Station History

On March 29, 1961, Channel 19 signed on the air as KCSD, an instructional television station owned and operated by the Kansas City Missouri School District.

Ten years later, when the district chose to relinquish its broadcast license, a small group of civic leaders established a nonprofit agency to create a public television station for Kansas City and its surrounding areas in Kansas and Missouri. The group received ownership of the broadcast license in January 1972, creating a community-licensed public television station operating under the call letters KCPT.

KCPT began transmitting national programs offered by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in 1970.