WTHR

WTHR
Indianapolis, Indiana
United States
Branding WTHR 13, Channel 13 or WTHR Channel 13 (general)
Eyewitness News (newscasts; visually displayed as "13 Eyewitness News")
Slogan Indiana's News Leader
Channels Digital: 13 (VHF)
Virtual: 13 (PSIP)
Affiliations
Owner Dispatch Broadcast Group
(VideoIndiana, Inc.)
First air date October 30, 1957 (1957-10-30)
Call letters' meaning Channel THiRteen
Former callsigns WLWI (1957–1976)
Former channel number(s)
  • Analog:
  • 13 (VHF, 1957–2009)
  • Digital:
  • 46 (UHF, 1998–2009)
Former affiliations
  • DT1:
  • ABC (1957–1979)
  • DT2:
  • Skytrak Weather Network (2006–2013)
  • DT3:
  • Universal Sports (2009–2011)
Transmitter power 42.1 kW
Height 299 m
Facility ID 70162
Transmitter coordinates 39°55′43.2″N 86°10′54.9″W / 39.928667°N 86.181917°W / 39.928667; -86.181917Coordinates: 39°55′43.2″N 86°10′54.9″W / 39.928667°N 86.181917°W / 39.928667; -86.181917
Licensing authority FCC
Public license information: Profile
CDBS
Website www.wthr.com

WTHR, virtual and VHF digital channel 13, is an NBC-affiliated television station located in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. The station is owned by the Dispatch Broadcast Group of Columbus, Ohio, and is a sister station to Cozi TV affiliate WALV-CD (channel 46) and Columbus's CBS affiliate WBNS-TV (channel 10). WTHR and WALV share studio facilities located on North Meridian (south of I-65) in downtown Indianapolis; WTHR maintains transmitter facilities located near Ditch Road and West 96th Street in Carmel. On cable, WTHR is available on Comcast Xfinity and Bright House Networks channel 12, and AT&T U-verse channel 13 in standard definition; and in high definition on Bright House Networks digital channel 1012, and Xfinity and AT&T U-verse channel 1013.

Under Dispatch's ownership, WTHR has a great deal of autonomy and due to its private ownership, is less beholden to the constraints of public ownership its local competitors are under, along with being the only commercial station in the state not under any large broadcast chain ownership.[1]

History

The station first signed on the air on October 30, 1957 as WLWI. Founded by the Crosley Broadcasting Corporation, it originally operated as an ABC affiliate,[2][3] taking the affiliation from Bloomington-licensed WTTV (channel 4, formerly a CW affiliate, now a CBS affiliate), which had affiliated with the network one year earlier. WLWI was one of four Crosley stations that made up the "WLW Television Network", alongside the company's television and the regional network's flagship WLWT in Cincinnati, WLWC (now WCMH-TV) in Columbus and WLWD (now WDTN) in Dayton, Ohio. Crosley also owned WLW radio in Cincinnati, WLWA (now WXIA-TV) in Atlanta and WOAI-TV in San Antonio. Channel 13 and its sister stations in Ohio shared common programming (such as The Ruth Lyons 50-50 Club, The Bob Braun Show, The Paul Dixon Show, Midwestern Hayride, The Phil Donahue Show, and Cincinnati Reds baseball game telecasts) and similar on-air branding which reflected their connection to each other. Channel 13 called itself "WLW-I" to trade on its association with WLW radio, which can be heard in most of the market under the right conditions during the day.

From 1957 to 1962, the station was tied up in one of the most heated licensing disputes in early television history. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) originally awarded the construction permit to build a television station on channel 13 to a group headed by Union Federal Savings and Loan president George Sadlier. However, after an appeal, the FCC reversed its decision and awarded the permit to Crosley. One of the other competitors, Richard Fairbanks, owner of WIBC, then sued to force new license hearings. Fairbanks contended that the FCC had erred in awarding the last VHF channel allocation in Indianapolis to a company based in Cincinnati when there were viable applicants based in Indiana. The suit, however, was filed too late to prevent WLWI from signing on under Crosley ownership.

