The affiliation switch became official on December 11, 1994. This move left WGNX with cartoons and sitcoms that it would no longer have time to air as a CBS affiliate, so it sold some of its syndicated programming to WVEU, which became the UPN affiliate (while WATL joined the WB), and was later sold to Viacom, which changed its calls to WUPA. For several months, it continued to negotiate with Tribune, who finally relented in November and allowed WGNX to become a CBS affiliate. However, CBS still wanted to affiliate with a station that people were more familiar with (and that had a functioning news department). Around the same time that the WB launched, another new network, the United Paramount Network ( UPN), co-owned by Paramount Pictures/ Viacom and Chris-Craft Industries, was set to launch, with WATL as the most likely pick to be that network's Atlanta affilaite. Almost out of desperation, CBS made a deal to buy WVEU, a low-rated station on channel 69 with the weakest signal of Atlanta's full-power stations. However, neither were interested at first.īy October 1994-only a month before WAGA was slated to join Fox, CBS faced the prospect of having to pipe in WSPA-TV in Spartanburg, WDEF-TV in Chattanooga, WRBL in Columbus and WMAZ-TV in Macon for cable customers. CBS needed to find a new affiliate, and approached all of Atlanta's major stations. One of the stations due to switch was Atlanta's longtime CBS affiliate, WAGA-TV (channel 5). This resulted in most of its stations set to become Fox affiliates. On that day, New World Communications announced an affiliation agreement with the Fox Broadcasting Company, months after Fox won the broadcast rights to NFC football games. Those plans came to a halt on May 22, 1994, however. When Tribune partnered with Time Warner to form the new WB Network, WGNX was slated to become the new network's Atlanta outlet-and the city's first owned and operated station-when that network launched in January 1995. The station significantly upgraded its programming, picking up more racier programming than it had aired under CBN ownership. The 700 Club was now only broadcast once a day, before being dropped altogether until 2007, when WGCL picked it up again. Tribune changed its call letters once again, this time to WGNX, named after then-sister station in Chicago WGN-TV: it took WGN, and added an X from the previous callsign (essentially WGN + WANX). The station was bought by Chicago-based Tribune Broadcasting in 1984. It didn't air any programming that would offend the sensibilities of its mostly fundamentalist and Pentecostal audience. However, its programming policy was somewhat more conservative than its two main rivals at the time, WTBS (channel 17, now WPCH-TV) and WATL). In 1977, it changed calls to WANX-TV, which stood for "Atlanta IN Christ (X)." It also began offering more mainstream programming. At that time, it began to run general entertainment programming during the afternoon. Children's programming, westerns and movies were shown on Saturdays and the station continued to air strictly religious programming on Sundays until the fall of 1980. It ran only religious programming on Sundays.īy 1976, the station had expanded to a 20-hour broadcast day, airing cartoons, classic sitcoms, family dramas, westerns, and religious programming (including The 700 Club twice a day) on weekdays. It also had a low-budget lineup consisting of a few hours of general entertainment and another few hours of religious shows per day. Its original broadcast callsign was WHAE-TV, which stood for "Heaven And Earth." It originally was programmed for an eight-hour broadcast day. It was originally owned by the Continental Broadcasting Network, an arm of Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network. The station's digital TV signal on channel 19 formerly datacasted TV Guide On Screen for the area.Ĭhannel 46 first went on the air on June 6, 1971. The station transmits from the "Richland" site near North Druid Hills from the east tower, along with several other stations. As a result, WGCL is the flagship television station of the company. It was the largest affiliate of any of the original "Big Three" networks ( ABC, CBS or NBC) on analog UHFprior to the digital TV transition, and remains the largest such station to identify via PSIP with a channel number above the traditional 2-13 VHF range.ĭigital: 19 ( UHF) Virtual: 46 ( PSIP), 809/108.1 (Comcast)Ĥ6.1 - CBS (1080i) 46.2 - March Madness (480i)Īs of late 2009, Meredith's broadcasting division is headquartered in the WGCL facility. Its city of license is Atlanta, and the station is owned by Meredith Corporation, making it the largest- market CBS station not owned by the network. WGCL-TV, virtual channel 46.1 ( digital channel 19) is the CBS television station serving the Atlanta, Georgia area.
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