Station History

Channel 10 was founded in 1953 as a shared-time signal between KOY-TV and KOOL-TV; the two later merged to become simply KOOL-TV. Gene Autry was one of the station's owners. The station was originally a limited-schedule ABC affiliate until 1955, when KTVK signed on and took the ABC affiliation. KOOL then took the CBS affiliation away from KPHO-TV. As a result, the station was now able to feature Autry's show on its schedule.

The station was sold to Gulf Broadcasting in 1980, and changed its callsign to KTSP-TV. It had been said that the call sign stands for Tempe Scottsdale Phoenix, but some have also claimed that the call sign was simply changed to match WTSP in Tampa, which the company also owned. KTSP's logo at the time was similar to WTSP's "Sunset 10" logo.

KTSP was sold to Taft Broadcasting in 1984, as part of a corporate deal. Taft then sold most of its network affiliates to Great American Broadcasting. The station was then sold to New World Communications late in 1993.

The station changed its call sign to KSAZ on February 12, 1994 to match its new slogan, "The Spirit of Arizona". It remained as the CBS network's Phoenix affiliate; however, as a result of a deal reached between New World and FOX, 4 commercial stations in the Phoenix market swapped network affiliations at different times. KSAZ dropped the CBS affiliation in December of 1994 which went to KPHO 5.

Fox network's prime time and sports programming moved to the station from KNXV in December 1994, although the Fox Kids programming moved to KTVK and in 1997 to KASW. KSAZ became known as "News Channel 10" in the Fall of 1994 and in December "News Channel 10 KSAZ FOX". With several top-rated syndicated shows moving to other stations in 1995, KSAZ was up to about 50 hours a week of local news. In the fall of 1995, KSAZ added 3 hours of talk shows jointly produced by New World and FOX.

FOX bought out New World late in 1996, making KSAZ a fully owned-and-operated station, or "O&O". KSAZ has since been known as FOX 10. FOX then began to upgrade the station's programming, adding some high-rated off-network sitcoms such as M*A*S*H, Seinfeld, and King Of The Hill. The station also added higher-rated court shows and reality shows. FOX Kids though stayed with KTVK and then KASW.

KSAZ and KUTP became sister stations in 2001, following FOX's purchase of the latter. This makes both the only network O&Os in the Phoenix market.