WMYV

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

WMYV ("My48") is the MyNetworkTV television affiliate serving the Greensboro-Winston-Salem-High Point, North Carolina designated market area. The station is owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, and is sister station to ABC affiliate WXLV-TV. It is licensed to Greensboro, but is operated out of WXLV's studios in Winston Salem. The station offers a general entertainment format consisting of sitcoms, first run talk and reality shows, court shows, first run prime time shows from MyNetworkTV, paid programming, and some cartoons. Its transmitter is located in Randleman, North Carolina.

[edit] History

An earlier independent station with call letters WUBC had operated on channel 48 in Greensboro during the late 1960s, but went dark.

The current incarnation of the station signed on in 1981 as WGGT-TV, running a general entertainment format featuring cartoons, old movies, classic sitcoms, religious shows, and CBS shows preempted by WFMY-TV. It was owned locally by Guilford Broadcasting. The station was initially profitable, but it had fallen on hard times by 1987. It filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy, but stayed on the air with the same format, albeit with far more barter programming.

The financial woes at the station continued, and it was close to filing for chapter 7 bankruptcy in 1991. However, Act III Broadcasting, owner of Fox affiliate WNRW (now WXLV), stepped in and bought WGGT's programming. It consolidated the programming into WNRW's lineup, resulting in a strong combined signal with 60% overlap in the market known as the "Piedmont Superstation."

The simulcast continued after Act III was bought by Abry in 1993. WNRW/WGGT took secondary UPN affiliation in January 1995, and became the market's ABC affiliate in September of that year, after WGHP dropped the ABC affiliation and became a Fox station.

In 1996, Abry merged with Sinclair, and Glencairn bought WGGT from Guiliford Broadcasters. The simulcast was discontinued, and the two stations entered into a local marketing agreement instead. However, since 90 percent of Glencairn's stock was owned by Sinclair's founders, the Smith family, Sinclair effectively owned both stations. WGGT then became a UPN affiliate, and changed its call letters to WUPN-TV that year. The station was purchased outright by Sinclair in 2001.

In January 2006, UPN and The WB announced that they will merge into a new network, The CW. Sinclair decided that all of its UPN and WB affiliates would join the new network My Network TV, except for one each in those markets where they own both UPN and WB affiliates. This cleared the way for WTWB-TV (now WCWG) to take The CW affiliation. On June 19th of 2006, WUPN changed its call letters to WMYV in anticipation of this affiliation switch.

[edit] Logos

UPN 48 logo, when that station had their "News at Ten", which was cancelled in August 2005.

[edit] External links

• My48 Homepage
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WMYV
• BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on WMYV-TV