KTRK-TV (channel 13) is a television station in Houston, Texas, United States, serving as the market's ABC outlet.

After the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) lifted its freeze on new television station applications, multiple groups expressed interest in channel 13, which became the last VHF assignment to be adjudicated in Houston.

[15] Early local programs included the children's show Kitirik, which featured the station's mascot, a black cat named after the call letters.

[18] The nearly $21.3 million purchase fell just behind the acquisition of WIIC-TV in Pittsburgh, making it the second-highest price paid at a time for a single TV station.

[19][20] Cap Cities already owned five VHF television stations and had to sell one of them to acquire the Houston outlet, which resulted in the company disposing itself of WPRO-TV in Providence, Rhode Island, in a deal that closed simultaneously with its purchase of KTRK-TV in July 1967.

[21] Capital Cities made major investments in news and other programming, and by 1978, KTRK-TV was rumored to be the most profitable station in the entire company.

... As the city grew exponentially and boomed economically, fast-paced newscasts stressing spot news, laced with presentations by distinctive, assertive characters, mirrored the impression many residents had of their town by the end of the day: a hectic, chaotic, goofy place.

Zindler, who joined KTRK in 1973 at Ward's suggestion[34] after being pushed out of the Harris County sheriff's office,[35] and whose arrival was noted as marking the start of a two-decade "broadcast dynasty" for the station,[33] was also widely noted in the Houston market for his Friday night Rat and Roach Report focusing on Houston restaurants that have failed health inspections, which ended with his trademark line "Slime in the Ice Machine".

[36] Zindler continued to work for the station until his death from pancreatic cancer in 2007, even filing reports from his hospital bed during treatment.

[37] During the 1970s and 1980s, Ward and co-anchor Jan Carson, along with Zindler, sports director Bob Allen and weatherman Ed Brandon, led KTRK to the No.

On October 7, 2002, new Chief Meteorologist Tim Heller (who joined from Fox O&O KDFW in Dallas) would succeed Brandon as the station's lead weatherman, presiding over the station's 10 p.m. and Live at Five weather reports while Brandon would continue to preside over the station's 6 p.m. weather reports until his retirement in 2007 after a 35-year career (with occasional appearances as a fill-in weather anchor afterwards), while Fryer would be succeeded by former MSNBC anchor (and former KTRK morning anchor) Gina Gaston the prior year, with Gaston settling into the position during KTRK's wall-to-wall coverage of Tropical Storm Allison.

In January 2013, sports director Bob Allen left KTRK after a 38-year career with the station, having been succeeded by Greg Bailey (who held the same position at WCNC-TV in Charlotte) four months prior on September 4, 2012.

[39] KTRK has been the official television home of the Houston Texans since the team began play in 2002,[40] telecasting any preseason games that are not aired nationally.