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Frank StantonFrank Stanton
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Session:         Page of 755

Washington with The Washington Post, which had acquired a station in Washington, and so that gave us an affiliate there.

We never did get back into Boston as an owner, we only came in through an affiliation. An interesting thing developed in Chicago. I knew that Ed [Edward J.] Noble wanted to sell ABC. Have I talked about this?

Q:

No, but I --

Stanton:

Well, I knew that Noble had his stomach full of running third place on ABC radio. He had talked to me and others about wanting to get out of the business. Together with Joe Ream, I went down to see a man by the name of Leonard [H.] Goldenson, who was then a bright young executive of Paramount, and said, “Why don't you buy ABC?” I knew that there was interest in television on the part of Paramount, because they were a contender in the color battle. Paramount Pictures -- or the Paramount company -- had been split into two: one was theaters and the other was production. Leonard was here in New York, he was on the exhibition side. And, why did I urge him to get in to buy ABC? It was because that group, Paramount, at that time owned a television station in Chicago. I knew that if he bought ABC, which had a television station in Chicago, this would shake one of those two stations out. They'd have to dispose of one in order to get approval at the Commission. And I wanted to be first in line to buy it. And that's what I did.

We got our station in Chicago -- WKBK -- Belleman and Katz -- were the initials -- we got that station as a result of Paramount acquiring ABC. We bought it -- I had a deal, at first, for five million dollars. Ultimately, I think we paid seven and a half million because Leonard





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