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WWLP-TV "TV 22" is the NBC affiliate serving the Springfield, Massachusetts television market. Its studios are in Chicopee, Massachusetts while its transmitters are on Provin Mountain in the Feeding Hills section of Agawam, Massachusetts.
History The station first went on the air on channel 61 on March 17, 1953. It was founded by William L. Putnam, the founder and longtime owner of Springfield Television. WWLP had the distinction of being one of the first UHF television stations in the United States as well as being Massachusetts' oldest television station outside Boston. WWLP began broadcasting on channel 22 on July 2, 1955. Springfield Television also operated WJZB-TV Channel 14 in Worcester, Massachusetts * from 1958 to 1968 and WRLP Channel 32 in Greenfield, Massachusetts * from 1957 to 1978. WRLP-TV 32 also served Brattleboro, Vt. and Keene, N.H. and went off the air on Sunday, 9 April 1978, after the 11:00 p.m. newscast. No special programming was aired to signal its demise. Both stations were initially satellites of WWLP, and later became independent stations. Both WJZB and WRLP have since gone dark; the WRLP transmitter was shipped to Salt Lake City, Utah almost immediately after WRLP went dark in order to launch independent station KSTU on UHF Channel 20. (The present-day KSTU, on VHF Channel 13, is a separate license from the original KSTU — and a Fox O&O. The Channel 20 allocation in Salt Lake City is now occupied by religious independent station KTMW.) After three decades, William L. Putnam decided to retire from broadcasting by selling his company and its three stations (WWLP and KSTU, plus WKEF in Dayton, Ohio) to Adams Communications in 1984. Adams began breaking up the Springfield Television group in 1987 with the sale of KSTU to Mountain West Television. Adams then sold WKEF to KT Communications in 1989 before selling WWLP to Paul Brisette of Brisette Broadcasting in 1991. In 1996, Brisette sold all of his stations to Benedek Broadcasting. LIN Television acquired the station in 2000 by swapping KAKE-TV in Wichita, Kansas and WOWT-TV in Omaha, Nebraska to Benedek in the wake of Chronicle Broadcasting (which owned the latter two) being disbanded. The sale could be seen as the ultimate undoing for Benedek, which in 2002 declared bankruptcy and sold most of their stations, including WOWT and KAKE, to Gray Television. In early 2000, the station's studios and offices moved from their original home in Feeding Hills to their current home in Chicopee. (Its transmitter was not moved.) Shortly after the move, then-pending owner LIN constructed an addition which became a master control hub for their stations in the Northeast with room for future expansion in the event LIN expands their Northeast properties. The station is known for producing As Schools Match Wits, one of the longest running high school quiz programs in the United States. The program has been on the air since October 1961. In September 2006, due to the FCC and sponsorship of the show, the show was cancelled. The show will return in January 2007, but on WGBY and based at Westfield State College. WFXQ-CA In 2005, WWLP purchased W28CT, channel 11, a low-power television station in Hartford, Connecticut, from Communications Site Management LLC. The station was moved to Springfield, given a new channel location on channel 28, and renamed WXCW-CA with talk that it would be an affiliate of The CW Television Network when Channel 28 goes on the air in 2007. *). In August 2006, its call letters changed again to WFXQ-CA, matching speculation that it would be a FOX affiliate when it launches * This would give western Massachusetts its first local FOX affiliate. (It currently is served by WTIC-TV, channel 61, in Hartford.) WFXQ will also be a initially be an analog television channel, before it converts to a digital broadcast channel in the near future, meaning then TV viewers must have a digital television or cable to receive the station. *. WFXQ-CA is currently a simulcast of WWLP's main analog signal. The station's transmiter is located on Mt. Tom in Holyoke. Newscasts WWLP has traditionally had the most-watched newscasts in the market, beating WGGB in the ratings most of the time ever since both stations went on the air. There have been some brief periods in which WGGB was on top, and there have also been extended periods in which the stations were basically neck-and-neck with WWLP having a slight edge. However, WWLP has consistently outpaced WGGB since Sinclair Broadcast Group acquired WGGB in 1998, with a sizable margin in WWLP's favor for most shows. The long-term ratings ramifications of WSHM-LP, which started up a newsroom in late 2005, remain to be seen. To this point, however, the traditional ratings pecking order has not changed. WWLP uses two weather radars. One of the radars is called "ESP Live Doppler", with ESP an abbreviation for Exclusive Storm Prediction. The radar is provided through the Weather Central service. The other radar is a privately owned one, which is located with the station's transmitter on Provin Mountain in Feeding Hills, Massachusetts. It is currently is fed onto the Internet. As of October 2006, WWLP does not offer NBC Weather Plus, although WVIT in nearby Hartford, CT does. WWLP does offer a non-audio broadcast of its "ESP Live Doppler" on its DT2 digital subchannel. Weekdays Saturday Sunday Anchors & Reporters 22 News Storm Team Meteorologists Sports Anchor Former Anchors Former Reporters Former 22 News Storm Team Meteorologists Former Sports Team | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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