In many ways, Johnny Carson was one of the pioneers of television, especially in the Omaha market. He never forgot the moment when Nebraska viewers first turned on their TV sets and neither will those who knew Johnny before he was famous.

Johnny Carson was on board at WOW TV when the station first went on the air.

"I was the announcer. I was in the announce booth, excited as we all were," he recalled in an interview years later, looking back on the early days.

It happened in August of 1949 in the same studio you see Channel 6 newscasts in today. Back then, everything was live, nothing happened on tape and filling the time was a learning experience that would set the stage for the rest of Carson's career.

"We were all kind of caught up by the idea we were on television," he recalled about the early days in TV during a 1984 interview with Omaha TV Producer Arlo Grafton.

Johnny told Arlo, "We did anything to survive. We had turtle races, one of our more exciting things. Because with turtle races you see, you can kill a lot of time."

Richard "Pete" Petrashek looks back with fond memories of his days with Carson. They worked together, first at WOW radio and then at the TV station and the reason that Petrashek now goes by the name Pete is a Johnny Carson story.

Petrashek says, "There were five people named Richard at one time that worked at WOW TV. He stood up and said 'Dick where are you?' The three of us back here in the corner said 'here we are John.' John turned around and he says, 'from now on, you're Pete Petrashek."

Bill Templin used to sign Carson's paychecks and remembers him as always being good natured.

Looking back at all the old stories in a 1992 Channel 6 special still has Bill laughing. That includes the one about Carson's long-distance bill.

Templin says, "One month he decided to pay it off in pennies."

Although the version of the story changes with who's telling it, it's still classic Johnny Carson.

Templin says, "The driver of the truck came up and poured the pennies out on my desk."

It was $1.50 worth of pennies.

The Omaha years provided a foundation for Johnny's entire career and he told Grafton in that 1984 interview, "I'm still doing on this show, the Tonight Show, what basically I did in Omaha 35 years ago."

Bill Templin still has the document showing Carson's final pay raise at WOW TV. It was a $5 increase that brought him to a salary of $57.50 a week. Templin sent a copy to Carson in Los Angeles and Carson joked that he would use it in contract negotiations with the folks at NBC.