owners of KXOB would ultimately receive shares in Radio Diablo in a settlement agreement, and broadcaster and furniture store owner Edward Peffer did likewise, paving the way for the FCC to grant Radio Diablo the construction permit on February 11, 1954. Leslie Hoffman, who had become the new president of the company, was to have the station named for him as KHOF, but when Hoffman thought of the possibility of "cough" puns based on the designation, the call sign was changed to KOVR, for "coverage". KOVR began broadcasting September 6, 1954; after an opening night produced in the Stockton studios, the highlight of its first days on the air was live coverage from the California State Fair. It had studios in Stockton on Miner Avenue, as well as a converted bus serving as a remote broadcast van along with two other mobile units. KOVR was the second television station in Stockton; a UHF outlet, KTVU (channel 36), had gone on the air the previous December. As an independent station without network affiliation, the program schedule was heavy with local programming. Lynn Taylor hosted a talent show, a weeknight "Do It Yourself" show, and a teen program. Sportscaster Bob Fouts began commuting to Stockton from San Francisco to host a sports show, leaving KGO-TV in that city, and regional news coverage and a bingo program were also slated. Art Finley hosted an afternoon children's program, Toonytown, on the station for several years before moving to San Francisco's KRON-TV. By 1955, the station had opened offices in San Francisco, where at one point it was proposed that NBC might try to affiliate with or purchase KOVR given discord with KRON-TV, its San Francisco affiliate, and a desire by NBC to own its San Francisco outlet. It attempted to move its main operation from Stockton to San Francisco, a proposal denied by the FCC as stripping Stockton of its lone VHF television station and being unnecessary given the number of television channels allotted to the Bay Area, though the company did announce it would add a studio in San Francisco on a secondary basis. This studio was located in the Mark Hopkins Hotel, where the San Francisco offices were also relocated. In December 1955, Variety magazine reported that CBS, which coveted a VHF owned-and-operated station to serve San Francisco but had affiliate KPIX-TV there instead, was bidding on KOVR. However, as time went