But fans watching the syndicated version of the show heard commentary provided by Rodger Kent. In the mid-1970s, during a prolonged illness, O'Neill was occasionally replaced as ring announcer by program producer Al DeRusha and interviews were conducted by both Kent and Gene Okerlund. By 1979, Okerlund had permanently replaced O'Neill, who died a couple of years later, and production was transferred to Minneapolis station KMSP-TV. In 1985, Verne Gagne began airing weekly programming on ESPN, hoping to help the promotion compete with the national exposure already enjoyed by the WWF (on USA Network) and the NWA's Georgia/World Championship Wrestling (although much less successful than the WWF at the time) (on TBS). However, weekly AWA shows were not treated with any priority by the cable network, sometimes being delayed, preempted by live programming, or suffering from occasional changes in time slot, making it difficult for fans to tune in on a regular basis.
Promotional headquarters (N–Z) Eastern Championship Wrestling's shows were broadcast on a Philadelphia local cable sports station (SportsChannel America's local affiliate, SportsChannel Philadelphia) on Tuesday evenings. After Sports Channel Philadelphia went off the air in 1997, the show moved to WPPX-TV 61. It later moved to a former independent broadcast station (WGTW 48) in Philadelphia on either Friday or Saturday night, and at 1:00a.m. or at 2:00a.m. Shows were also aired on the MSG Network in NYC on Friday nights (early Saturday morning) at 2:00a.m. Due to the obscurity of the stations and ECW itself, as well as the lack of FCC oversight at that late hour, many times expletives and violence were not edited out of these showings, along with extensive use of copyrighted music and music videos. The St. Louis Wrestling Club's weekly television program, Wrestling at the Chase (carried by KPLR-TV), is considered one of the legendary programs in the history of professional wrestling, and ran from 1959 until 1983, and the St. Louis Wrestling Club lasted two years more until 1985. In response to the threat posed by Roy Shire's Big Time Wrestling promotion, Joe Malcewicz – who had long resisted the emergence of televised wrestling, fearing it would compete with live events – begun running NWA San Francisco shows each Monday night on the fledgling independent Oakland television station KTVU in 1961. Shire later secured a television slot on KTVU in 1961 and spent several weeks airing tapes of matches from the Midwest. In January 1961, he began airing National All-Star Wrestling, a live show recorded in the KTVU studio that aired at 19:00 PST on Friday evenings, originally hosted by Bill Welsh and then by Walt Harris. Shire would later begin producing a second weekly show, Big Time Wrestling this one airing on KOVR. Big Time Wrestling was originally hosted by Harris, then later by Hank Renner. KTVU cancelled Big Time Wrestling in 1970. In 1970, Shire secured a new deal with the Sacramento station KTXL, airing Big Time Wrestling at 19:00 PST on Saturday evenings. The show featured Hank Renner as play-by-play announcer. He was later joined by Pepper Martin as color commentator. San Juan's Capitol Sports Promotions gained fame in Puerto Rican homes soon after their TV show, Super Estrellas de la Lucha Libre, went on-air every weekend on channel 4, WAPA-TV. The taped show is still aired on weekends (both Saturday and Sunday for two hours until March 2008 when it was reduced to one hour on both Saturdays and Sundays due to declining ratings). From 1973 to 1980 it aired on channel 11 (Telecadena Pérez Perry, then on Teleonce after the before mentioned went off the air), on channel 7 on Sunday evenings at 6 pm and on Telemundo on Saturday mornings at 10 am. Sydney's World Championship Wrestling gained publicity through television programs on the Nine Network, which were presented at noon on Saturdays and Sundays. In 1978, the Nine Network ceased coverage of WCW; with no TV coverage promoters were facing financial ruin, leading to the decline of professional wrestling in Australia. The "World Championship Wrestling" name was reused in 1982 by Georgia Championship Wrestling in the United States for its own TV program, which became the roots of the American promotion of the same name. At the time, the promotion's former owner, Jim Barnett, was one of the owners of Georgia Championship Wrestling.