KGMB to celebrate 50 years on the air

By Wayne Harada
Advertiser Entertainment Writer

Bob Sevey, a longtime news anchor with KGMB-9, will host a special program marking the 50th anniversary of Hawai'i's first TV station. Advertiser library photo • 1986

"Sevey is coming back in September and will spend a week here to work on the show," said Phil Arnone, who is producing the show. Arnone was a producer-director at the CBS affiliate from 1966 to 1989; he said the show will include snippets from a warehouse of memories in the Channel 9 archives, with updates on luminaries that provided hours of TV pleasure.

"The good news is that there is quite a bit of archival tape from the 1970s and '80s," Arnone said. "The bad news is that in the 1950s, there was no videotape, only kinescopes. And machines to play the old tapes are nonexistent."

KGMB went on the air in December 1952. The special will air sometime in October.

"The first guy on air was Kini Popo, who still is here," said Arnone. Kini Popo was the on-air name of Carl Hebenstreit, president of Trade Publishing.

KGMB's local news and entertainment programming included budding TV legends and cultural icons — folks such as Andy Bumatai, Checkers & Pogo, Al Michaels, Larry Beil, Joe Moore, Kirk Matthews, Leslie Wilcox, Kamasami Kong and Michael W. Perry. Perry today hosts "Hawaiian Moving Company."

The station had an early franchise on televising island music-makers and hit songs via "Island Music, Island Hearts," a summertime series featuring Booga Booga in comic interludes, plus specials on Cecilio & Kapono. Bumatai's "All in the 'Ohana" and "High School Daze" are classics.

Channel 9 also was the home base for early Hawai'i-filmed series, including "Hawaii Five-O," "Magnum P.I." and "Jake and the Fatman."