Sixty years ago today, December 15, 1956, WRAL-TV began broadcasting to viewers in eastern North Carolina. In order to better understand why this station is so driven, one needs to have insight into its founder and the first leadership team.No one can tell the story better than Tom Campbell, host of the program NC Spin . He has worked in the broadcasting industry for many years and at one time served as President & General Manager of WRAZ-TV. Tom wrote and presented this bit of history to a local club and shared it with CapCom many years ago. We have dusted it off and present it to you today.
David Beats Goliath Again: How Capitol Broadcasting Company Won the License to WRAL-TV By Tom Campbell
CBC founder AJ Fletcher signs WRAL-TV on air for the first time on Dec. 15, 1956.
Alfred Johnston Fletcher was no ordinary man. Born the seventh child of a Baptist minister, Fred, as he was called in his younger years, knew what it was like not to have enough food, clothing, or adequate shelter. At various times in his young life he had jobs as a stable boy, a bank clerk, a bellhop, a delivery boy for a grocery store, and an attendant for a fruit stand. At age 19, his older brother convinced him that he could be admitted to Wake Forest College located, at that time, in Wake Forest. When his meager resources ran out at the end of his sophomore year he took a job running a small weekly newspaper in Apex; a job that required that he be the news reporter, editor, ad solicitor, and publisher. Though the paper struggled, the position gave Fletcher a standing in the community. It also allowed him to get to know W.F. Utley, a successful businessman and civil war veteran. Fletcher met Utley's daughter, Elizabeth, at a party where she played the piano and she was impressed with Fletcher's singing. Elizabeth encouraged his attention and the couple married in January of 1910. After one year at the paper and the birth of a son, Fred, the couple moved to Wake Forest and Fletcher returned to college with the $900 he had saved. A.J. never graduated from college but learned enough to be admitted to the bar. Shortly after son Frank had arrived, the Fletchers moved to Fuquay Springs and A.J. hung out his shingle. After the birth of a third son, Floyd, Fletcher founded the Fuquay Springs Golf Leaf, a weekly newspaper.
A.J. Fletcher's law practice continued to grow and, being a frugal man, he invested in land and stocks whenever there were spare funds. One of his early investments that intrigued him was in a new company called Radio Corporation of America. Radio had effectively reduced the boundaries of the world. By March of 1919, Fletcher had established himself as a capable lawyer and a businessman and decided to move to Raleigh, the capitol city.
By the late 1930's, son Fred had married and pursued a graduate degree from UNC. Floyd had enrolled at Wake Forest and son Frank had graduated from Wake Forest law school. Frank needed a job and went to Washington, D.C. It just happened that he was among the first group of lawyers hired at the initiation of Franklin Roosevelt's alphabet agencies, the Federal Communications Commission. Young Frank was assigned to codifying the regulations governing the burgeoning broadcast industry, reviewing the applications for new stations, and tracking the success of stations across the country.
Raleigh had a highly successful station, WPTF, owned by Durham Life Insurance Company. The call letters represented the motto of the company: We Protect The Family. The station started in 1927 through experiments at NC State College. This 50,000-watt facility broadcast from their elegant studios in the insurance company's 20-story building, with announcers in tuxedos introducing programs in rich baritone voices. As the powerhouse radio station for the eastern third of the state, WPTF was an affiliate of the NBC network and carried programs like Burns and Allen, Fred Allen, Jack Benny, and the big band sounds of Dorsey, Goodman, and Miller. WPTF was an established institution in the life of citizens, a modern-day Goliath in the broadcast business.
Fletcher's interests in business and music, combined with the reports from son Frank about the lucrative opportunities in radio, sparked him to apply for a license for a station of his own in Raleigh. On July 28, 1938, the FCC granted a license to Capitol Broadcasting Company to operate station WRAL on 1240 kilohertz with a power of 250 watts. On March 29, 1939, the station signed on the air with Governor Clyde Hooey and Raleigh Mayor George Isley issuing welcoming addresses. The Reverend Sydnor Stealey pastor of The First Baptist Church invoked the Lord's blessings. So much for the people who said we didn't have a prayer, Fred Fletcher later joked. A.J. Fletcher was 52 years old.
In 1939, before WRAL had even started broadcasting, A.J. attended the World's Fair with his son Fred. They stopped at the RCA demonstration booth and saw television for the first time. World War Two restricted the growth of the new medium but with the dawning of the 1950's it became obvious that TV was going to be a big factor in American life. In 1948, for example, there were only 170,000 households in the U.S. with a TV set, mostly in the northeastern part of the country. By 1952, more than fifteen million sets had been sold. A.J. Fletcher saw the future and was determined not to be left behind in this new medium.
Hundreds of applications flooded the FCC for television broadcast licenses, so many that the agency had to put a freeze on the granting of any new television stations. Before the freeze, Raleigh had a TV station, WNAO, a UHF station affiliate with CBS on channel 28, owned by the News and Observer. Few could view the station because of its inferior UHF frequency coupled wit
