History
KXMB first went on the air on November 19, 1955, as KBMB-TV, owned by Fargo businessman John Boler and his North Dakota Broadcasting Company. The station had a primary affiliation with CBS, but carried other networks as well. During the late 1950s, the station was briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network.[1] In 1958, it moved to its current location.
In 1961, Boler sold a part-interest in the North Dakota Broadcasting Company to Chester Reiten of Minot. The two men teamed up to buy that city's CBS station, KCJB-TV, and changed the calls to KXMC-TV. The two stations merged their operations, with KXMC as the flagship station. That same year, KBMB changed its calls to the current KXMB.[2] They would put KXMD-TV in Williston on in 1969.
KXJB-TV in Fargo was co-owned with the KX stations (though programmed separately) until Boler sold his interest in the partnership to Reiten in 1971. Reiten retained the western North Dakota stations. The KX stations formerly had a secondary affiliation with ABC shared with KFYR-TV before full-time ABC affiliate KBMY signed on.
Reiten Broadcasting purchased KNDX (previously KDIX-TV) in Dickinson in 1985 and converted it into a full-time semi-satellite of KXMB and changed the call letters to KXMA (It would have been KXME, but Prairie Public Television objected.) Before being sister stations, KNDX/KDIX would often pick up CBS programming from KXMB since 1970, when KHSD-TV (KOTA-TV Rapid City, South Dakota satellite) dropped CBS programming.
After an ice storm on April 6, 1997, caused the KXJB-TV mast to collapse, some cable systems replaced KXJB with KXMB, either temporarily or permanently, to maintain CBS service.
In 2006, the stations began a web portal-like website called KX Net, with each station's website displaying a localized front page. The stations continue to be branded as "KX Television" and as "KX News" on the air, but also use the "KX Net" moniker on the air. KXNet.com combined the previous domains kxma.com, kxmb.com, kxmc.com and kxmd.com under one umbrella. The original domains are still active. KXNet.com won the 2007 Teddy Award for Best Website and the 2007 Eric Sevareid Award for best website small market television in a six state region.
In July 2008, Reiten Television began a joint agreement to sell television commercial slots on both KXMB and KBMY, Bismarck's ABC affiliate owned by Forum Communications Company. KXMB houses sales and engineering personnel solely for KBMY's operations. A consequence of this agreement has enabled KBMY-DT to begin broadcasting in July 2008 directly from KXMB's station, bringing a digital ABC television signal to Bismarck.
In October 2007, KXNet.com along with Midkota Solutions launched DakotaPolitics.com, a web site focusing on North Dakota political news coverage. DakotaPolitics featured profile information, voting records and some analysis. DakotaPolitics also launched weekly tracking polls for the 2008 elections. In 2008, KXNet.com became the first web site in North Dakota to deliver a live news broadcast over the Internet when they streamed a 1-hour special coverage of the 2008 Presidential Caucuses from Bismarck.
Nexstar Broadcasting Group announced its $44 million purchase of the Reiten Television stations, including KXMB-TV, on September 17, 2015. The deal gave the Reitens a handsome return on Chester Reiten's investment of 57 years earlier.[3] The sale was completed on February 2, 2016.[4] As a result of the acquisition, Nexstar decided to terminate the joint sales agreement with KBMY.[5]
