Words from Our Sponsors: WWJ-TV4 (now WDIV-TV4), 20 May 1977

The ads above aired during a broadcast of Dinah! - that's the talk show hosted by the woman behind the famous blow-away kiss - which took place between the 4:00-5:00PM hour that day. Besides perennially being an NBC station, what was then known as WWJ-TV was affiliated with the DuMont Television Network from 1947 to 1948 (when that affiliation was claimed by WJBK-TV, long a primary CBS station, and owned and operated by Fox since 1994) and the Paramount Television Network from 1953 to 1955.

Originally signed on for demonstrative programming as WWDT on 23 October 1946, the Evening News Association, parent company of the Detroit News, who owned WWJ radio (AM 950 and FM 97.1, now WXYT-FM), signed on WWJ's TV counterpart on 3 June 1947, nearly one month after that station adopted the WWJ call letters (which were later adopted for use by the former WGPR-TV (channel 62), after its 1995 purchase by CBS, which had acquired WWJ radio in 1989; the current WWJ-TV is a separate entity and not related to WDIV). The Detroit Tigers, Red Wings and Lions games, and Michigan's first TV newscasts, made their TV debut on this station; in 1954, it was the first station in the Motor City that ever broadcasted in colour (it was also aired newscasts and other locally produced programs in colour as early as 1960!!! ).

Back in 1969, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) began to impose restrictions on the common ownership of print and broadcast media in the same market. The combination of the Detroit News and WWJ-AM-FM-TV was given grandfathered protection from the new regulations. But by the point the video above was recorded, the Evening News Association was under pressure to break up its Detroit cluster voluntarily. Fearing that an FCC-forced divestiture was imminent, the Evening News Association agreed to trade WWJ-TV to the Washington Post Company in return for that company's flagship station, WTOP-TV (later WDVM-TV and now WUSA). On 22 July 1978, channel 4 changed its call letters to the present WDIV-TV, for Detroit's IV (representing the Roman numeral for 4). Additionally, in a series of promotional announcements with news anchor Dwayne X. Riley, the new call letters were said to represent the phrase, "Where Detroit Is Vital".

Ultimately, the FCC never imposed any limitations on ownership of television station and newspapers in the same market and the exchange of stations between the Evening News Association and the Washington Post Company (which was renamed Graham Holdings Company following the sale of the Washington Post in 2013) became somewhat unique in television broadcasting.