WBME-TV
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| WBME-TV | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Racine/Milwaukee, Wisconsin | |
| Branding | MeTV Milwaukee |
| Slogan | Milwaukee's home for classic TV |
| Channels | Analog: 49 (UHF) |
| Affiliations | Independent classic television service |
| Owner | Weigel Broadcasting (TV-49, Inc.) |
| First air date | January 27, 1990 |
| Call letters’ meaning | W-Be Memorable Entertainment[1] |
| Sister station(s) | WDJT-TV, WMLW-CA, WYTU-LP |
| Former callsigns | WJJA (1990-2008) |
| Former affiliations | HSN (1990-1995, 1996-2001) The Military Channel (1995-96) Shop at Home (2001-2008) Jewelry Television (2006-2008) |
| Transmitter Power | 2570 kW (analog) 62 kW (digital) |
| Height | 149 m (both) |
| Facility ID | 68545 |
| Transmitter Coordinates | |
| Website | www.metvmilwaukee.com |
WBME-TV (channel 49) is a television station licensed to Racine, Wisconsin, and serving Milwaukee and the surrounding areas of southeastern Wisconsin. The station has the branding MeTV Milwaukee and carries classic television sitcoms and dramas from between the 1950s and 1990s. WBME is currently owned by Weigel Broadcasting as part of that company's Milwaukee cluster of full power and low power television stations, including WDJT, WYTU-LP and WMLW-CA, and is carried on channel 19 on southeastern Wisconsin Time Warner Cable systems.
The concept, which has been a major success on sister station WWME-CA (channel 23) in Chicago, Illinois, is considered a local equivalent of Equity Broadcasting's Retro Television Network, and actually carries most of the programming featured on that network.
WBME's transmitter is located in the southeastern Milwaukee County suburb of Oak Creek close to the Racine County line.
The station (as WJJA) had carried various home shopping networks for many years, and was known for being 100% owned and operated by a minority group from the time of the station's launch until Weigel bought the station in 2007.[2]
Contents |
[edit] History
[edit] As WJJA
Channel 49 signed on the air on January 27, 1990 as WJJA, an affiliate of the Home Shopping Network. The station was founded by Joel Kinlow, a minister in Milwaukee who also owns Elm Grove-based WGLB (1560) (the WJJA calls stood for Joe, Joel, and Arvis, all members of the Kinlow family). By 1995, WJJA had dropped HSN for The Military Channel (an operation unrelated to the current Discovery Networks channel of the same name). Kinlow dropped them the next year, and returned to HSN, eventually affiliating with Shop at Home in 2001.
When CBS-affiliated WITI switched to Fox in 1994, Kinlow decided not to affiliate with CBS when approached by the network with an offer to become an affiliate. Kinlow claimed he wanted to maintain his staff while continuing to give broadcasting experience and training to many different people beyond those usually hired to operate a television station. He felt the station could accomplish this better without the responsibilities and obligations of serving as a major network affiliate. The CBS affiliation eventually wound up on WDJT.
Throughout the 1990s and into the 2000s, WJJA continued to air Shop at Home, while also airing E/I programming, local church services, public domain sitcoms, and other programs relevant to local residents of Racine and Milwaukee, mostly in the mornings.
On May 16, 2006, Shop at Home parent company E.W. Scripps announced that the network would be suspending operations, effective June 22, 2006.[3] However, the network's liquidation sale ended one day early on June 21, and WJJA switched to Jewelry Television in the meantime. SAH resumed on June 23 after Jewelry Television purchased some assets relating to SAH, and began to air a split schedule of programming, with JTV in the mornings and afternoons, and SAH during evenings.[4] Shop at Home eventually closed again in March 2008, and WJJA's last month under Kinlow ownership featured a 24/7 JTV schedule.
On August 1, 2007, Weigel Broadcasting of Chicago announced their intention to purchase WJJA. The FCC granted approval for the transfer in mid-September 2007, though the license and financial transfers between the two parties, along with the poor condition of the station's Oak Creek transmitter tower[5] took months longer to settle before Weigel could take full control of the station.
