after it switched to Fox in 1996. WBRC began producing live local programming in 1950 after it converted the building that formerly housed WBRC-FM into a makeshift television studio; the station also acquired additional studio camera equipment, including shows such as Coffee Break, Supersonic Sam and Cowboy Theatre. Like many network affiliates, WBRC-TV would preempt ABC programming occasionally or regularly, in some cases. For example, according to local legends, the station initially turned down Bewitched, not because it was concerned about witchcraft, but because it concerned a mixed marriage (between a witch and a mortal); there were fears that Bewitched would encourage what some segregationists referred to as "cross-breeding"; channel 6 would not clear Bewitched until 1967 (although, according to the October 15, 1965, issue of The Birmingham News, Bewitched was shown airing at its in-pattern time of Thursdays at 8:00 p.m. (Central) on WBRC). Channel 6 continued these practices for most of its years with ABC. It also preempted the ABC Evening News (the forerunner to World News Tonight) from the program's debut in 1968 until August 7, 1972 (when both it and WJRT-TV in Flint, Michigan, became the last two ABC affiliates to begin airing the network newscast), as well as daytime network programs at aired during the 10:00 a.m. hour. However, ABC largely brushed off the preemption issue, even though it would eventually become the No. 1 network nationwide by the late 1970s, because of WBRC's status as central Alabama's dominant station. WBRC cemented viewer allegiances by carrying a heavy schedule of local programs during the 1960s and 1970s, most notably two long-running morning shows. The first was The Morning Show, hosted by sports anchor Tom York; airing for 32 years from 1957 to 1989, it was a more general-interest interview and features program that was formatted basically a local version of Today; WBRC anchor Joe Langston (who also hosted the children's programs Birthday Party and Junior Auction for the station in the late 1960s) and comedian Fannie Flagg joined as York's co-hosts in the early 1960s (Flagg would leave for Los Angeles in 1964 to become a writer for Candid Camera). Fiddler, guitarist and vocalist Eddie Burns was invited to bring his musical group to serve as The Morning Shows house band and act as the program's bandleader; however, within a few months, station management offered Burns his own morning program on channel 6. That series,