WSFA
- This article is about the television station (wsfa.com). For the science fiction club (wsfa.org), see Washington Science Fiction Association.
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WSFA is an NBC-affiliated television station broadcasting on VHF channel 12 in Montgomery, Alabama, owned by Raycom Media. WSFA-TV's signal is one of the strongest in the state, covering a large area extending from the geographical center of the state in Chilton County to the Florida state line and the Black Belt region of southwestern Alabama to the Chattahoochee River bordering the state of Georgia. As such, the station is the default NBC affiliate for the Dothan/southeastern Alabama market as well, as that area has no NBC station of its own. Its transmitter is located near Grady, Alabama. It offers NBC Weather Plus and The Tube on its digital feeds. WSFA is the one that does not have a matching cable channel.Since WTLV is on cable channel 11 WTLV's sister station WSFA-TV is on channel 11 on most cable systems.
History
When WSFA went on the air on Christmas Day, December 25, 1954, it was the second television station in Montgomery (after WCOV-TV). The station was owned by WSFA radio (now WLWI), famous for launching the career of country music legend Hank Williams, a native of nearby Georgiana, in the 1940s.
The station was sold to the Oklahoma Publishing Company in 1955, and to the Broadcasting Company of the South, a subsidiary of The Liberty Corporation, in 1959. During that period, WSFA gained a national reputation for its coverage (fed periodically to the NBC network) of local events in the Civil Rights Movement such as the Bus Boycott of 1955 involving Rosa Parks and the varied activities of Martin Luther King, Jr. during his pastorate at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. The station's news director for much of the Civil Rights era was Frank McGee, who eventually joined NBC News and hosted The Today Show until his death in 1974.
The station's reputation as a strong news station dates from its purchase by the Oklahoma Publishing Company. For example, it was one of the first stations outside a major market to own film processing equipment. Channel 12 has received much praise from critics for its thorough and straightforward coverage of state politics.
That reputation, along with its history as the area's only VHF station until 1985 and its large service territory (almost all of southeastern Alabama), has made channel 12 the far-and-away market leader for as long as records have been kept. WSFA has further cemented its hold on local audiences with programs such as the Auburn University football coach's Sunday post-game show, hosted for many years by former WSFA sports director Phil Snow. Also, its early morning Today in Alabama is reputed to be one of the highest, if not the highest, rated local morning shows in the U.S. Liberty exited the insurance business in 2002, bringing WSFA directly under the Liberty banner. Liberty merged with Raycom in 2006.
Current News Personalities
News Anchors: Bob Howell, Valorie Lawson, Kim Hendrix, Mark Bullock, Tonya Terry, Judd Davis
Reporters: Bryan Henry, Chris Holmes, Cody Holyoke, Eileen Jones, Sally Pitts
Weather: Rich Thomas, Rob Hatchell, Dan Atkinson
Sports: Jeff Shearer, Derek Steyer