WIAT

Infobox_Broadcast
call_letters = WIAT
city =
station_
station_slogan =
station_branding = CBS 42
analog = 42 (UHF)
digital = 30 (UHF)
other_chs =
affiliations = CBS
network =
founded =
airdate = October 17, 1965
location = Birmingham, Alabama
callsign_meaning = It's About Time
former_callsigns = WBMG (1965-1998)
former_channel_numbers =
owner = New Vision Television, Inc.
licensee = NVT Birmingham Licensee, LLC
sister_stations =
former_affiliations = Secondary:
NBC (1965-1970)
effective_radiated_power = 5000 kW (analog)
1000 kW (digital)
HAAT = 421 m (analog)
426 m (digital)
class =
facility_id = 5360
coordinates = coord|33|29|2|N|86|48|20.7|W|type:landmark_scale:2000 (analog)
coord|33|29|4.5|N|86|48|25.5|W|type:landmark_scale:2000 (digital)
homepage = [http://www.cbs42.com/ www.cbs42.com]

WIAT is the CBS affiliate in the Birmingham/Tuscaloosa/Anniston, Alabama television market. It is a UHF television station licensed to Birmingham, on analog channel 42. Its transmitter is located on Red Mountain, just by the city's southern edge.

History

As WBMG

The station signed on October 17, 1965 as WBMG (standing for BirMinGham). It was owned by Bill DuBois, a local investment banker. A minority owner was Southern Broadcasting, owners of radio station WSGN.

As was the case at the time with most UHF stations in markets served by at least two commercial VHF stations (NBC/CBS affiliate WAPI-TV, now WVTM-TV; and then-ABC affiliate WBRC-TV), WBMG experienced considerable competitive disadvantages from the outset. Many households did not have TV sets capable of viewing UHF signals without a converter, since the FCC had not required TV manufacturers to include UHF tuning until 1962. The station's signal also left much to be desired, particularly given central Alabama's hilly-to-mountainous terrain; only the city proper and some suburbs over Red Mountain received channel 42 clearly.

As a result, although on paper WBMG took the CBS affiliation from WAPI, CBS continued to allow channel 13 to air some of its more popular programming. WBMG was left with numerous lower-rated CBS shows, and filled the schedule with some NBC shows that WAPI-TV turned down. One of them was, strangely given its popularity elsewhere in the country, "The Tonight Show." Both stations listed their affiliation as "CBS/NBC." This "cherry-picking" arrangement ended when WBMG became a full CBS affiliate upon Park Communications's purchase of the station in 1970, after WAPI's owners opted for an exclusive contract with NBC.

With a poor signal, the lack of sets with UHF capability and two of the South's oldest and most respected stations as competition, WBMG found the going very difficult. But many of WBMG's problems were of its own making. Its newscasts often--inadvertently or not--became comedy shows. Examples of this include mid-1970s sportscaster (and local radio personality) Tommy Charles wadding up scripts and tossing them over his shoulder after reading them, as well as even letting balloons fly around the set for no apparent reason.

Furthermore, CBS' decision in 1971 to cancel many of its rural-oriented sitcoms and variety shows, especially the country music showcase "Hee Haw" and shows hosted by Sylacauga native Jim Nabors, in order to comply with the Prime Time Access Rule may have hurt WBMG's ability to attract viewers in rural Alabama, where those programs were highly popular among viewers.

Still, WBMG gained notoriety in central Alabama for some local shows, such as live studio wrestling, and the children's show "Sergeant Jack," which featured former WSGN radio disc jockey Neal Miller, who donned the uniform of a sheriff's deputy (and actually was sworn in as an honorary deputy by the Jefferson County sheriff himself) and engaged in fanciful banter with puppets.

Park significantly boosted the station's signal, erecting a new tower in 1974. It also tried to professionalize the newscasts, with little success. WBMG had no local newscasts at all from 1980 until 1987, aside from hourly cut-ins. During this time, the station broadcast syndicated shows at both 5 and 10 p.m. Even when local news returned in 1987, WBMG had no luck whatsoever competing with WVTM and WBRC. It was perennially one of CBS' weakest affiliates, in marked contrast to its competitors, who were two of their networks' strongest affiliates. It even trailed WTTO, an independent station (and later a Fox affiliate) that had only been on the air since 1982.

