Television in the United States Gray Television, whose 131 stations cover mostly smaller metropolitan areas reaching only 10% of the population. The five major U.S. broadcast television networks are the National Broadcasting Company (NBC), CBS (formerly known as the Columbia Broadcasting System), the American Broadcasting Company (ABC), the Fox Broadcasting Company (Fox) and the CW Television Network. The first and elder three (which are colloquially known as the "Big Three") began as radio networks: NBC and CBS respectively began operations in 1924 and 1927, while ABC was spun off from NBC to Edward J. Noble in 1943 as the Blue Network during FCC inquiries over
King Broadcasting Company King Broadcasting in 1987. Following Dorothy Bullitt's death, KING Broadcasting Company was sold to The Providence Journal newspaper in 1991, which was later sold to the Belo Corporation in 1997, which included King Broadcasting. Belo itself was acquired by the Gannett Company in 2013. Gannett's print and broadcast assets were split into two companies in 2015, with King Broadcasting following the broadcast assets into the newly created Tegna, Inc. The King Broadcasting name lives on as a holding company within Tegna's corporate structure (as is also the case with Multimedia and a forerunner of Combined Communications, Pacific and Southern Company,