Fox Kids - History

History

According to James B. Stewart's DisneyWar, Fox Kids' history is intertwined with the history of The Disney Afternoon. DuckTales, the series which served as the launching pad for the Disney Afternoon, premiered in September 1987 on Fox's owned-and-operated stations, as well as various Fox affiliates. This may have been due in no small part to the fact that then-Disney chief operating officer Michael Eisner and his then-Fox counterpart, Barry Diller, had worked together at the ABC network and at Paramount Pictures.

In 1988, Disney purchased Los Angeles television station KHJ-TV, later renaming it as KCAL-TV. The station's new owners wanted DuckTales to be shown on KCAL, thus taking it away from Fox-owned KTTV. Furious at the breach of contract, Diller pulled DuckTales from all other Fox owned-and-operated stations in the fall of 1989. Diller also encouraged Fox affiliates to do the same, though most did not initially. As Disney went forward in building the Disney Afternoon, Fox then began the process of launching its own children's programming lineup.

Fox Kids was launched on September 8, 1990, a joint venture between Fox Broadcasting and its affiliates. Originally headed up by division president Margaret Loesch and airing programming originally for 30 minutes per day Monday through Friday, and three hours on Saturday morning. In 1991, programming expanded to 90 minutes on weekdays and four hours on Saturday mornings, and a year later grew to 2½ hours on weekdays.