WSMV-TV

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WSMV-TV
Nashville, Tennessee
Branding	Channel 4 News
Slogan	Coverage You Can Count On & Working for You
Channels	4 (VHF) analog, 10 (VHF) digital
Affiliations	NBC
Owner	Meredith Corporation
Founded	September 30, 1950
Call letters meaning	We Shield Millions (V for "Vision" added to differentiate from WSM radio)
Former callsigns	WSM-TV (1950-1981)
Former affiliations	ABC (secondary, 1950-54), CBS (secondary, 1950-53), DuMont (secondary, 1950-1956)[1]
Website	www.wsmv.com

WSMV-TV "Channel 4" is the NBC affiliate serving the Nashville, Tennessee area. It broadcasts its analog signal on VHF channel 4 and its digital signal on VHF channel 10. Its transmitter and tower are located adjacent to its studios in west Nashville, which were opened in 1963.

Contents 1 History 2 Weekday Newscasts 3 Weekend Newscasts 4 Station trivia 5 See also 6 External links

[edit] History

WSMV signed on as WSM-TV on September 30, 1950 at 1:10pm. It was Nashville's first television station and the second in Tennessee, behind WMCT (now WMC-TV) in Memphis. It was owned by the locally-based National Life and Accident Insurance Company along with WSM radio (650 AM & 95.5 FM); the AM station is renowned for broadcasts of the country music show "The Grand Ole Opry," which has been heard since 1925. The stations took their calls from their parent's slogan, "We Shield Millions."

The television station has been an NBC affiliate from the very first day, though it carried some programming from CBS, DuMont, and ABC until 1953, when WSIX-TV channel 8 (now WKRN-TV channel 2) signed on as a CBS primary affiliate. WSM shared ABC programming with WSIX for a year until WLAC-TV (now WTVF) signed on and took CBS. Before the advent of satellite delivery, network programming was delivered to WSM-TV by microwave transmission from WAVE in Louisville, Kentucky.

National Life was taken over by American General, a Houston-based insurer, in 1980. The new owners sold off WSM-AM-FM-TV, the Opry, and Opryland USA in order to maintain focus on the insurance business. Gaylord Entertainment Company bought the Opry, Opryland USA and WSM-AM-FM. It would have bought WSM-TV as well, but was already at the FCC's ownership limit at the time; the FCC has since practically abandoned such restrictions. Instead, Gillett Broadcasting bought WSM-TV on November 3, 1981 and changed the callsign to WSMV, in order to trade on the well-known WSM identity while at the same time separating it from its former radio sisters (later, the TV and radio stations would engage in news department cross promotions). WSMV was later sold, in the late 1980s, to Cook Inlet Television Partners, an Alaska-based company which was a subsidiary of an Alaska Native Regional Corporation; Cook Inlet, in turn, sold it in the early 1990s to Meredith Corporation, its present licensee.

The station's famous alumni include Pat Sajak (announcer and weekend weatherman from 1974 to 1977), Robin Roberts (sports anchor and reporter from 1986 to 1988), John Tesh (news anchor in 1975-1976), John Seigenthaler, Jr. (weekend anchor in the late 1980s) and Huell Howser (features reporter in the 1970s). Ralph Emery, the longtime country music disc jockey on WSM-AM for many years, hosted morning (and at times, afternoon) shows on WSM(V) from the mid-1960s until the early 1990s; for much of that time, they were the highest-rated locally-produced early morning shows on American television. They featured performances by prominent country stars like Tex Ritter and current star Lorrie Morgan; also, the studio band consisted of top-notch Music Row session musicians. The newscast that replaced it has been nowhere as successful, often trailing both WKRN and WTVF in the time period.

WSMV has alternated with WTVF for first place in the Nashville ratings for many years. Generally speaking, the station takes a softer approach to news than WTVF. Surprisingly, the reverse was true some 15-20 years ago, as WSMV earned numerous prestigious awards for hard-hitting investigative stories, while WTVF took a more cautious approach. While WTVF usually leads the way in the city of Nashville itself, WSMV generally leads in Nashville's more conservative suburbs. Dan Miller, one co-anchor of its newscasts, has been associated with the station since the late 1960s.

Early in 2006, WSMV attracted some attention by becoming the largest-market NBC affiliate to refuse clearance to the controversial NBC show The Book of Daniel on its programming schedule, after its premiere. This action, along with that of several smaller affiliates in the Midwest and South, prompted NBC to cancel the series after only three episodes.

