WPMT
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| WPMT | |
|---|---|
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| York/Harrisburg/Lancaster, Pennsylvania | |
| Branding | Fox 43 |
| Slogan | Central Pennsylvania's Fox Station |
| Channels | Analog: 43 (UHF) |
| Affiliations | Fox |
| Owner | Tribune Company (Tribune Television Company) |
| First air date | December 1952[1] |
| Call letters’ meaning | Pennsylvania Movie Time (station showed a lot of movies after becoming independent) |
| Former callsigns | WSBA-TV (1952-1983) |
| Former affiliations | ABC (1952-1961) CBS (1961-1983) independent (1983-1986) The WB (secondary, to 2006) |
| Transmitter Power | 2140 kW (analog) 933 kW (digital) |
| Height | 415 m (analog) 385 m (digital) |
| Facility ID | 10213 |
| Transmitter Coordinates | |
| Website | fox43.trb.com |
WPMT is the Fox affiliate broadcasting to the Susquehanna Valley area. Licensed to York, Pennsylvania, it also serves the cities of Harrisburg, Lancaster, and Lebanon. Its transmitter is located in Hallam, Pennsylvania.
Fox 43 currently produces two news broadcasts a day: Fox 43 Morning News, and Fox 43 News at Ten.
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[edit] History
The station began broadcasting on December 22, 1952, as WSBA-TV. It was owned by Susquehanna Radio Corporation along with WSBA radio (AM 910). It is one of the first commercially-licensed UHF stations in the United States, just over three months after KPTV, channel 27 in Portland, Oregon, first went on the air. However, that station moved to VHF channel 12 shortly after taking to the air. This makes WPMT the third oldest active UHF station in the country, only behind WARD-TV channel 56 in Pittsburgh -- now CBS-owned CW affiliate WPCW on channel 19 and CBS affiliate WSBT-TV channel 22 in South Bend, Indiana, owned by Schurz Communications.
WSBA-TV was originally an ABC affiliate. In 1961, WSBA-TV switched to CBS and joined the Keystone Network, comprising of WHP-TV in Harrisburg, WLYH-TV in Lebanon, and WSBA-TV. The three stations provided a strong combined signal with about 55% overlap.
In 1983, Susquehanna sold WSBA-TV to Idaho-based Mohawk Broadcasting, who changed its calls to WPMT and dropped the CBS affiliation in favor of becoming an independent station. WPMT aired cartoons, sitcoms, movies, dramas, sports and westerns. The station also got rid of its newscast, & local news on WPMT would not return until the debut of Fox 43 News at 10 in 1994.
In October 1986, after Mohawk sold the station to Renaissance Broadcasting, it became one of the charter affiliates of the newly-launched Fox Broadcasting Company.
In 1997, Renaissance merged with Tribune Broadcasting, WPMT's present owners.
From the late 1990s to 2006, WPMT carried a secondary affiliation with The WB, which was part-owned by Tribune. However, cable systems in Lancaster County continued to import sister station WPHL-TV in Philadelphia as their WB affiliate until September 4, 2006, when WPHL dropped The WB in favor of Fox's new MyNetworkTV.
[edit] Trivia
- In the mid-1990s, WPMT featured original children's programming hosted by the station's mascot, a clown named Pete McTee.
- "At ten it's news, at eleven it's history" is Fox 43 News at Ten's popular slogan.
[edit] Logos
late 90s? - 2007 
Current Logo
[edit] External links
- Fox 43 website
- Fox 43's Weblog
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WPMT
- BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on WPMT-TV
[edit] References
- ^ The Broadcasting and Cable Yearbook says December 22, while the Television and Cable Factbook says December 21.
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