The District of Columbia Court of Appeals overturned the FCC's decision in 1958, but allowed Crosley to continue running the station pending further action by the FCC. In 1961, the FCC awarded Fairbanks the channel 13 license, but Crosley appealed. The following year, Crosley and Fairbanks reached a deal in which Crosley traded WLWA to Fairbanks in return for being allowed to keep WLWI.

Amid this instability in ownership, WLWI found the going rather difficult. It was also dogged by a weaker network affiliation; ABC would not be on an equal footing with CBS and NBC in the ratings until the 1970s. WLWI spent most of its first 17 years of operation languishing as a third place also-ran behind NBC affiliate WFBM-TV (channel 6, now ABC affiliate WRTV) and then-CBS affiliate WISH-TV (channel 8, now The CW affiliate). In some cases, it even fell to fourth place in the local ratings behind then-independent station, WTTV (channel 4, now CBS affiliate).

From last place to ratings leadership

WTHR's previous logo from 1995-2014.

In late 1974, Avco Broadcasting Corporation (which Crosley Broadcasting was renamed as in 1968) announced it was exiting the broadcasting business in an effort to raise cash. The Wolfe family, owners of the Columbus Dispatch and WBNS-AM-FM-TV in Columbus, bought WLWI from Avco in August 1975; the Wolfes changed the station's call letters to WTHR six months later in February 1976.[4][5][6] With new ownership in place, the quality of the station's programming began to improve, but WTHR remained stuck at third place in the ratings behind WISH and WRTV.

Meanwhile, ABC gradually rose to first place during the decade and was seeking out stronger affiliates in many markets. At the same time, NBC tumbled to last place among the "Big Three" networks. Under the circumstances, long-dominant WRTV was very receptive to an offer from ABC. WTHR and WRTV swapped networks on June 1, 1979, with channel 13 becoming the market's NBC affiliate and channel 6 becoming an ABC affiliate.[7] The switch to NBC eventually provided a major windfall for WTHR starting when the NFL's Indianapolis Colts moved from Baltimore; until NBC lost the rights to the NFL to CBS in 1998 (effectively moving the games to WISH-TV and later WTTV in 2015), WTHR aired the bulk of the team's regular season games under the AFC package. Ratings gradually improved in the 1980s with NBC's powerful primetime lineup, but not enough to get the station out of third place.

On April 7, 1991, WTHR participated in an experiment in which it moved NBC primetime programming one hour earlier (mirroring the scheduling of the network's primetime lineup in the Central and Mountain time zones), the half-hour late evening newscast also moved from 11:00 to 10:00 p.m. as a result[8] (the experiment, which lasted until the fall of 1992, was succeeded by similar efforts by KRON-TV and KPIX-TV in San Francisco, and KOVR in Sacramento later in the decade).

Channel 13 first saw a significant ratings boost in the mid-1990s, buoyed by NBC's stronger programming as well as improvements in its news department. It has long since left its ratings-challenged past behind, and is now one of the strongest NBC affiliates in the nation.

On September 2, 2007, WTHR celebrated its 50th anniversary;[9] the station used the song "Carousels (Dreaming of Tomorrow)" by Columbus-based rock band Alamoth Lane in an image campaign to promote the event (the song was also used in a market campaign by Columbus sister station WBNS to promote its upgrade to high definition newscasts).[10][11][12]

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital channel is multiplexed:

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming[13]
13.1 1080i 16:9 WTHR-HD Main WTHR programming / NBC
13.2 480i 4:3 COZI TV Cozi TV
13.3 MeTV MeTV (simulcast of WALV-CD)
Logo for 13.3 MeTV Indianapolis.

WTHR formerly operated the SkyTrak Weather Network, which was carried on digital subchannel 13.2, which in turn simulcast WALV-LP (channel 50, now on channel 46), where the service first launched in 2000.[14] The service carried local weather forecasts, rebroadcasts of WTHR's noon and 6:00 p.m. newscasts, and five-minute news updates throughout the day; in 2005, the station began producing an eight-minute weather segment at 10:00 p.m. for the service titled First Forecast. In March 2013, WALV-CD/WTHR-DT2 affiliated with the classic television and lifestyle network Cozi TV.

