WKMG-TV
WKMG-TV | |
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Orlando, Florida | |
Branding | Local 6 |
Slogan | Your Breaking News Station |
Channels | Analog: 6 (VHF) Digital: 58 (UHF) |
Translators | W29AB Ocala |
Affiliations | CBS LATV (DT2) |
Owner | Post-Newsweek Stations, Inc. (Post-Newsweek Stations, Orlando, Inc.) |
First air date | July 1, 1954 |
Call letters’ meaning | Katharine Meyer Graham (in honor of the late widow of Phillip L. Graham, former president of the Washington Post Company) |
Former callsigns | WDBO-TV (1954-1982) WCPX-TV (1982-1998) |
Former affiliations | All secondary: NBC (1954-1957) ABC (1954-1958) DuMont (1954-1955) |
Transmitter Power | 100 kW (analog) 1000 kW (digital) |
Height | 445 m (analog) 516 m (digital) |
Facility ID | 71293 |
Transmitter Coordinates | (digital) |
(analog)
Website | www.local6.com |
WKMG-TV, channel 6, is the CBS network affiliate for Central Florida (the Orlando-Daytona Beach-Melbourne, Florida market). WKMG is licensed to Orlando and is owned and operated by Post-Newsweek Stations, Inc., a subsidiary of the Washington Post Company. It is branded as "Local6", under the "Local Mandate," a station standardization adopted for all stations owned by Post-Newsweek. WKMG's transmitter is located in Bithlo, Florida.
WKMG also has a repeater in Ocala, W29AB channel 29. This station originally served as a repeater for Tampa Bay's WTOG during the 1980s and 1990s.
Digital subchannel 6.2 carries LATV.
Contents |
History
The station first took to the air on July 1, 1954; as WDBO-TV, which stood for "Way Down By Orlando." It is the sixth-oldest station in Florida, and the oldest in Central Florida. It was originally owned by the Orlando Broadcasting Company along with WDBO radio (AM 580 and FM 92.3, now WWKA).
As the only station in the market at its inception, it originally carried programming from all four networks of the time — CBS, NBC, ABC and DuMont. DuMont would shut down most network operations in 1955, but honor network commitments until 1956; at that point, DuMont disappeared from the schedule. It lost NBC when Daytona Beach's WESH expanded its signal to cover all of Central Florida in 1957, and ABC when WLOF-TV (now WFTV) signed on in 1958.
Orlando Broadcasting merged with Cherry Broadcasting in 1957. In 1963, WDBO-AM-FM-TV were sold to The Outlet Company.
In 1982, WDBO AM-FM was sold to Katz Broadcasting, as Outlet decided to begin exiting radio. Outlet was nearly bought out by Columbia Pictures around the same time. In advance of this, channel six prematurely changed its call letters to WCPX-TV, which stood for "W Columbia PiX" (shorthand for "Pictures"). While the deal fell through, channel 6 kept the WCPX calls for 16 years.
Outlet pared down its holdings after a buyout in 1986, selling off many stations. At that point, WCPX was sold to First Media, Inc.
In the early 1990s WCPX decided to move the CBS program Picket Fences from Friday evening to 11:35 pm on Saturday so that it could air Star Trek: Deep Space Nine on Friday evenings. WCPX also pre-empted some CBS sports programs as well. In 1994, WCPX hired a new general manager, Brooke Spectorsky, from WUAB in Cleveland. (Spectorsky is now general manager of WKYC-TV in Cleveland.) Under Spectorsky, WCPX put Picket Fences back at its normal time.
In 1995, WCPX was one of the first CBS affiliates to air Guiding Light at 10 a.m. instead of 3 p.m., which was the normal time to air it. Under this arrangement, the program would air on a one day delay. However, CBS soon discovered that several of its O&O's were doing the same thing. CBS then decided to provide two (eventually three) same day feeds of Guiding Light to its stations (one at 9 a.m., 10 a.m., and 3 p.m.). WKMG currently airs Guiding Light at 9 a.m.
In 1997, First Media merged with Meredith Corporation, which already owned Fox affiliate WOFL. At the time, duopolies were not allowed, and Meredith decided to keep WOFL (which has since been sold to Fox). In mid-1997, Meredith swapped WCPX to Post-Newsweek Stations in exchange for Hartford, Connecticut's WFSB (which at the time was Post-Newsweek's flagship).
In early 1998, the newly-launched Pax (now ION) network wanted as many callsigns with "PX" as possible for its stations across the country. With this in mind, channel 6 changed its callsign to WKMG.[citation needed] The new callsign was chosen in honor of longtime Washington Post publisher, Katharine M. Graham.
