WRBU

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WRBU
East Saint Louis, Illinois / St. Louis, Missouri
Branding	My46 St. Louis
Channels	46 (UHF) analog, 47 (HDTV, UHF) digital
Affiliations	My Network TV
Owner	Roberts Broadcasting
Founded	August 13, 1987 as WVCL-TV
Call letters meaning	W Roberts Broadcasting UPN (former affiliation)
Former callsigns	WVCL-TV (August 1987-June 1989), WHSQ-TV (June-September 1989), WHSL-TV (September 1989-January 2003)
Former affiliations	HSN (until January 2003) UPN (until September 2006)
Website	www.my46stl.com

WRBU is the My Network TV television affiliate for the St. Louis, Missouri area. However, the station operates out of East Saint Louis, Illinois. WRBU is owned and operated by Roberts Broadcasting and operates on channel 46. WRBU-DT (WRBU's digital channel) operates on channel 47. The station does not broadcast in stereo. However, WRBU-DT broadcasts in stereo.

The channel's call letters since January 2003, WRBU, reflect the owner and the former television network: Roberts Broadcasting (RB) and UPN (U).

[edit] History

From its beginning on August 13, 1987 (as WVCL-TV), then to WHSQ in June 1989, and then to WHSL on September 25 of that same year, and up until September 2002, WRBU showed the Home Shopping Network 24 hours per day. St. Louis finally received a pseudo UPN affiliate when WHSL added UPN prime time programming in the Fall of 2002. On April 1, 2003, the station became a full UPN affiliate and added cartoons from UPN, sitcoms, syndicated talk shows and reality shows to fill out the schedule. Until this switch, St. Louis had been the largest television market without a UPN affiliate. The Disney UPN Cartoons disappeared in the fall of 2003 when UPN ended the kids block on all affiliates.

On January 24, 2006, the WB and UPN networks announced they would merge. The newly combined network would be called "The CW", the letters representing the first initial of its corporate parents CBS (the parent company of UPN) and the Warner Bros. unit of Time Warner. The merger took effect on-the-air on September 18, 2006, and two weeks earlier, WRBU switched, as announced on March 9 to an affiliation with My Network TV, the sister network to Fox. While all of that was happening, KPLR (the WB station from 1995-2006) was announced as The CW's St. Louis affiliate.

WRBU's transmitter is located in Jefferson County, Missouri (near Antonia, Missouri) at 38 23 18 North, 90 29 16 West. Antenna Height Above Average Terrain (HAAT) is 345 meters/1132 feet; the antenna structure itself is 250 meters/800 feet above ground level. East St. Louis is the official city-of-license. WRBU's digital signal on Channel 47 has an Effective Radiated Power (ERP) of only 109 kilowatts (KW), making reception problematic over much of the metropolitan area. WRBU's analog signal has an ERP of 5 million watts (MW).

As of September 8th, My46 pulled WWE Friday Night SmackDown! from its 7PM (local time) timeslot on Friday nights (in favor of WRBU's new show, Desire) and placing it to air at 3AM (local time) on Sunday morning. WWE SmackDown! will only be aired at this timeslot on WRBU, although, September 22nd, SmackDown! started being viewed at its normal 7PM timeslot on local CW affiliate KPLR Channel 11 (although that particular episode did not air due to the broadcasting of a Cardinals-Astros game in Houston, Texas).

[edit] Logo gallery

WRBU's UPN 46 "The U" logo from January 2003 to September 2006.

WRBU's My 46 logo since September 2006.

[edit] External links

• Official website
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WRBU
• CW

Broadcast television in the St. Louis market  (Nielsen DMA #21)
KTVI 2 (Fox) - KMOV 4 (CBS) - KSDK 5 (NBC)  (NBC WX+ on DT2) - KPTN-LP 7 (HSN) - WSIU 8 (PBS) - KETC 9 (PBS) - KPLR 11 (The CW) (The Tube on DT2) - K22HG 22 (TBN) - KNLC 24 (FamilyNet) - KEFN 28 (EWTN) - W29CI 29 (3ABN) - KDNL 30 (ABC) - WRBU 46 (MNTV) - W50CH 50 (REL) - KUMO 51 (RTN) - KDTL 64 (DS)
Local/regional cable television stations
FSN Midwest