Three rings and a line encased in a square – this has been the logo for ABS-CBN for many years, but it wasn’t always like this.
This is one of two articles chronicling the evolution of ABS-CBN’s logo. This article covers the years 1946 to 1967, the 21 years before the ABS-CBN logo in its current iteration would first surface.
56 years – that is how long the media and entertainment company has been using the logo in its current iteration, since the 1967 merger of Alto Broadcasting System and Chronicle Broadcasting Network that formed ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation (now ABS-CBN Corporation).
But how did it come to be? And how has it evolved thru the years?
Before ABS-CBN (1946-1961)
ABS-CBN’s first component came to be in 1946, by the name of Bolinao Electronics Corporation, established by James Lindenberg. To this day, though, information about what logos it used are limited, but what appears to be an old BEC logo was featured on a video from IdentChannel chronicling ABS-CBN (that has since been deleted, however), which has since been featured as BEC’s logo on the Logopedia article for ABS-CBN Corporation. Being a startup, it only makes sense that the logo was simple at best.
In 1952, BEC, bought by Antonio Quirino, became Alto Broadcasting System (Al for Aleili, Antonio’s wife, and To from Antonio), and a new logo was adopted, one that featured a transmitter tower with a ring representing a signal. Sounds familiar?
Either way, whether or not the next logos’ designs were intentional tributes, I like to think that the logos that followed are, more than a representation of their business, a tribute to their precursors’ contributions.
As the print ad for the first TV broadcast (on 23 October 1953) suggests, though, ABS itself didn’t use the logo – rather, it was Alto Sales Corporation, which Quirino also owned, with ABS’ name just placed on top. (I’m not exactly sure what kind of goods ASC sold – though ABS-CBN has mentioned time and again that for the first TV broadcast in 1953, which its precursor ABS made, 300 TV sets were imported – so I may as well assume that they sold TV sets.)
Just to clarify, ABS was the TV station and ASC, from what ABS-CBN’s history may suggest, sold TV sets.
Three years after, in November 1956, Chronicle Broadcasting Network (owner of the first FM radio station), owned by Don Eugenio Lopez (Manila Chronicle’s owner, and who took over Meralco six years after) and Fernando Lopez. Again, it was another simple logo with CBN’s initials on it on 3 blocks, akin somewhat to what the logos used by the BBC, and later, IBC (2003 – 2011) and even its future news channel ANC.
Of course, as the story goes, ABS in 1957 was then bought by the Lopezes, and brought together with CBN – though not yet to ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation, but rather under a company called Bolinao Electronics Corporation (ABS’ former name). In this case, though, it’s quite unclear as to what kind of logos this “BEC” used before 1967.
The Early Years of the “ABS-CBN” Brand (1961-1967)
The brand “ABS-CBN” first came to be in 1961 – just as the first TV station outside Manila, Channel 3 in Cebu, came to be. There was nothing too fancy about the first ABS-CBN logo, as it was just the ABS and CBN names interconnected by a large B, in a box in between Channel 3 and Channel 9, the frequencies of ABS and CBN’s Manila TV channels then.
Said logo, unfortunately, other than a small appearance on ABS-CBN’s new millennium special in 2000, seen below, would not be featured again by ABS-CBN, and would be mostly forgotten before later surfacing on the Internet via Pinoy Nostalgia Atbp. on Facebook, though it was a recreation that was lacking the number 9.
The cameo of the 1961 logo on the new millennium special of ABS-CBN where they unveiled the 2000 logo. (Credits to View on the 3rd)
Then, in 1963, along came a logo that was all too reminiscent of the one ASC used – a triangle (signifying a transmitter tower), and in place of one ring, four rings. The box enclosing them was also a square instead of a rectangle. And then there are the ABS-CBN letters above, on a form that would evolve thru the years. (Notice the serifs?)
Again, like the 1961 logo, it would be forgotten (apart from a few small appearances on the 50 Taong Ligawan documentary) until pictures of the old logo (including one detailing the logo that followed it) surfaced on the Internet. The logo would then be used on one of the Lopez Link’s webcomics about Don Eugenio and on a PDF showing the history of the network’s logo by ABS-CBN’s own Anjo Bagaoisan, who runs PinoyJournalist.
Variants of the 1963 logo as it appeared on the “50 Taong Ligawan” documentary (Credits to OPM MTV Video)
At this point, the ABS-CBN brand would be limited to TV. But that would be until 1967 when ABS and CBN formally merged, at which point a pivotal moment in the company’s history and of its branding would come to fruition.
To be continued
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