WTXF-TV
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| WTXF-TV | |
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| Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | |
| Branding | Fox 29 |
| Slogan | Local First |
| Channels | 29 (UHF) analog, 42 (UHF) digital |
| Affiliations | Fox (since 1986) |
| Owner | Fox Television Stations |
| Founded | May 16, 1965 |
| Call letters meaning | TVX and TaFt (former owners, partially through former callsign WTAF-TV) |
| Former callsigns | WIBF-TV (1965-1969) WTAF-TV (1969-1988) |
| Former affiliations | Independent (1965-1986) NBC (alternate affiliation) (1966-1976) ABC (alternate affiliation) (1978-1991) |
| Transmitter Power | 5000 kW/347 m (analog) 305 kW/161 m (digital) |
| Website | www.myfoxphilly.com |
WTXF-TV, channel 29, is an owned-and-operated station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. From studios in downtown Philadelphia and transmitter located in the Roxborough section of the city, the station's signal covers the Delaware Valley area (Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware).
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[edit] History
The station signed on the air on May 16, 1965 as independent station WIBF-TV, owned by brothers William, Irwin, and Benjamin Fox. The Fox brothers had already been operating WIBF-FM (103.9 MHz., now WPPZ) for several years. Channel 29's original studio was located in the Fox family's Benson East apartment building on Old York Road in the Main Line suburb of Jenkintown. WIBF-TV was the first commercial UHF station in Philadelphia, and the first of three UHF independents in the Philadelphia market to sign-on during 1965. WPHL-TV (channel 17) and WKBS-TV (channel 48) arrived in September.
WIBF-TV struggled at first, in part because it signed on only a year after the Federal Communications Commission required television manufacturers to include UHF tuning capability. In 1969, the Fox brothers sold the station to the Cincinnati-based Taft Television and Radio Company. Taft already owned WNEP-TV (channel 16) in Scranton, a station whose signal overlapped with channel 29 in the Lehigh Valley area north of Philadelphia. Taft sought a waiver to keep both stations, since the FCC at that time normally did not allow common ownership of two stations with overlapping coverage areas, even if they were in different markets. The FCC initially granted the waiver [1], but later reversed itself and forced Taft to sell WNEP as a condition of buying WIBF-TV.
Taft assumed control of channel 29 in mid-1969 and changed the calls to WTAF-TV (for TAFt). Under Taft's ownership, WTAF soon established itself as a local powerhouse. By the start of the 1980s, WTAF had passed WKBS as Philadelphia's leading independent station. When WKBS left the air in the late summer of 1983, the station placed advertisements in TV Guide and local papers reminding Philadelphia viewers that channel 29 was still around and that channel 48's former audience was welcome to sample channel 29. But interestingly, the station passed on picking up any of channel 48's shows, most of which went to WPHL-TV.
WTAF-TV also became a strong sports station. At various times, it owned the broadcast rights to Major League Baseball's Philadelphia Phillies (Taft also owned a small portion of the team for much of the 1980s), the NHL's Philadelphia Flyers and the NBA's Philadelphia 76ers. In the 1980s, the station also aired network shows that NBC's then-affiliate KYW-TV and ABC station WPVI-TV preempted in favor of local programming. In the spring of 1986, channel 29 added a 10 p.m. newscast, the second attempt in the market, and the most successful. In the fall of that same year, WTAF-TV became a charter affiliate of the fledgling Fox network.
As part of a group deal, all of Taft's independent and Fox-affiliated stations, including WTAF, were sold to the Norfolk, Virginia-based TVX Broadcast Group in February 1987. A year later, the new owners changed the station's call letters to the current WTXF-TV. The Taft purchase created a large debt load for TVX, and as a result the company sold a number of its smaller stations. Paramount Pictures purchased a minority stake in TVX in 1989. A year later, after calling itself TV-29 for many years, the station changed its on-air branding to Fox 29.
In 1991, Paramount acquired the remainder of TVX which it did not own, and the company's name was changed to Paramount Stations Group, with WTXF as its largest-market station. Viacom gained control of the stations as part of its purchase of Paramount Pictures in 1993. In 1994 Viacom announced plans to create a new network service, the United Paramount Network, which it would co-own with Chris-Craft Industries. The initial affiliation plans called for WTXF dropping Fox and becoming the Philadelphia outlet for the new network, which would launch in January 1995. Though Fox received no official notification from Viacom that the affiliation would be cancelled, Fox made a preliminary deal to buy rival station WGBS-TV (channel 57, now WPSG). Signs of the planned switch began showing up at the start of the 1994-95 season, when WTXF began calling itself simply "29".
The planned move coincided with the biggest affiliation shuffle in Philadelphia television history. In the spring of 1994, CBS and Westinghouse Broadcasting, owners of KYW-TV, had entered into a long-term affiliation agreement, which resulted in KYW-TV dropping NBC in favor of CBS. CBS would then sell its longtime owned-and-operated station, WCAU-TV. Several months earlier, Fox entered into a multi-station, multi-year partnership with New World Communications. New World and NBC emerged as the leading bidders for WCAU, with New World intending to switch WCAU to Fox if it emerged victorious. Fox later cancelled its preliminary deal to purchase WGBS and joined the bidding for WCAU, which was eventually sold to NBC. During this time, Viacom/Paramount changed its Philadelphia plans and decided to sell WTXF to Fox, a sale which was finalized in late August 1995. Almost simultaneously, Viacom bought WGBS and made it the market's UPN station.
