WSYX
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| WSYX | |
|---|---|
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| Columbus, Ohio | |
| Branding | ABC 6 |
| Slogan | On Your Side Your Weather Authority |
| Channels | Analog: 6 (VHF) |
| Affiliations | ABC MyNetworkTV (on digital subchannel 6.2) |
| Owner | Sinclair Broadcast Group (WSYX Licensee, Inc.) |
| First air date | August 30, 1949 |
| Call letters’ meaning | SYX sounds like six, station's channel number |
| Sister station(s) | WTTE |
| Former callsigns | WTVN-TV (1949-1987) |
| Former affiliations | DuMont (1949-1955)[1] |
| Transmitter Power | 100 kW (analog) 59 kW (digital) |
| Height | 286 m (both) |
| Facility ID | 56549 |
| Transmitter Coordinates | |
| Website | www.wsyx6.com |
WSYX, channel 6, is the ABC television affiliate in Columbus, Ohio. WSYX is owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group and is the sister station to Fox affiliate WTTE (channel 28). The two stations share a studio in suburban Grandview Heights, which shares a post office with Columbus. WSYX carries a secondary affiliation with MyNetworkTV on its second digital subchannel.
WSYX's audio signal can be heard on 87.75 MHz in much of central Ohio. The audio component of television channel 6 is located on the same wavelength as 87.7 FM. WSYX emphasizes the fact that many FM radios can also receive the station when a television set is not nearby.
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[edit] History
The station began operations on August 30, 1949 as WTVN-TV, Columbus' second television station. The station was owned by Picture Waves, Inc., controlled by Toledo attorney and investor Edward Lamb, and was a sister station to WTVN radio (610 AM). In February 1953, Picture Waves sold the WTVN stations to the Taft Television and Radio Company, which was based in Cincinnati. Taft later purchased an FM station in Columbus, WLWF (96.3 MHz.), from the Crosley Broadcasting Corporation in 1959, renaming the FM station WTVN-FM (it is now WLVQ).
WTVN-TV was an affiliate of the DuMont Television Network at its inception, and was one of only three primary affiliates of that network. In 1953, it took on a secondary affiliation with ABC. Channel 6 became an exclusive ABC station when DuMont closed down operations in 1955. In the early 1970s, Taft's common ownership of WTVN-TV and WKRC-TV in Cincinnati was awarded "grandfather status" by the Federal Communications Commission which, under its newly-enacted "one-to-a-market" rule, prohibited television stations with overlapping signals to share common ownership while protecting existing instances. (One of channel 6's competitors, Crosley/Avco-owned WLWC [channel 4, now WCMH-TV], was also given grandfathered protection through a similar situation.)
In 1987 Taft Broadcasting underwent a corporate restructuring, which saw Cincinnati financier Carl Lindner acquire a majority of Taft's shares, renaming the company Great American Broadcasting. However, as the FCC considered the restructuring as an ownership change, WTVN-TV lost its grandfathered protection and could not be retained by Great American. A group of former Taft Broadcasting shareholders, led by the Bass brothers, purchased WTVN-TV for their new company, called Anchor Media. The sale closed on August 31, 1987; and the new owners renamed the station WSYX. WTVN and WLVQ-FM remained owned by Great American Broadcasting for the next several years.
Anchor Media, which also purchased fellow ABC affiliates WLOS in Asheville, North Carolina (in April 1987) and KOVR in Stockton, California (in January 1989), was purchased by River City Broadcasting in 1993. River City was merged into the Sinclair Broadcast Group in 1996. Sinclair owned Columbus' Fox affiliate, WTTE, but could not keep both stations since the FCC did not allow common ownership of two stations in a single market. Sinclair kept the longer-established WSYX and sold WTTE to Glencairn, Ltd., owned by former Sinclair executive Edwin Edwards. However, the Smith family (Sinclair's founding owners) controlled nearly all of Glencairn's stock. In effect, Sinclair now had a duopoly in Columbus in violation of FCC rules. Sinclair and Glenciarn further circumvented the rules by merging WTTE's operations with those of WSYX under a local marketing agreement, with WSYX as the senior partner.
In 2001, after the FCC allowed duopolies, Sinclair tried to acquire Glencairn outright. However, the FCC would not allow Sinclair to repurchase WTTE for two major reasons. First, the FCC does not allow duopolies between two of the four highest-rated stations in a single market. Also, the Columbus market has only seven full-power stations -- too few to legally permit a duopoly. Glencairn was renamed Cunningham Broadcasting, but is still effectively owned by Sinclair because nearly all of its stock is owned by trusts controlled by the Smith family. This situation is one of many that has led to allegations that Cunningham is simply a shell corporation used by Sinclair to circumvent FCC ownership rules.
In August 2006, WSYX launched a digital subchannel to carry programming from My Network TV, a new programming service from News Corporation, the parent company of Fox. The digital subchannel is known as My TV Columbus.
