KCRA-TV

KCRA-TV (channel 3) is a television station in Sacramento, California, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Hearst Television alongside Stockton-licensed CW affiliate KQCA (channel 58). The two stations share studios on Television Circle off D Street in downtown Sacramento; KCRA-TV's transmitter is located in Walnut Grove, California. KCRA-TV began broadcasting on September 3, 1955. An NBC affiliate from the first day on air, it was built by the Kelly and Hansen families, owners of KCRA radio, with the Kellys assuming sole control in 1962 and forming Kelly Broadcasting. The Kelly era was characterized by a very high level of investment into the news product in the areas of technology and personnel. The result of channeling this attention into the news department was an image as the leading news station and a dominant position in news ratings that has generally persisted throughout the station's history, making it one of NBC's leading affiliates. KCRA was first locally to use electronic news gathering and the first TV station in California to own its own news helicopter. Nationally, its Weeknight was the first local evening magazine program, predating other attempts such as Evening Magazine and PM Magazine, and it was the first station to institute local weekend morning newscasts. KCRA employees of this period included Joan Lunden, who spent 17 years as host of Good Morning America, and Maurice DuBois, who in 2025 was co-anchor of the CBS Evening News. In the 1980s and early 1990s, KCRA also experimented with producing programming for national syndication; the most successful effort, the newsmagazine The West/In America, ran for three years. From 1991 to 1993, KCRA experimented with an early prime time schedule from 7 to 10 p.m., airing a 10 p.m. local newscast; when NBC forced the station to switch back to regular...