[edit] MeTV Milwaukee
On April 21, 2008, Weigel took full control of the station, and at 12:30 p.m., Jewelry Television was replaced by a test pattern and color bars.[6] Later that afternoon, it became the full-power home of MeTV Milwaukee.[7] Weigel immediately filed to change station's call letters to WBME-TV (for "B-Me"); this became official on April 29, 2008.[8]
MeTV was originally launched as a digital subchannel of WDJT on 58.3 on March 1, 2008 at 5 a.m., with an episode of Route 66. MeTV had full cable coverage throughout the market on Time Warner Cable and Charter Communications over digital channel 201 on both services, requiring a digital cable receiver in order to watch the station[9][10]. This simulcast currently continues while technical issues are worked out as WBME transitions to Weigel's West Allis studios, and while Weigel begins to negotiate with Charter Communications, DirecTV and Dish Network to carry the station on the basic tier of all of those services, as they are allowed to assert must-carry status with those systems. Currently, this means that on Time Warner, the station airs on both channels 19 and 201.
In the future the station will move transmission north to the Weigel tower in Milwaukee's Lincoln Park[11] to better serve the entire market.
[edit] Programming
MeTV Milwaukee features much of the same programming as WWME's schedule, although the scheduling is different since MeTV Chicago has added a few relatively recent programs to their schedule (and due to program rights issues) and spun off a second MeTV channel on WMEU-CA (channel 48), along with a block of programming featuring versions of shows with Spanish dubbing. Mornings and early afternoons feature dramatic programming like Perry Mason, Hawaii Five-O and Gunsmoke, while late afternoons and evenings have an all-sitcom schedule with such programs as Leave it to Beaver, Happy Days, The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Laverne & Shirley. Late evenings feature a mix of both sitcoms and dramas, while the late night schedule is dominated by crime dramas and stage programs like Four Star Playhouse, along with reruns of Weigel flagship WCIU's cult horror movie/comedy show Svengoolie. Limited paid programming airs in a few time slots, while the station fulfills their E/I programming requirements with Saved by the Bell, Daktari, and the WCIU production Green Screen Adventures between 6 a.m.-8 a.m. The station also has a public affairs program devoted to topics in their city of license, Racine & Me, which airs Sunday mornings at 7am [12].
During multicasting of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament in March, WDJT used MeTV during game broadcasts to air an additional NCAA game in standard definition besides the one being aired in HD on the DT1 signal[13]. It is unknown currently if WDJT would resume a full multicast of all the NCAA games as had been done in the past, and if the WBME-DT signal would be subdivided further to provide additional programming services as has been done with WCIU.
[edit] References
- ^ Golembiewski, Dick (2008-04-29). A Brief History of Milwaukee Television (the Analog Years). Milwaukee TV Horror Hosts.
- ^ Malone, Michael. "Weigel Broadcasting Closes on WJJA Milwaukee", Broadcasting & Cable, 2008-04-25.
- ^ The E. W. Scripps Company (2006-05-16). "Scripps ceasing Shop At Home operations". Press release.
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim. "Without Couric, 'Today' flies high", Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2006-06-22.
- ^ Kirchen, Rich. "Channel 49's tower condition delays sale", The Business Journal of Milwaukee, 2008-03-07.
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim (2008-04-21). A new WJJA-TV. Inside TV & Radio. JSOnline.
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim (2008-04-21). Me-TV for a wider audience. Inside TV & Radio. JSOnline.
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim (2008-04-24). 'Sopranos' star may have information on murder of Wisconsin woman. Inside TV & Radio. JSOnline.
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim (2008-02-29). The launch of Me-TV. Inside TV & Radio. JSOnline.
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim. "TV goes all-local on the storm, but with limited visibility of wider world", Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2008-02-10.
- ^ Service Area Map. Federal Communications Commission.
- ^ http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=756444
- ^ Cuprisin, Tim. "Channel 58's new 'sub-channel' a sign of the coming digital revolution", Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 2008-02-10.
[edit] External links
- Station website
- Backchannel Media's current schedule for MeTV Milwaukee
- History of Milwaukee television
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WBME-TV
|
||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||
