Cable News Network (CNN) begins broadcasting from 1st June 1980
Cable News Network (CNN) is an American basic cable and satellite television news channel owned by the Turner Broadcasting System, a division of Time Warner. CNN was founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner as a 24-hour cable news channel. Upon its launch, CNN was the first television channel to provide 24-hour news coverage,and was the first all-news television channel in the United States.
While the news channel has numerous affiliates, CNN primarily broadcasts from the Time Warner Center in New York City, and studios in Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles. Its headquarters at the CNN Center in Atlanta is only used for weekend programming. CNN is sometimes referred to as CNN/U.S. (or CNN Domestic) to distinguish the American channel from its international sister network, CNN International.
As of August 2010, CNN is available in over 100 million U.S. households. Broadcast coverage of the U.S. channel extends to over 890,000 American hotel rooms, as well as carriage on cable and satellite providers throughout Canada. As of July 2015, CNN is available to about 96,374,000 cable, satellite, and telco television households (82.8% of households with at least one television set) in the United States. Globally, CNN programming airs through CNN International, which can be seen by viewers in over 212 countries and territories.
The Cable News Network was launched at 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time on June 1, 1980. After an introduction by Ted Turner, the husband and wife team of David Walker and Lois Hart anchored the channel's first newscast.
Burt Reinhardt, the executive vice president of CNN at its launch, hired most of the channel's first 200 employees, including the network's first news anchor, Bernard Shaw.
Since its debut, CNN has expanded its reach to a number of cable and satellite television providers, several websites, and specialized closed-circuit channels (such as CNN Airport). The company has 42 bureaus (11 domestic, 31 international), more than 900 affiliated local stations (which also receive news and features content via the video newswire service CNN Newsource), and several regional and foreign-language networks around the world. The channel's success made a bona-fide mogul of founder Ted Turner and set the stage for conglomerate Time Warner's eventual acquisition of the Turner Broadcasting System in 1996.
A companion channel, CNN2, was launched on January 1, 1982 and featured a continuous 24-hour cycle of 30-minute news broadcasts. The channel, which later became known as CNN Headline News and is now known as simply HLN, eventually focused on live news coverage supplemented by personality-based programs during the evening and primetime hours.