ABC Weekend TV was the popular name of the British broadcaster ABC Television Limited, which provided the weekend service in the Midlands and Northern England regions of the Independent Television (ITV) network from 1956 to 1968. It was one of the "Big Four" companies that between them produced the majority of ITV networked programmes during this period.
Originally created as Associated British Cinemas (Television) Ltd, ABC was one of a number of commercial television companies established during the 1950s by cinema chain companies, in an attempt to safeguard their business by becoming involved with television, which was taking away their cinema audiences. In this case, the parent company was the Associated British Picture Corporation (ABPC) — owner of ABC Cinemas — which initially did not wish to become involved with the new broadcasting system, but was persuaded to do so by the Independent Television Authority (ITA) and the manager of its Pathé News subsidiary Howard Thomas, who became the new company's managing director.
ABC operated two franchises, one in the Midlands, which was the fourth ITA franchise to go on air, in 1956, and the other in the North of England, which was the sixth franchise to go on air, later the same year. It lost both its franchises in 1968, but merged with another franchisee to form Thames Television, which held the London weekday franchise for 24 years.
From 1967, ABC's sister company, ABC Television Films, used the name Associated British Corporation on its exports to the US, such as the last two series of The Avengers.
History
Formation
When Kemsley-Winnick, one of the consortia that had been awarded two franchises in the new Independent Television network in 1954, collapsed, the ITA approached ABPC to step into the breach. The Corporation agreed to assume the franchises to broadcast on Saturdays and Sundays to the Midlands and the North of England. The contract agreeing to do so was signed on 21 September 1955, the day before Independent Television (ITV) began in London.
This left the new ABC five months to begin broadcasting in the Midlands, the service beginning on 18 February 1956. Soon afterwards, it was also up and running in the North; it began broadcasting in the North West on 5 May 1956, and in Yorkshire on 3 November 1956. It was aided in part by the failure of the original contractor; Kelmsley-Winnick had ordered over £1 million (equivalent to £ million today) of production equipment from manufacturer Pye, which it sold to ABC at a much-discounted price.
Relations with ITA, ITN and ATV
ATV
The London weekend contractor had launched under the name "Associated Broadcasting Company" (ABC), but ABPC wanted to use the ABC brand for its own service, to match its existing ABC Cinemas brand, so it took legal action against the Associated Broadcasting Company who subsequently agreed to rename as Associated Television (ATV) after broadcasting for three weeks as "ABC". This allowed ABPC to launch its own station as "ABC".
ITN
ABC's late entry into Independent Television meant that some of the details of how the new system would run were already agreed between the ITA regulator and the other three contractors. ABC felt that some of these details were unfair on itself as the smallest contractor, and the only contractor that broadcast only at weekends.
In particular, ABC objected to paying one-quarter of the costs for ITN, provider of national news broadcasts for the network, as there would be fewer news programmes at the weekend than on weekdays. ABC's managing director Howard Thomas, former head of Pathé News, felt that ABC could provide its own news for a fraction of ITN's price, but the ITA would not allow this: regional companies were responsible only for regional news, and national news should be independent of the regional companies. ABC lobbied both ITN and the ITA for change, which eventually resulted in a cutback to the amount of programming to be provided by ITN to the network and a substantial reduction in ITN's costs.
Presentation
Once the "Big Four" companies were in profit, the ITA reviewed the performance each of them. ABC escaped with little criticism, except for its presentation, which was considered to be dull and too closely aligned with its sister "ABC Cinemas" brand. ABC took this to heart and launched a new look in September 1959.