From the late 1980's until 2001, the station was almost always in last place in the ratings. At the same time, WESH and WFTV battled for first place in the Orlando market, and basically continued to do so into the early 2000s; however, in the past two years, WFTV has become the dominant station (though channel 6 claimed first place at 11 p.m. in the May 2006 ratings period). Currently, despite the strength of CBS prime-time programming, WKMG has been trading second and third place with WESH in the newscast ratings except at 11 pm, where it wages a spirited battle with WFTV for first.
The main news anchors at WKMG currently are Bob Frier and Jacqueline London. Lauren Rowe recently moved to help co-anchor the early morning news, and now Jacqueline London does the five, six and eleven PM newscasts alongside Frier and the four PM newscast with Marla Weech.
WKMG also can be found on Bright House Networks in Citrus County, although that county is part of the Tampa market.
Today WKMG clears all available CBS programs but sometimes will pre-empt programs. It also pushes back the Late Late Show by a half-hour as well.
With sister station Jacksonville's WJXT's decision to drop CBS in 2002, rumors abounded that WKMG would ditch CBS in favor of becoming an independent or joining another network. However, this was highly speculative at best, and WKMG signed a long-term contract extension with CBS in 2005.
As of recently, WKMG is the last "Big Six" affiliate in Orlando that is not part of any television duopoly (Fox/Newscorp's WOFL/WRBW, Cox's WFTV/WRDQ and Hearst-Argyle's WESH/WKCF).
WKMG, WFTV and WRDQ are the only three stations with studios located inside the Orlando city limits. In WKMG's case, studios are located on John Young Parkway.
In March 2008, WKMG began broadcasting news in high definition, becoming the third station in the Orlando market to do so. The transition means that all three "big three" network affiliates in Orlando are now broadcasting HD newscasts.
Personalities
News Anchors
- Bob Frier - Local 6 News at 5, 6, and 11
- Todd Jurkowski - Local 6 News at 6 (Saturday) and 6:30 (Sunday) and 11
- Jacqueline London - Local 6 News at 4, 5, 6, and 11
- Marla Weech - Local 6 News at Noon, 4, and 5:30
- Lauren Rowe - Local 6 First News
- Erick Weber - Local 6 First News, News at Noon.
- Laura Diaz - Local 6 News at 6 (Saturday) and 6:30 (Sunday) and 11
Meteorologists
- Tom Sorrells - Local 6 News at 4, 5, 5:30, 6, and 11 (Chief Meteorologist) (AMS-CBM/NWA)
- Eric Wilson - Local 6 First News and Local 6 News at Noon (AMS/NWA)
- Elizabeth Hart - Local 6 News at 6 (Saturday), 6:30 (Sunday)and 11
- Rob Eicher - meteorologist
Sportscasters
- David Pingalore (on-air stage name: Ping) - sports director - Local 6 News at 6 & 11
- Todd Romero - sports anchor/reporter - Local 6 News at 6 (Saturday) and 6:30 (Sunday)
Reporters
- Louis Bolden
- Jessica D'Onofrio
- Mike DeForest
- Jamie Guirola
- Kimberly Houk
- Ramin Khalili
- Adam Longo
- Tarik Minor - Flagler/Volusia County reporter
- Tiffany Tift
- Jessica Sanchez
- Kim Sanders - morning traffic reporter
- Chris Trenkmann
- Erik von Ancken
- Charnel Wright
Local 6 Problem Solvers
- Steven Cooper - consumer reports
- Donald Forbes - To Catch a Criminal reports
- Mike Holfeld - investigative reports
- Tony Pipitone - investigative reports
Other
- Henry Maldonado - General Manager/Editorials
- Mark McEwen - Good Neighbor 6
External links
- WKMG Official Website
- WKMG History
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WKMG
- BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on WKMG-TV
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WESH 2 (NBC) - WKMG 6 (CBS) - WFTV 9 (ABC) - WCEU 15 (PBS) - WKCF 18 (The CW) - W21AU 21 (AZA) - WMFE 24 (PBS) - WVEN 26 (UNI) - WRDQ 27 (Ind) - WRCF 29 (A1) - WTMO 31 (TEL) - WOFL 35 (Fox) - WZXZ 36 (Unknown) - WOTF 43 (TFU) - WTGL 45 (TLN / Faith TV) - WHLV 52 (TBN) - WOPX 56 (ION) - WRBW 65 (MNTV) - WBCC 68 (PBS) Local cable television channels |
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WFOR 4 (Miami) - WCTV 6 (Tallahassee) - WKMG 6 (Orlando) - WTSP 10 (St. Petersburg) - WINK 11 (Fort Myers) - WPEC 12 (West Palm Beach) - WTEV 47 (Jacksonville) - WGFL 53 (High Springs / Gainesville) |
See also: ABC, CW, Fox, MyNetworkTV, NBC, PBS, Religious, Spanish and Other stations in the state of Florida |