| Manchester, New Hampshire/Lowell, Massachusetts | |
|---|---|
| Channels | Analog: 50 (UHF) |
| Affiliations | Defunct |
| Owner | Merrimack Valley Communications |
| First air date | October 1969 |
| Last air date | June 1970 |
| Former affiliations | Independent (1969-1970) |
WXPO-TV was a short-lived television station that was licensed to Manchester, New Hampshire, but mainly targeted the Boston market. Owned by Merrimack Valley Communications, the station aired on channel 50.
WXPO-TV signed on early in October 1969, from two studios. Its offices and master production facilities were located on Dutton Street in downtown Lowell, Massachusetts; however, its transmitter and "main" studio was on Governor Dinsmore Road in Windham, New Hampshire to comply with Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations requiring that a station's transmitter be located within 15 miles of the city of license. The original vision was to air business news during the daytime, and a general entertainment format — including sports — late in the afternoon and in the evening.
Its Treehouse 50 program in the afternoons gained a cult following with Boston-area college students, as it had slapstick comedy and the Warner Bros. cartoons that had been released to television stations at that time. The station also attempted to do live remotes with some mixed success. In addition, WXPO was infamous for a New Year's Eve show that by 1:00 a.m. had started to become particularly strange.
WXPO also attempted a news operation; in addition to the financial news programming, it was the first station to have news updates every hour (a precursor to the 24 Hour News Source format used by many stations in the 1990s), and was the first New England television station to air a ten o'clock newscast (WKBG-TV, now WLVI-TV, also attempted such a newscast during this time, but did not launch it for another two months); however, it did not have any newsfilm and relied solely on AP slides to provide visuals.
However, the station's coverage in many parts of Greater Boston was spotty at best. The Lowell studio was located less than 1,000 feet from the WLLH transmitter, making high-quality production impossible during the day due to RF interference with the cameras. Advertisers were scared off when the Lowell Sun blacklisted anyone who advertised on the station. Bills went unpaid for several months.
By early 1970, the vast majority (90%) of the staff was removed from the payroll, although many continued with the station, believing it could pull through. However, the spring of that year saw the closure of the Lowell studio. Finally, in June the power company pulled the plug at the Windham studios during a Maverick rerun, taking WXPO off the air.
On July 17, 1973, channel 50 returned to the air with a test transmission, with plans to return the station to the air later that year, possibly as New Hampshire's CBS affiliate. Those plans were never realized, and the WXPO-TV license was deleted in 1975. The channel would remain silent until September 1983, when WNDS (now WBIN-TV) began operations.
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