Since WBMG's signal was still rather weak after the signal boost, CBS retained affiliation with two other stations in central Alabama, WCFT-TV in Tuscaloosa and WHMA-TV (later WJSU-TV) in Anniston. Both stations, started during WBMG's formative period, reached some Birmingham homes with UHF rooftop antennas. WCFT and WHMA/WJSU regularly trounced WBMG in their respective regions, especially in Anniston since WBMG's signal didn't cover east central Alabama well at all during that period, again because of high elevations from the Appalachian foothills.

By the early 1990s, WBMG was only ahead of WABM in the Birmingham ratings. Some people felt the station's on-air appearance had become very primitive by this time; it looked more like a small-market independent station than a major-network affiliate in a top-100 market. Despite this, the station managed to make a name for itself while John Harrod was news director. He launched a very aggressive and hard hitting news department, concentrating exclusively on local stories and investigative reporting. During his time as news director from 1990 through 1995, the station won awards from the Associated Press for its reporting, but, unfortunately given long-entrenched viewing habits by central Alabamians, these awards were never rewarded with a ratings win.

In 1995, Fox purchased WBRC. ABC's affiliation with WBRC did not expire until September of 1996, so Fox continued to run WBRC as an ABC affiliate while ABC looked for a new affiliate in the Birmingham/central Alabama market. It first approached WTTO, but broke off talks after WTTO would only offer a secondary affiliation, carrying just prime time and sports. ABC's second choice, WBMG, at least had a news department; despite WBMG's weak ratings, ABC even offered to buy the station. Instead, WBMG re-signed a long-term deal with CBS. ABC then opted for a unique arrangement with WCFT and WJSU. The two stations would combine to act as full-powered satellites of WBMA, a low-powered station whose signal did not carry outside of Jefferson and Shelby counties.

The switch took place in September. However, despite getting all of central Alabama by default from WCFT and WJSU's subsequent abandonment of CBS (thus getting access to numerous cable television systems in western and eastern Alabama for the first time ever), WBMG reaped almost no windfall from this switch and was still a distant fourth in the ratings. As a result, CBS decided in 1996 to affiliate with yet another central Alabama station, WNAL-TV (now WPXH) in Gadsden, which put a fairly decent signal into the eastern portions of the Birmingham area, as well as eastern Alabama. However, WBMG provided the local newscasts by arrangement for WNAL, and the affiliation only lasted three years, so comparatively little damage was done to channel 42.

As WIAT

In 1997, Park Communications merged with Media General. However, WBMG stayed in the ratings basement with a mere 1% market share, trailing not only WVTM and WBRC but also WTTO and at times even WABM. Legend has it that even old repeats of "Sanford and Son" and "The Andy Griffith Show" beat channel 42's evening newscast.

After only a few months, new general manager Eric Land had seen enough. On New Year's Day 1998, he canceled the newscast and shut down the news department. Over the next month, channel 42 rebuilt its news department from scratch. During that time, the station showed a picture of a countdown clock at 5 and 10 p.m. -- the slots where news would air once the product was re-launched. In order to signify a new start, Media General had the station's callsign changed to WIAT, which stood for It's About Time, the station's new slogan. The new format debuted on February 5, 1998 -- the same day as the start of the Winter Olympics--with a new name, "42 Daily News". Land was seen just before the countdown clock expired speaking to an unseen audience, then throwing a switch that blew up an image of the WBMG logo, with the new WIAT logo emerging.

The station did not have any on-air reporters; instead all stories were narrated by the anchors. Strict time limits were imposed on story lengths, leading to segments such as "Top Story in a Minute," "Weather Minute," "Neighborhood Minute," a "2-Minute Drill" sportscast, etc.

