Owned by Standard Media, the station maintains studios on 10th Street south of downtown Lincoln and broadcasts from a transmitter located near Utica, Nebraska.

NTV's owners, the Amaturo Group, upgraded the KCNA-TV transmitter facility and split it from the network in 1984 as KBGT-TV "Big 8", the first independent station in the state of Nebraska.

This lasted two years before Citadel Communications acquired the station and converted it at the end of 1986 into KCAN, which rebroadcast ABC affiliate KCAU-TV in Sioux City, Iowa.

Beginning in 1991, Citadel campaigned to move KCAN from Albion to Lincoln, where it would give the capital city two commercial television stations for the first time since the 1950s.

[7] In the wake of the decision, the Bi-States Company, owner of KHOL-TV, applied for stations in Albion and Superior to repeat the Kearney outlet, which the FCC approved in February 1964.

[14] Amaturo Group announced in September 1983 that it would split KCNA-TV from the NTV network to become an independent station, move its transmitter to Genoa in Nance County to increase coverage, and rebrand it as KBGT-TV "Big 8" on November 1.

[19][20] Despite offering a typical schedule for an independent of its era, including syndicated programs, movies, sports, and national news coverage,[16] Big 8 failed to catch on.

The delayed construction process gave rise to a lawsuit filed by NTV in July 1984 against the contractor, seeking $1.4 million over what were described as substantial financial losses.

[21] The station's decision to briefly air unedited films, including nudity and strong language, in May 1986 led to boycotts and the loss of half of its local and national advertisers,[22] and the depressed regional farm economy further weighed on the business.

[26] The FCC approved the sale in November, earlier than expected, and Citadel announced its plan for the station: to rebroadcast KCAU-TV, its ABC affiliate in Sioux City, Iowa.

Citadel then protested a proposed sale of NTV to Blackstar Communications in 1995, feeling that Fant Broadcasting had attempted to block its own Lincoln proposal; company president Anthony Fant denied this, noting that his main goal for seeking the Albion channel was to restore the coverage lost a decade prior and "try to put that part of the NTV puzzle back together".

[49] However, KLKE was shuttered by Citadel on March 2, 2003, with the company citing the high costs of digital television conversion for the Albion facility.