[quote name=\'trainman\' date=\'Jan 23 2004, 11:20 PM\']The bizarre situation is that in the really big cities there were fewer pre-emptions because some or all of the affiliates were network owned-and-operated...but then at the next "level" of city size, suddenly, you'd hit a peak number of pre-emptions, and there would tend to be fewer and fewer pre-emptions as the city got smaller and smaller.
The Tampa soap opera pre-emptions that I'm aware of, to give you some idea: I don't think WTSP ever aired "Edge of Night" after it moved from CBS to ABC (they had a 4:00 movie); WTVT dropped "Search for Tomorrow" near the end of its run on CBS (because they expanded their noon news to 60 minutes); I don't think WFLA/WXFL ever aired "Search" after it moved to NBC (they had various syndicated shows in the 12:30 time slot during those years, most notably "All in the Family" reruns); and due to the 60-minute noon news, WTVT also never aired "Capitol" or "Bold and the Beautiful" (when WTSP became the CBS affiliate in December 1994, "B&B" started airing in Tampa).[/quote]
Back in the 1970's, WTVT aired Search on next-day tape delay at 1 pm; their midday news had always been an hour since the 1960's. When Search... jumped to NBC, it was still on at 12:30, but WFLA/WXFL bumped it off because they, too, had an hour-long midday newscast some years, or news and Archie Bunker reruns other years.
From a game show perspective, WTVT never aired any CBS programming at 10 am, be it Joker's Wild or the 1980's version of Pyramid until the mid-1980's due to the likes of Mike Douglas, John Davidson and Gary Collins, nor did they air any 4 pm shows, like Match Game or TattleTales because of Bonanza reruns or Merv Griffin. What was ironic, though was that by the 1980's, WTVT aired the syndicated Joker's Wild.
WFLA/WXFL bumped Card Sharks at 10 am for Romper Room, then during the noon hour for the news, but, in another bit of irony, they bumped one of NBC's daytime games in the mid-1980's for syndicated reruns of [/I]Card Sharks.
Pre-emptions were all about the money and how stations can make more of it by selling their own ads.