The new anchor team was mostly made up of talent from out of town, except for the two-person sports team. Sports Director Paul Finebaum's established popularity from his highly-opinionated newspaper column and radio show sparked some interest from sports fans. However, his sportscasts were often seen as incomplete since he had only two minutes to convey the day's sports. Weekend sports anchor Sam Smith was the only on-air WBMG staff member to survive the transition to WIAT; however, he soon departed.

Ratings improved somewhat, but many problems behind the scenes occurred involving on-air talent and management that led to lawsuits. However, that year the station received its first two Emmy Awards in station history. The station later updated its image to become "News 42," and slowly, reporters began to emerge and story lengths became more flexible.

WIAT has steadily improved its ratings in the last decade and has been far more competitive than ever before. At times, it has used powerful CBS lead-ins to rank as #1 for an individual newscast. However, the station generally places third or fourth, a position it trades with WVTM-TV.

Beginning in October 2005, WIAT teamed with former WB affiliate WTTO, which is now a CW affiliate (as of September 2006) to begin producing a 9 p.m. newscast. Using the same set and anchors as WIAT and a modified graphics package, the "CW21 News at 9" (formerly "WB21 News at 9") aired seven days a week. However, the newscasts were discontinued on October 13, 2006, after the finalization of the Media General - New Vision deal, therefore leaving CW21 with no evening newscasts, as WVTM opted not to continue them under the previous Media General agreement.

In April 2006, Media General bought four NBC owned and operated stations, including WVTM. Since the FCC does not allow one company to own two of the four largest stations in a single market, Media General opted to keep the higher-rated WVTM and sell WIAT to another owner. The move in turn back-fired as WIAT has posted higher late news ratings than WVTM over the past two years.

On August 2, 2006, New Vision Television, LLC announced its purchase of WIAT and sister station KIMT in Mason City, Iowa for $35 million. The sale was finalized on October 12 2006. [http://www.media-general.com/press/2006/oct12_Iowa_Ala.html]

WIAT began a morning newscast in August 2007, titled "Wake Up Alabama." The station has recently made several high-profile hires in an effort to bring familiar faces back to Birmingham television news. These include Cynthia Gould, formerly a long-time weekend anchor at rival WBRC-TV; Mark Prater, who previously held positions at WBRC-TV and WBMA; and former long-time WVTM-TV NBC13 Sports Director and news anchor Jim Dunaway.

Previous owners of Channel 42

*1965–1970: Southern Broadcasting
*1970–1997: Park Communications
*1997–2006: Media General
*2006–present: New Vision Television

Anchors

*Sherri Jackson - Weekdays 5 and 10PM
*Cynthia Gould - Weekdays 5PM
*Stephen Hauck - Weekdays 5PM (on location) and 10PM
*Anna Donaldson - Wake Up Alabama, Weekdays 5-7AM
*Alexa Jones - Wake Up Alabama, Weekdays 5-7AM
*Emily Ingram - Wake Up Alabama, Weekdays 5-7AM (news updates)
*Nicole Wyatt - Weekends
*David Sawyer - Weekends

Weather Anchors:
*Mark Prater - Weekdays 5 and 10PM
*Charles Daniel - Wake Up Alabama, Weekdays 5-7AM
*David Neal - Weekends

Sports Anchors:
*Jim Dunaway - Weekdays 5 and 10PM
*Brad Radice - Sports Director / Weekends
*Scott Griffin - sports analyst
*B.J. Millican - sports producer

Newscast titles

Before adopting the former "News42" title, the station started out with "42 Daily News" on all their evening newscasts. Today, its newscasts are called "CBS 42 News".

Transmitter

The WIAT-TV Tower is a 365.8 meter high guyed mast, located at 30°41'17.0" N and 87°47'54.0" W. The WIAT-TV Tower was built in 1974.

* http://www.skyscraperpage.com/diagrams/?b17269
*

External links

* [http://www.wiat.com/ WIAT Homepage]
* [http://www.birminghamrewound.com/radio-tv.htm Birmingham Rewound -- classic TV]
*TVQ|WIAT
*BIA|WIAT|TV|TV
*TitanTV|WIAT