On December 14, 2011, the Dispatch Broadcast Group signed an agreement with MeTV to affiliate with WTHR; the station began carrying the classic television network on its second digital subchannel (which is also carried on Comcast digital channel 248, and Bright House Networks channels 93 and 358) on January 1, 2012, replacing Universal Sports (which converted into a cable- and satellite-only network on that date).[15]

Analog-to-digital conversion

WTHR shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 13, at 12:37 a.m. on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 46 to VHF channel 13 for post-transition operations.[16][17]

Due to reception problems in parts of Central Indiana with its VHF digital signal (including in areas on the fringe of its Grade B coverage such as Bainbridge and Crawfordsville) that did not occur with stations broadcasting on the UHF band following the transition, WTHR filed a request with the FCC in June 2013 to increase its transmitter power to 77,000 watts, which would exceed the Commission's maximum power limit in effect at the time.[18]

Programming

WTHR clears the majority of the NBC network schedule, with the exception of the second hour of the Saturday edition of Today and the early morning newscast Early Today, which air instead on WALV-CD/WTHR-DT2 (the latter program moved to that station on February 24, 2014, due to the expansion of its weekday morning newscast).[19] Syndicated programs broadcast by WTHR include The Ellen DeGeneres Show, The Dr. Oz Show, Dr. Phil, Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune (the latter two game shows both moved to WTHR in 2002, after airing for more than a decade on WISH-TV).

WTHR also produces the Brain Game, a weekly televised quiz bowl competition for Indiana high school students, which debuted in 1972. The program, which airs Saturdays at 7:00 p.m., is currently hosted by weekday morning meteorologist Chuck Lofton.[20]

Sports programming

From the arrival of the Indianapolis Colts in 1984 until 1997, WTHR (through NBC's rights to the team's American Football Conference division) aired regular season games televised locally with WISH (channel 8) from 1984 until 1993 (for select games televised by CBS in which the Colts play against an NFC opponent), with WRTV--until 2005--carrying non-preseason games via ABC's Monday Night Football on occasions when a game involving the Colts was scheduled.

Since 2006, regular season games currently televised over-the-air locally are split between WISH from 1998 and since 2015 WTTV (channel 4, through CBS' rights to the team's AFC division), WXIN (channel 59, for select games televised by Fox in which the Colts play host to an NFC opponent at home since 1994), with WTHR carrying non-preseason games and select Indianapolis Colts NFL games broadcast by NBC as part of the network's Sunday Night Football package. The station also acquired the local rights to two Colts regular season games during the 2013 season between the San Diego Chargers (on October 14, which aired on ESPN's Monday Night Football – whose Colts broadcasts are normally carried over-the-air by WNDY-TV (channel 23)) and the Tennessee Titans (on November 14, which aired on NFL Network's Thursday Night Football).[21]

Since 2013, WTHR currently serves as the official sponsor of the Indiana Pacers and the Indiana Fever; the station displayed its in-court advertisements during all of the NBA and WNBA franchises' home games held at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse, these marked the only NBA and WNBA team to sponsored by a NBC Affiliated station following the loss of NBC's rights to the NBA in 2002. WTHR occasionally runs special editions of its newscasts or its highlight program Sports Jam to cover Pacers or Fever games.

News operation

WTHR's studios in downtown Indianapolis.

WTHR presently broadcasts 38 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with six hours on weekdays, and four hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in addition, the station produces the hour-long business discussion program Inside Indiana Business, which airs Sundays at 11:00 a.m. and is hosted by Gerry Dick, and the 25-minute sports highlight program Sports Jam, which airs Sundays at 11:35 p.m.

