RKO General was the main holding company through 1991 for the noncore businesses of the General Tire and Rubber Company and, after General Tire's reorganization in the 1980s, GenCorp. The business was based around the consolidation of its parent company's broadcasting interests, dating to 1943, and the RKO Pictures movie studio General Tire purchased in 1955. The holding company acquired the name of RKO General in 1959 after General Tire dissolved the film studio. Headquartered in New York City, the company operated six television stations and more than a dozen major radio stations around North America between 1959 and 1991.
RKO General still exists, at least nominally, registered as a Delaware corporation. In addition to broadcasting, its other former operations included soft-drink bottling and hotel enterprises. The original Frontier Airlines was a subsidiary from 1968 to 1985. In 1981, the company revived RKO Pictures on a small scale. It is as a broadcaster, however, that RKO General left its mark. Recognized as the owner of some of the most influential radio stations in the world and as a pioneer in subscription TV service, RKO General also became known for the longest licensing dispute in television history.
Famous quotes containing the word general:
“There was not a tree as far as we could see, and that was many miles each way, the general level of the upland being about the same everywhere. Even from the Atlantic side we overlooked the Bay, and saw to Manomet Point in Plymouth, and better from that side because it was the highest.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)