Jump to content

WYOU

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 71.222.116.50 (talk) at 03:44, 16 June 2008. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

{{Infobox broadcast}} may refer to:

{{Template disambiguation}} should never be transcluded in the main namespace.

WYOU, channel 22, is the CBS-affiliated television station for northeastern and north central Pennsylvania, licensed to Scranton. Its transmitter is located in Mountaintop. The station is owned by Mission Broadcasting but operated by the Nexstar Broadcasting Group through a joint sales agreement (JSA). This makes it a sister station to NBC affiliate WBRE-TV. Although most of WYOU's operations are based at WBRE's facilities on South Franklin Street in downtown Wilkes-Barre, it produces its own newscasts from studios located on Lackawanna Avenue in downtown Scranton.

Translators

WYOU serves one of the largest geographic markets in the country. This area is very mountainous, making UHF reception difficult. However, WYOU is in a unique situation since Scranton / Wilkes-Barre is a "UHF island". As a result, it operates several translators to repeat its signal.

Call letters Analog Channel Digital Channel City of license
W19AR 19 19 Clarks Summit
W26AT 26 26 Williamsport
W35?? 35 Waymart
W54AV 54 45 Mansfield
W55AG 55 8 Williamsport
W60AH 60 40 Stroudsburg
W66AI 66 50 Pottsville

History

WYOU was launched on June 7, 1953 as WGBI-TV. It was owned by the Megargee family and their company, Scranton Broadcasters, along with WGBI radio (910 AM, now WBZU, and 101.3 FM, now WGGY). Studios were located in the basement of an office building on Wyoming Avenue and Ash Street in downtown Scranton. The station remained at this location for many years, even after Scranton Preparatory School moved there.

Managed for many years by founder Frank Megargee's daughter Madge Megargee Holcomb, Scranton Broadcasters was at one time probably the only broadcasting company in the country run by five women. This included Mrs. Holcomb, her mother Mrs. Megargee, and Frank Megargee's younger daughters: Katharine Megargee Collins, Mary Megargee Griffin and Jean Megargee Reap.

Despite its link with one of northeast Pennsylvania's most prestigious broadcasters (WGBI-AM had been founded in 1925), WGBI-TV operated on a tight budget. For example, the Megargees found AT&T's rates for a dedicated network feed line too high for their liking. This forced station engineers to switch to and from the signal of WCBS-TV in New York City, resulting in less-than-adequate picture quality for CBS programming. The switchover was a delicate process requiring tight coordination between engineers stationed around the clock at the transmitter site and the directors at the studio, since no one at the studio could see the WCBS-TV feed.

WGBI went into a limited partnership with the Philadelphia Bulletin in 1958 and was renamed WDAU-TV after WCAU-TV in Philadelphia, which was also owned by the newspaper. The FCC ruled that there was so much signal overlap between the two CBS stations that they were effectively a duopoly. Channel 22's Grade B signal reaches the Lehigh Valley, which is part of the Philadelphia market. Ironically, CBS was placed in a similar situation because WCAU-TV overlapped with WCBS-TV, but CBS was able to get a waiver to keep both stations in that case. Even with new ownership, WDAU wasn't able to get a network feed until the 1970s.


In 1984, WDAU was sold to Keystone Broadcasters. In 1986, WDAU was sold to Diversified Communications of Portland, Maine. Its call letters were changed to the current WYOU on January 3, 1987. It changed hands 10 years later to Nexstar Broadcasting. In 1998, Nexstar bought rival WBRE and sold WYOU to Mission Broadcasting. However, it kept control of WYOU's operations under a joint sales agreement, with WBRE as senior partner.

WYOU still has a film archive dating back to the 1950s. A 1972 flood ruined the film archive in WBRE's basement.

News operation

Channel 22 was a solid runner-up to WBRE and later WNEP-TV for much of the time from the 1950s to the 1980s. This was achieved through its coverage of major stories including the Knox Mine Disaster and U.S. Senate hearings on racketeering in the late-1950s. The Associated Press commended the station on its gavel-to-gavel coverage of the Senate hearings and WDAU News Director Tom Powell was courted by CBS to be a network news anchor. During the 1950s and 1960s, mirroring the longstanding rivalry between Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, WDAU dominated Scranton while WBRE dominated Wilkes-Barre.