[edit] Weekday Newscasts

• Channel 4 News Today
  • 4:30 AM-7 AM
    • Aaron Soloman, Anchor
    • Holly Thompson, Anchor
    • Tim Ross, Meteorologist
    • Tammi Arender, Traffic Reporter

• Channel 4 News Noon
  • 12:00-12:30 PM
    • Alan Frio, Anchor
    • Terri Merryman, Anchor
    • Tim Ross, Meteorologist

• More at Midday
  • 12:30 PM-1 PM
    • Holly Thompson, Anchor

• Channel 4 News at Five
  • 5 PM-5:30 PM
    • Dan Miller, Anchor
    • Demetria Kalodimos, Anchor
    • Lisa Spencer or Dan Thomas, Meteorologist

• Channel 4 News at Six
  • 6 PM-7 PM
    • Dan Miller, Anchor
    • Demetria Kalodimos, Anchor
    • Lisa Spencer, Chief Meteorologist
    • Rudy Kalis or Steve Wrigley, Sports Anchor

• Channel 4 News at Ten
  • 10 PM-10:35 PM
    • Dan Miller, Anchor
    • Demetria Kalodimos, Anchor
    • Lisa Spencer,Chief Meteorologist
    • Rudy Kalis or Steve Wrigley, Sports Anchor

[edit] Weekend Newscasts

• • 6 AM-8 AM Weekends
    • Lilla Marigza, Anchor
    • Nancy Van Camp, Meteorologist

• Channel 4 News at Five
  • 5 PM-5:30PM
    • Tom Randles, Anchor
    • Nancy Van Camp, Meteorologist
    • Steve Wrigley, Sports

• Channel 4 News at Six
  • 6 PM-7PM
    • Tom Randles, Anchor
    • Nancy Van Camp, Meteorologist
    • Steve Wrigley, Sports

• Channel 4 News at Ten
  • 10-10:30 p.m. Saturday, 10-10:35 p.m. Sunday
    • Tom Randles, Anchor
    • Nancy Van Camp, Meteorologist
    • Steve Wrigley, Sports

[edit] Station trivia

• Alan Frio, a former anchor of the syndicated program Hard Copy, joined WSMV in 2004. His co-anchor on the weekday noon newscasts, Terry Merryman, is also his wife. They're not the only Nashville-area husband-and-wife news anchor team — WKRN's Neil and Heather Orne are also married.
• FOX News anchor Shepard Smith told Brian Lamb in April 2002 on C-SPAN's Washington Journal, that he actually wanted to work at WSMV during his career, but he never got there, although it still may be surprising, considering the fact that Smith was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi, slightly outside of WSMV's broadcast area and much closer to the Memphis, Tennessee market.
• Dan Miller, a longtime anchor of the station's newscasts, left WSMV in November, 1986 for an anchor job at KCBS in Los Angeles. While there, Pat Sajak, his buddy and former channel 4 colleague, hosted a short-lived late-night talk show for CBS. Miller joined the cast of the show and was to Sajak what Ed McMahon was to Johnny Carson. Unfortunately for Miller and Sajak, Carson was still the king of late-night television, and Sajak's show was cancelled after just a year and a half. Miller stayed in California until 1992, when he returned to Nashville to host a talk show, Miller & Company, which aired on The Nashville Network. He returned to the anchor chair on March 9, 1995. The initial delay of Miller to the anchor's chair was attributed to anchor Jeff McAtee (who replaced Miller in 1986 and now works for WWMT) refusing to take a demotion to accommodate Miller's return.
• Sports anchor Steve Wrigley can also be seen working as an occasional sideline reporter for The AFL on NBC. Wrigley also hosts FSN South's Predators Tonight, a pregame show broadcast before Nashville Predators hockey home games.
• Former Tennessee Titan Brad Hopkins now works for WSMV as a sports anchor for special stories/occasions.

[edit] See also

WSMV TV-Tower

[edit] External links

• Memories Of The WSM-TV Announcers' Booth
• WSMV - Nashville
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WSMV

Broadcast television in the Nashville market  (Nielsen DMA #30)
WKRN 2 (ABC) - WSMV 4 (NBC) - WTVF 5 (CBS) - WNPT 8 (PBS) - WETV 11 (Ind) - WIIW 14 (Religious/DS) - WZTV 17 (Fox) - WCTE 22 (PBS) - WNPX 28 (i) - WUXP 30 (MNTV) - WJNK 34 (3ABN) - W36AK 36 (TBN) - WHTN 39 (CTN) - WPGD 50 (TBN) - W52CT 52 (A1) - WNAB 58 (The CW) - WJFB 66 (ShopNBC)

NBC Network Affiliates in the state of Tennessee
WRCB 3 (Chattanooga) - WSMV 4 (Nashville) - WCYB 5 (Bristol) - WMC 5 (Memphis) - WBIR 10 (Knoxville)
See also: ABC, CBS, CW, Fox, i, MyNetworkTV, PBS and Other stations in Tennessee