Seattle’s First TV Broadcast Featured Wenatchee

Seattle’s First TV Broadcast Featured the Wenatchee Panthers

Nearly 13,000 cheering spectators filled Seattle's Memorial Field on Thanksgiving 1948. West Seattle High School, the champions of Seattle, took on the best team from outside the city - the Wenatchee Panthers. Milt Bohart, team captain for Wenatchee, said (as quoted in a KING 5 article):

We were the underdogs coming from Eastern Washington and playing the big kids from Seattle and so it was very big for the team as well as the community.

The contest ended in a 6-6 tie.

The result was that Jack Barnes' 1948 Wenatchee Panthers football team won their second football state title, making it a vital footnote in broadcast history.

The story of Television's arrival in the state of Washington

A year before the historic Thanksgiving football game, the Federal Communications Commission was losing patience with Seattle’s KRSC AM and FM. 

More stalling caused the government to issue its final warning of withdrawing the license. In response, KRSC hired Lee Schulman (who worked at NBC-TV in New York) as its first director of programming. He quickly built the first TV transmission tower high above Queen Anne Hill.

Newspapers in Seattle promised the arrival of the exciting new technology.

The hype encouraged the sale of 600 TV sets at a listed price before any television broadcast had occurred. 

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After a successful test in early November, KRSC told the Seattle newspapers that their inaugural Television broadcast would be the upcoming Thanksgiving game at Seattle’s Memorial Stadium.

November 25, 1948 

The West Seattle vs.Wenatchee football game was broadcast by KRSC AM, FM, and for the first time in Seattle, on Television - using two cameras to cover the action.

The Television images on that historic Thanksgiving day were described as weak and grainy on the small 7-inch black and white TV.

Feedback from viewers was positive.

 ‘One viewer, a local Stimson empire heiress Dorothy Bullitt, sent Leberman a bouquet of congratulatory flowers.’ - Delphine Haley,��Dorothy Stimson Bullitt: An Uncommon Life

With few TV sets in the Seattle metro area and little ad revenue, Leberman and Priebe sold KRSC-TV to Dorothy Bullitt for over $300,000. 

Dorothy Bullitt took over the Stimson family company after her father, C.D. Stimson, passed away in 1932. 

When Dorothy Bullitt died in 1989, daughters Harriet and Patsy were suddenly in charge of KING Broadcasting. 

One year later, in 1990, Harriet and Patsy sold KING Broadcasting. They announced that the proceeds would help grow the Bullitt Foundation's endowment. The family foundation has given more than $300 million to environmental causes in the Pacific Northwest. 

The Bullitt family’s love of Leavenworth included a 300-acre Coppernotch on the east side of Icicle Creek. In 1995, Harriet Bullitt developed the Sleeping Lady Mountain Resort on this site. Harriet Bullitt lived in Leavenworth until her passing at 97 in April of 2022. 

Dorothy Bullitt Served the community of Seattle

Dorothy Bullitt’s main mission for KING-TV was to serve the community. She wasn’t concerned with profit.

When KRSC changed its name to KING-TV, Dorothy and her television station were the only station in Seattle for nearly four years. 

In 1952, the Fisher Stations (a former owner of KW3 Wenatchee) finally launched KOMO.

KIRO would make its Seattle TV debut in 1957, nine years after the Wenatchee Panthers fought and battled West Seattle on Seattle's first TV broadcast at Seattle’s wet and cold Memorial Stadium.