In the early 1980s, channel 22 strengthened its hand when it lured away Gary Essex, longtime anchorman at WNEP, and teamed him with popular anchorwoman Debbie Dunleavy. It also became the second station in the market to use a news helicopter, as well as the first to air a newscast in drive time.

WYOU spent the early part of the 1990s trading the runner-up position in the market with WBRE. However, after Nexstar began the JSA with WBRE, channel 22's ratings plummeted and have never recovered.

In 2002, both stations dropped their separate weekday morning and Noon newscasts in favor of Pennsylvania Morning and Pennsylvania Midday, which were jointly-produced and simulcasted on both stations. In the beginning of 2008, Pennsylvania Morning stopped airing on WYOU. In its place is the 6 A.M. hour of the nationally syndicated morning show, The Daily Buzz. The station also debuted their own newscast at Noon that replaced Pennsylvania Midday.

In an effort to become more competitive with dominant WNEP, WBRE and WYOU instituted a major shakeup in format n the fall of 2006. While WYOU went with a talk / debate format for its weeknight shows, WBRE News became more of the traditional news program. This set a more clear competition against WNEP. For each WYOU weeknight broadcast, it starts off with weather ("No Wait Weather", another innovation) and a shortened rundown of the day's top stories. The show then focuses on an ongoing story, investigation or topic and brings in analysts and experts to discuss it. WYOU generally does a traditional newscast whenever WBRE has programming that bumps their newscast back by a significant amount of time.

On June 16, 2008, there will be several major changes on WYOU. Candice Kelly, who anchors on WYOU, will move to the weeknight newscasts on WBRE beginning in mid-May. She will be joined by newcomer Drew Speier. WYOU and WBRE's midday shows will switch anchors. Mark Hiller will move from WBRE’s 11 A.M. news to WYOU’s Noon broadcast. Eva Mastromatteo will switch over to WBRE at 11 A.M. Hiller will also debut as anchor of WYOU’s First at 4 weekday broadcast. The station will be the first one in the market to broadcast local news at 4 P.M. This will be followed at 4:30 by The Insider which will move from its 7 o'clock slot. WYOU will then drop their 5 P.M. newscast and air two episodes of Judge Judy.

Finally, at 6 o'clock, Lyndall Stout (who currently anchors on WBRE) will join Eric Scheiner for the half-hour WYOU Interactive. The station will also launch a new weeknight newscast, WYOU News at 7. WNEP already airs local news at that time on the weeknights. All of the preceding changes will attempt to better compete against WNEP and get more ratings.

News team

Anchors

  • Eva Mastromatteo - weekdays at Noon
    • weekday mornings (on WBRE)
  • Candice Kelly - weeknights
  • Eric Scheiner - weeknights
  • Eric Deabill - weekends
    • reporter and producer

No Wait Weather Team

  • David Kuharchik (Certified Broadcast Meteorologist and NWA Seal of Approval) - Chief seen on weeknights
  • Kristi Capel - weekdays at Noon
    • weekday mornings and 11 A.M. (on WBRE)
  • Les Still - weekends

Sports

  • Mike Conigliaro - seen on weeknights at 6 and 11
  • TBD - weekends

Reporter

  • David DeCosmo

News/Station Presentation

Newscast Titles

  • News 22 (1986-2000)
  • 22 Action News (2000-200?)
  • WYOU News (200?-Present)

References

  • Krawczeniuk, Boris. Pioneering anchorman Tom Powell dies at 76. Scranton Tribune. February 25, 2004.
  • Mates, Rich. A look back at 50 years of local television. The Scranton Times. July 19, 2003.
  • Mates, Rich. Randy Williams takes new position of station manager at WBRE-TV. The Scranton Times. November 13, 2004.
  • Mates, Rich. Reinventing the wheel for morning newscasts. The Scranton Times. September 21, 2002.
  • Mates, Rich. Time is now to preserve local television archives. The Scranton Times. July 26, 2003.
  • Mates, Rich. WYOU cameraman Jim Keenan reflects on four-decade career. The Scranton Times. April 17, 2004.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=WYOU&oldid=219626830"