| WCVE: Richmond, Virginia WCVW: Richmond, Virginia WHTJ: Charlottesville, Virginia |
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| Branding | WCVE PBS WCVW PBS WHTJ PBS |
| Channels | Digital: WCVE: 42 (UHF) WCVW: 44 (UHF) WHTJ: 46 (UHF) |
| Affiliations | PBS |
| Owner | Commonwealth Public Broadcasting Corporation |
| First air date | WCVE: September 1964[1] WCVW: December 1966[2] WHTJ: May 19, 1989 |
| Call letters' meaning | WCVE: Central Virginia Educational |
| Sister station(s) | WCVE-FM |
| Former channel number(s) | Analog: WCVE: 23 (1964-2009) WCVW: 57 (1966-2009) WHTJ: 41 (1989-2009) |
| Former affiliations | NET (1964-1970) |
| Transmitter power | WCVE: 160 kW (digital) WCVW: 100 kW (digital) WHTJ: 165 kW (digital) |
| Height | WCVE: 346.3 m (digital) WCVW: 328 m (digital) WHTJ: 331.6 m (digital) |
| Facility ID | WCVE: 9987 WCVW: 9989 WHTJ: 9990 |
| Transmitter coordinates | WCVE: WCVW: WHTJ: |
| Website | WCVE-TV WCVW WHTJ |
WCVE-TV is a Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) member public television station licensed to Richmond, Virginia. It broadcasts on channel 23 and is owned by Commonwealth Public Broadcasting Corporation. The station is a member of PBS, of which WCVE-TV became a charter member. The station signed on for the first time in September 1964. Offices are at 23 Sesame Street in Bon Air, a suburb of Richmond. Its transmitter is located a few blocks away on 5 Sesame Street. WCVE's programming is also broadcast by a satellite in Charlottesville, Virginia on channel 41 as WHTJ. WCVE, the sister affiliate WCVW, and WHTJ were all together known locally as the Community Idea Stations, but in 2008 began using their call letters to identify themselves, simply referring to themselves each as "a Community Idea Station".
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The community-owned public broadcasting company was established in 1961 by Thomas Boushall (Chairman of the Richmond School Board and an officer of the Bank of Virginia) and a group of concerned citizens to employ television for educational purposes. The patron saints of public broadcasting in central Virginia were Boushall, E. Claiborne Robins Sr., Mary Ann Franklin, and Bill W. Spiller. Mrs. Franklin first approached Boushall and Henry I. Willett, then Superintendent of Richmond City Schools, with the idea of establishing an educational television station. Boushall and Franklin then recruited Spiller, who was hired in December 1963 and began working for them in January 1964.
WCVE's sister station, WCVW-TV (channel 57) signed on in 1967. Richmond became the first community in Virginia to have dual stations, and only the eighth in the nation to do so, doubling the amount of instructional programming provided to schools in central Virginia. Over forty years later, both WCVE and WCVW are still in operation.
In 1974, Commonwealth Public Broadcasting took over WNVT-TV, a Fairfax public TV station on the verge of financial insolvency, in order to protect instructional television and educational services for schools in northern Virginia. In 1981, a second Northern Virginia station, WNVC-TV, was established. Today, these two stations provide international programming in English and several other languages tailored to the needs of the Washington, D.C., area's culturally diverse population.
When Union Theological Seminary & Presbyterian School of Christian Education announced its plans to give up its public radio license for WRFK, which had assumed a fine music format from WFMV. To ensure public radio would remain in Richmond, WCVE-FM radio went on the air as a NPR affiliate in 1988. The following year, the company established WHTJ in Charlottesville. Before WHTJ's sign-on, Charlottesville had been one of the few areas in the country without a full-powered PBS station; it had been served by a repeater of Harrisonburg's WVPT.
A 25,000 square foot (2,300 m²) TV and radio studio-office complex was added in 1991.
After signing off at midnight almost daily for over 40 years, WCVE and WCVW became 24 hour stations most days of the week in the fall of 2006. Starting in early 2008, the stylized "i" logo became the station's secondary logo, while a new once display the WCVE call letters was adopted. On March 30, 2009 all three sations WCVE, WHTJ, WCVW began broadcasting in all digital after they turned off their analog signal.
Either WCVE-TV or WHTJ-TV rebroadcast on two analog low-powered translators. While W39AK is located in Rockfish Valley, Virginia near Waynesboro, Virginia the other is W60BM is located in Rustburg, Virginia near Lynchburg, Virginia. Both translators is owned and operated by Commonwealth Public Broadcasting Corporation.
Like most public television stations, this trio broadcasts shows distributed by PBS, but they also create a range of local programs. WCVE produces Virginia Currents, a program profiling residents of the state, both typical and notable, which is aired by other PBS stations in Virginia such as Blue Ridge PBS and WVPT. WHTJ, for instance, offers Charlottesville Inside-Out, hosted by musician Terri Allard.[3]
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