For many years, channel 13's newscasts had placed third in the ratings behind WISH and WRTV, even with NBC's primetime lineup as a lead-in. WTHR's newscasts surged to second place in 1996 after it hired former CBS News correspondent John Stehr as anchor of its evening newscasts around the same time that WRTV saw its ratings plummet following a botched format change; in 1999, the station's Eyewitness News broadcasts surged past then-dominant WISH in several key timeslots, finishing in first place for the first time in its history. It eventually overtook WISH-TV for first in all news timeslots in 2002. The station's ratings lead – which WTHR emphasizes in the slogan it adopted upon taking first place full-time, "Indiana's News Leader" – began to narrow in 2010 as WISH-TV and Fox affiliate WXIN (channel 59) saw viewership gains that year as WTHR’s ratings steadily decreased in certain timeslots, especially on weekday mornings. Despite decreased ratings for NBC's primetime schedule since the 2004-05 season, WTHR remains in a close battle with WISH for the #1 slot in the 11:00 p.m. timeslot.[22]

As NBC affiliates in several larger markets switched network affiliations and/or dropped the Eyewitness News format over the past three decades, WTHR is now the largest NBC affiliate to use the Eyewitness News brand continuously to date. This is based on the fact that the branding was originally synonymous with most ABC owned-and-operated stations, as well as stations owned by Westinghouse Broadcasting (or Group W) that were later acquired by CBS. The station first used the Eyewitness News format from 1969 to 1979 as an ABC affiliate (combining it with the NewsCenter format as Eyewitness NewsCenter 13 from 1976 to 1979, which utilized a format similar to that originated by CITY-TV in Toronto, Ontario, Canada for its CityPulse newscasts) and was restored in 1995. The station debuted an hour-long weekday morning newscast titled Sunrise in February 1987; this was followed by the addition of two-hour weekend morning newscasts in 1993 (which were later retitled under the Weekend Sunrise banner), becoming the first station in the Indianapolis market to expand its morning newscasts to Saturdays and Sundays.

On March 16, 1996, WTHR began producing a nightly half-hour 10:00 p.m. newscast for UPN affiliate WNDY-TV (now a MyNetworkTV affiliate). The news share agreement with WNDY was terminated after that station was acquired by WISH-TV owner LIN TV Corporation in February 2005; on February 28 of that year, when WISH assumed production responsibilities for the WNDY newscast, WTHR began producing a 10:00 p.m. newscast for Pax TV owned-and-operated station WIPX-TV (channel 63, now an Ion Television O&O), which was cancelled five months later on June 30. In May 2005, the station added a 4:30 a.m. half-hour to the weekday edition of its Sunrise newscast[23] (this predated morning news expansions into that timeslot by many other American television stations by a few years).

On November 12, 2006, beginning with the 11:00 p.m. newscast, WTHR became the first television station in Indiana to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. The station's news set at the time, which was built in 1997 with an eventual conversion to HD broadcasts in mind, underwent a refresh as part of the upgrade. Much of WTHR's field video continued to be shot in pillarboxed 4:3 standard definition until October 2, 2007 when all video recorded and broadcast live outside the studio began to be broadcast in widescreen;[24] footage taped by the station's news crews is shot, edited and broadcast in the 1080i resolution.

In June 2011, WTHR began offering newscast segments for free streaming on the Roku digital video player.[25] On February 24, 2014, the station expanded its weekday morning newscast by a half-hour to 4:00 a.m.[19] On June 23, 2014, The Indianapolis Star announced that it would end its content partnership with WTHR, and enter into a new content agreement with Fox affiliate WXIN beginning on August 1.[26]

Reporter Scott Swan interviewing Conley Stamper at the 2015 Indianapolis 500

Awards and honors

WTHR has received national honors for its news reporting over the years, including Peabody Awards for two 2006 reports, "Cause for Alarm" (an investigation into faulty tornado sirens in Indiana) and "Prescription Privacy" (an investigation of improper disposal of personal pharmacy records);[27] WTHR also earned a third Peabody for 2010's "Reality Check: Where Are the Jobs?", which revealed grossly exaggerated job creation claims made by the Indiana Economic Development Corporation.[28] "Investigating the IRS", an investigative series which exposed how illegal immigrants fraudulently received billions of dollars in tax refunds and the IRS's failure to stop it once the fraud was discovered, earned WTHR a fourth national Peabody Award in 2013.[29]

