WKAR-TV (channel 23) is a PBS member television station licensed to East Lansing, Michigan, United States, serving the Central Lower Peninsula of Michigan. The station is owned by Michigan State University and operated as part of its Broadcasting Services Division. WKAR-TV's studios are located in the Communication Arts and Sciences Building, at the southeast corner of Wilson and Red Cedar Roads on the MSU campus in East Lansing. Its transmitter is located on Kinawa Road in Meridian Township, Michigan between East Lansing and Williamston. History WKAR-TV went on the air in January 1954, broadcasting on channel 60. It took its call letters from WKAR radio (which first went on the air in 1922 with the call letters being assigned randomly, and do not reflect Michigan's automotive heritage or the university's early agricultural roots). It is the second-oldest educational television station in the United States, and the oldest east of the Mississippi River. It was the third station on the air, but the second, in Los Angeles (KTHE), went dark not long after it began operations. KUHT in Houston is the oldest. Despite MSU's long history in broadcasting, WKAR-TV struggled for viewers because television sets at that time were not required to have UHF tuning capability. Viewers needed an expensive converter to watch channel 60, and the picture was marginal at best even with one. With this in mind, MSU unsuccessfully tried to persuade the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to re-designate channel 10, the only other VHF channel allocated to the Lansing area, for noncommercial use. Instead, the license went to Jackson Telecasters, a private company, which used it to start Lansing's NBC affiliate, WILX-TV. Eventually, MSU made an arrangement with Jackson Telecasters to share channel 10 with WILX. So in 1959, WKAR-TV changed its call sign to WMSB (for Michigan State Broadcasting) and moved to channel 10. The two broadcasters maintained separate studios and offices, with WMSB continuing to air from a Quonset hut on the MSU campus while WILX operated from Jackson. However, they shared the same transmitting facilities in Onondaga. WMSB occupied channel 10 for 30 percent of the broadcast day, but WILX had the remainder, including all of prime time. WMSB would often cede its time to WILX in case of breaking news, or if NBC aired sports or special events during WMSB's allocated time. In 1972, MSU resumed full-time broadcasting on channel 23 under its original