Fox assumed control of WTXF on August 25, 1995. As a Fox owned-and-operated station, WTXF immediately added more first run talk and reality shows to the schedule. In 1996, morning cartoons were dropped in favor of a weekday morning newscast, Good Day Philadelphia. Throughout the mid-to-late 1990s, WTXF was available nationally on satellite as the east coast Fox feed, most notably on PrimeStar.
The station ID was changed to Fox Philadelphia in 1995, but in 2003 reverted back to Fox 29 because of confusion with the Fox News Channel. WTXF also underwent a major overhaul of its building and studios in Old City Philadelphia, with a "Window on the World" type studio making its debut on June 6, 2005.
In areas of central New Jersey where the Philadelphia and New York City markets overlap, WTXF shares resources with New York sister stations WNYW and WWOR-TV. The stations share reporters for stories occurring in New Jersey. In January 2007, WTXF-TV overhauled its on-air look, adopting a logo and graphics similar to that of other Fox O&O stations, including WTVT, WNYW, and WHBQ (see logo gallery below). Channel 29 also expanded its facilities to include a new studio for its newscasts, based on the new corporate Fox O&O set design. The "Window of the World" studio was originally intended for Good Day Philadelphia. On October 1, 2006 the station became the second station in Philadelphia to broadcast its local news programs in high definition.
On Monday, October 9, 2006, WTXF added a half-hour 11am newscast to its lineup. It is called "First News at Eleven". Sharon Crowley and Good Day Philadelphia anchor George Mallet anchor the 11am newscast.
WTXF debuted its new on-air look (new logo and graphics) beginning with the January 22, 2007 edition of Good Day Philadelphia.
WTXF also expanded its news operations to include a one-hour 5pm newscast on January 22, 2007; Kerri-Lee Halkett anchors the newscast. This new newscast has enabled channel 29 to go head-to-head with two of the three other network-owned stations.
[edit] Trivia
Philadelphia is the largest television market where My Network TV was not awarded to a Fox owned-and-operated station, as the affiliation is with WPHL-TV. As a result, WTXF does not have a secondary affiliation with the network.
[edit] Logos
 WTAF-TV ident from 1985-87. The "29" numeric logo was used from the late 1970s until the sale to Fox in 1995. |
 WTXF-TV logo from 1989-90 |
 WTXF-TV logo from 1991-92; first logo under Paramount ownership |
 WTXF-TV logo from 1992-95 |
 WTXF-TV logo from 1995-2003 |
 WTXF-TV logo from 2003-2007 |
Current logo |
[edit] Newscasts
- Good Day Philadelphia - Monday-Friday 5:00-7:00 a.m.
George Mallet & Sharon Crowley
- Good Day Philadelphia - Monday-Friday 7:00-9:00 a.m.
Shenelle Jones & Clayton Morris
- First News at Eleven - Monday-Friday 11:00-11:30 a.m.
Sharon Crowley & George Mallet
- Fox 29 News at 5- Monday-Friday 5:00-6:00 p.m.
Kerri-Lee Halkett
- Fox 29 News at 10 - every night 10:00-11:00 p.m.
Dawn Stensland & Dave Huddleston (m-f) Joyce Evans & Tom Burlington (weekend)
Weather Anchors:
Sports Anchors:
[edit] Reporters
[edit] Past Personalities
- Donya Archer
- Frank Cariello
- Linda Carson, wife of former Philadelphia Eagles assistant and NFL coach Bud Carson
- Chris Cimino
- Howard Eskin
- Christian Farr
- Mike Jerrick
- Tina Kim
- Rich Noonan
- Dave Price
- Nick Smith
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- WTXF-TV Website
- Photos of WTXF's studio
- report of WTXF's studio
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WTXF-TV
- Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia
- WTAF-TV 29
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KYW 3 (CBS) - WPVI 6 (ABC) - W07DC 7 (ABC) - WELL-LP 8 (DS) - WCAU 10 (NBC) - WHYY 12 (PBS) - WPHL 17 (MNTV) (The Tube on DT2) - WNJS 23/WNJT 52 (PBS/NJN) - W25AW 25 (A1) - WFPA-CA 28 (TFR) - WTXF 29 (Fox) - WQAV-LP 34 (AV/Ind) - WYBE 35 (Public) - WLVT 39 (PBS) - W40AZ 40 (Smile) - WMGM 40 (NBC) - WGTW 48 (TBN) - WTVE 51 (Religious) - WPSG 57 (The CW) - WBPH 60 (FamNet) - WPPX 61 (ION) - WWSI 62 (TEL) - WUVP 65 (UVN) - WFMZ 69 (Ind) |
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| Local digital television channels | ||
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| Past broadcast stations |
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| Local cable television channels |
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CN8 - Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia - MCTV 26 (Mercer Co., NJ) |
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| See also Broadcast television in the New York City, Scranton/Wilkes Barre and Susquehanna Valley markets | ||
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WWCP 8 (Johnstown) - WFXI-CA 17 (Mercer) - WTXF 29 (Philadelphia) - WPMT 43 (York) - WPGH 53 (Pittsburgh) - WOLF 56 (Hazelton) - WFXP 66 (Erie) |
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| See also: ABC, CBS, CW, MyNetworkTV, NBC, PBS, and Other stations in Pennsylvania | |