The station earned two national Edward R. Murrow Awards from the Radio and Television News Directors Association (RTNDA) in 2011, in the "Overall Excellence" and "Investigative Series" categories.[30] In 2012, WTHR earned two Murrow Awards for its breaking news coverage of the Indiana State Fair stage collapse and in the spot news category, which was given to WTHR videographer Steve Rhodes.[31]

Notable current on-air staff

Notable former on-air staff

References

  1. ↑ "WTHR Laps Competition; Dispatch station takes checkered flag in sweeps, Broadcasting and Cable, March 14, 2008 http://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/news-articles/wthr-laps-competition/84474
  2. ↑ http://www.dispatchbroadcast.com/wthr.html
  3. ↑ "Crosley WLWI (TV) signed as basic ABC-TV affiliate." Broadcasting, April 1, 1957, pg. 126.
  4. ↑ "Avco jettisons fifth station." Broadcasting, March 31, 1975, pp. 80-81.
  5. ↑ "Changing Hands." Broadcasting, August 25, 1975, pg. 70
  6. ↑ "For the Record." Broadcasting, February 23, 1976, pg. 105. (approval of call letter change from WLWI to WTHR)
  7. ↑ "Television Schedule". Marion Chronicle-Tribune. Marion, IN. 1979-05-30.
  8. ↑ WTTV, WRTV discuss joint newscast, Indianapolis Business Journal, April 1, 1991. Retrieved June 26, 2014 from HighBeam Research.
  9. ↑ "WTHR's 50th Anniversary promo" (FLV). WTHR-TV Indianapolis. 2007-09-02. Retrieved 2007-11-08.
  10. ↑ "WBNS-TV Station Image Promo; Alamoth Lane - Carousels (Dreaming of Tomorrow)". WBNS-TV Columbus. Retrieved 2008-02-24.
  11. ↑ "WBNS-TV Station Image Promo Version 1". WBNS-TV Columbus. Retrieved 2008-02-24.
  12. ↑ "WBNS-TV Station Image Promo Version 2". WBNS-TV Columbus. Retrieved 2008-02-24.
  13. ↑ Rabbitears TV Query for WTHR
  14. ↑ Channel 13 to launch weather network, Indianapolis Business Journal, October 25, 1999. Retrieved June 26, 2014 from HighBeam Research.
  15. ↑ Me-TV Adds Denver And Indianapolis Affiliates, TVNewsCheck, December 14, 2011.
  16. ↑ "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and the Second Rounds" (PDF). Retrieved 2012-03-24.
  17. ↑ FCC DTV status report for WTHR
  18. ↑ WTHR to boost tower power on signal gripes, Indianapolis Business Journal, August 17, 2013.
  19. 1 2 WTHR Expands Morning Newscast, TVSpy, January 31, 2014.
  20. ↑ WTHR - Indianapolis News and Weather - Westfield Insurance Brain Game
  21. ↑ WTHR To Air Two Indianapolis Colts Games, TVNewsCheck, August 6, 2013.
  22. ↑ WTHR's status as TV news leader starting to erode, Indianapolis Business Journal, November 13, 2010.
  23. ↑ Sunrise comes earlier on WTHR, Indianapolis Business Journal, April 25, 2005. Retrieved June 26, 2014 from HighBeam Research.
  24. ↑ WTHR'S 'QUICK' SWITCH TO HD TOOK 10 YEARS, TVNewsCheck, February 14, 2007.
  25. ↑ WTHR.com: Get WTHR video on Roku
  26. ↑ "IndyStar, Fox59 announce new media partnership". The Indianapolis Star. June 23, 2014. Retrieved June 23, 2014.
  27. ↑ 66th Annual Peabody Awards, May 2007.
  28. ↑ 70th Annual Peabody Awards, May 2011.
  29. ↑ 72nd Annual Peabody Awards, May 2013.
  30. ↑ "WTHR announced as national Edward R. Murrow award winner". WTHR website. 14 June 2011. Retrieved 14 June 2012.
  31. ↑ http://www.indianapolismonthly.com/news-opinion/wthr-tv-honored-for-state-fair-tragedy-covera/

External links

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