[edit] Digital television
The station's digital channel is multiplexed:
Digital channels
| Channel | Programming |
|---|---|
| 6.1 / 13.1 | main WSYX/ABC programming |
| 6.2 / 13.2 | MyTV Columbus (MyNetworkTV programming) |
[edit] Post-analog shutdown
After the analog television shutdown and digital conversion, which is tentatively scheduled to take place on February 17, 2009[1], WSYX will will remain on its current pre-transition channel number, 13. [2] However, through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers will display WSYX's virtual channel as 6.
[edit] News Operation
Channel 6 was generally in last place in the local news ratings, except for two periods when the station was intensely competitive -- from 1977 to 1983, and from 1987 to 1992. During this era, channel 6 often passed WCMH for second place behind long-dominant WBNS-TV. Over the years, the station has featured high profile Columbus anchors including Tom Ryan, Pat Lalama, I.J. Hudson, Lou Forrest (known as Louis de la Foret on CNN Headline News), and Deborah Countiss. Liz Claman, now an anchor on CNBC, and Carol Costello, now an anchor on CNN, were also one time anchors on WSYX. The station became competitive again in the late 1990s, and since then has waged a fierce battle with WCMH for the runner-up position behind WBNS-TV.
Currently, WSYX's news programs are called "ABC 6 On Your Side" while programming on WTTE is branded "FOX 28 News at 10" and "Good Day Columbus." The news operation produces five hours of news each weekeday on channel 6 and three hours of news on channel 28. The stations place a prime focus on their weather operation, which uses the full suite of Weather Central technology, by placing the forecast near the beginning of each newscast and by providing weather updates every ten minutes during morning newscasts. WSYX and WTTE did not participate in the wider implementation of Sinclair's now-defunct News Central format for its newscasts, but did air "The Point", a one-minute political commentary that was a requirement of all Sinclair-owned stations with newscasts until the series was discontinued in December 2006.
WSYX launched its newscasts in High Definition on Saturday, May 10th, 2008. This makes WSYX the third Columbus station and Columbus the second market in Ohio (after Cleveland) to have all major news operations producing news in high definition. In addition, this was the first Sinclair station to launch local newscasts in high definition.
[edit] Newscast Titles
WSYX's newscasts have been known by the following names:
Action 6 News (1977-1987)
Channel 6 News (1987-1992)
6 On Your Side News (1992-1995)
6 News (1995-1999)
NewsCenter on ABC 6 (1999-2006)
ABC 6 NewsCenter (2006-2007)
ABC 6 On Your Side (2007-Present)
[edit] Current Personalities
- Anchors
- Sean Cuellar - weekends
- Yolanda Harris - weeknights
- Kent Justice - weekday mornings and Noon
- Mike Rowe - weekends
- Terri Sullivan - weekday mornings and Noon
- Gabe Spiegel - weeknights
- Weather
- Lisa Colbert - weekday mornings and Noon
- Jerry Martz - chief meteorologist/weekday evenings
- Dana Turtle - weekends
- Sports
- Clay Hall - sports director/weeknights
- Anthony Rothman - weekends
- Reporters
- Tom Bosco (On Your Side)
- Susan Burton (Health and Science)
- Johnny DiLoretto (Entertainment)
- Maria Durant
- Mary Jedlicka
- Carol Luper
- Emily Riemer (State House)
- Shannon McCormick
- Dr. Marivi Soto
- Shawndrea Thomas
- Jake Whittenberg
- Alexis Wiley (On Your Side Investigations)
[edit] Notable alumni
- Bob Alan
- Anne Allred
- Mary Baer
- Terre Blair
- Kimberly Boles
- Mike Bowersock
- Chris Bradley
- Charlene Brown
- Tom Burris
- Demee Caporal
- Don Carson
- Liz Claman
- Kirstin Cole
- Mark Cooper
- Larry Cosgrove
- Carol Costello
- Deborah Countiss
- Wendi Craver
- Ray Crawford
- Michele DeSelms
- Jim Finnerty
- Lou Forrest
- Michelle Gailiun
- Earl Green
- Jon Greiner
- Tom Griffith
- Donna Hanover
- Ted Hart
- Bob Hetherington
- I.J. Hudson
- Tanya Hutchins
- Mike Jackson
- Bruce Kirk
- Pat Lalama
- Dwight Lauderdale
- Tom Lawrence
- Tom Layson
- Karen Massie
- Dawn Meadows
- Alan Mitchelle
- Steve Minich
- Jim Miller
- Chad Myers
- Megan Pringle
- Liz Ogletree
- Tom Ryan
- Mike Stevens
- Calvin Sneed
- Scott Taylor
- Tony Victor
- Lorene Wagner
[edit] References
[edit] External links
- WSYX Website
- WTVN-TV History Page at the Early Television Foundation
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WSYX
- BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on WSYX-TV
- [2] -Columbus Dispatch story about WSYX running fake news
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