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WNYW

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For the former shortwave radio station WNYW, see WNYW (shortwave) and WYFR.
For this and other stations that previously used the WNEW callsign, see WNEW (disambiguation).

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WNYW, channel 5, is the flagship television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in New York City. The station's transmitter is atop the Empire State Building and its studio facilities are located in the Yorkville section of Manhattan. WNYW is a sister station to Secaucus, New Jersey-based WWOR-TV (channel 9), the New York area's MyNetworkTV flagship station.

In the few areas of the eastern United States where viewers cannot receive Fox network programs over-the-air, WNYW is available on satellite via DirecTV, which also provides coverage of the station to Latin American countries and on JetBlue's LiveTV inflight entertainment system. WNYW is also available on cable in the Caribbean. As of March 4, 2009, WNYW is once again available on Dish Network as part of All American Direct's distant network package. Syndicated programming on WNYW include The Simpsons, The Big Bang Theory, TMZ among others.

History

The DuMont era

The station traces its history to 1938, when television set and equipment manufacturer Allen B. DuMont founded W2XVT (renamed as W2XWV in 1944), an experimental station. On May 2, 1944, the station received its commercial license — the third in New York City — on channel 4 as WABD, after DuMont's initials. It was one of the few stations that continued broadcasting during World War II, making it the fourth-oldest continuously broadcasting commercial station in the United States. The station broadcast from the DuMont Building on Madison Avenue. On December 17, 1945 WABD moved to channel 5.

Soon after channel 5 received its commercial license, DuMont Laboratories began a series of experimental coaxial cable hookups between WABD and W3XWT, a DuMont-owned experimental station in Washington, D.C. (now WTTG). These hookups were the beginning of the DuMont Television Network, the world's first licensed commercial television network. DuMont began regular network service in 1946 with WABD as the flagship station. In 1954, WABD and DuMont moved into the $5 million DuMont Tele-Centre at 205 East 67th Street in the Yorkville section of Manhattan's Upper East Side, inside the shell of the space formerly occupied by Jacob Ruppert's Central Opera House. As of 2011, channel 5 is still headquartered in the same building, which was later renamed the Metromedia Telecenter, and is known today as the Fox Television Center.

The Fox Television Center, 205 East 67th Street in New York City, was opened by DuMont in June 1954 and is the station's current studio.

By February 1955, DuMont realized it could not continue in network television, and decided to shut down network operations and operate WABD and its Washington sister station, WTTG (also operating on channel 5), as independents. WABD thus became the fourth independent in the New York market, alongside future sister station WOR-TV (now WWOR), WPIX (channel 11) and Newark-licensed WATV (channel 13, now WNET). After DuMont wound down network operations August 1956, DuMont Laboratories spun-off WABD and WTTG into a new firm, the DuMont Broadcasting Corporation. Channel 5 gained sister stations on radio during 1957 when DuMont purchased WNEW (1130 AM, now WBBR) in April, and the construction permit for WHFI, which was renamed WNEW-FM (102.7 FM, now WWFS) when it began operations in August 1958.

The Metromedia era

In May 1958 DuMont Broadcasting changed its name to the Metropolitan Broadcasting Corporation in an effort to distinguish itself from its former corporate parent. Four months later, on September 1, 1958, WABD's call letters were changed to WNEW-TV to match its radio sisters. The final major corporate event involving the station during 1958 occurred in December, when Washington-based investor John Kluge acquired Paramount Pictures' controlling interest in Metropolitan Broadcasting and installed himself as the company's chairman. Metropolitan Broadcasting began expanding its holdings across the United States, and would change its corporate name to Metromedia in 1961. However, the Metropolitan Broadcasting name was retained for Metromedia's TV and radio properties until 1967.

In the early 1960s, WNEW-TV produced children's shows such as Romper Room (until 1966, when it moved to WOR-TV), The Sandy Becker Show, and The Sonny Fox Show, which was later known as Wonderama. Bob McAllister took over hosting Wonderama in 1967 and by 1970, Wonderama was syndicated to Metromedia's other stations. WNEW-TV also originated the Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon in 1966, and broadcasted it annually until 1986, where it moved to its current home at WWOR-TV. In the 1970s, local programming also included a weekly public affairs show hosted by Gabe Pressman, and Midday Live, a daily talk/information show hosted by Lee Leonard, and later by Bill Boggs.

By the 1970s, the station was one of the strongest independent stations in the country. Despite WOR-TV's and WPIX's eventual statuses as national superstations, WNEW-TV was the highest-rated independent in New York. From the early 1970s to the late 1980s, channel 5 was a regional superstation available in large portions of the Northeast, including most of upstate New York, and portions of eastern Pennsylvania and southern New England.

The Fox era

WNYW's secondary on-air logo since 2012

In 1986 Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, who had then-recently bought controlling interest in the 20th Century Fox film studio, purchased the Metromedia television stations, including WNEW-TV. The station's call letters were changed on March 7, 1986 to WNYW and it and the other Metromedia stations formed the cornerstone of the Fox network, with WNYW as the flagship station. Initially, WNYW's schedule changed little, as Fox only aired network programming on weekends. Although it began taking on the look of an O&O in the spring of 1987, channel 5 continued its format of cartoons and sitcoms into the late 1980s.

Murdoch had one local obstacle to overcome before his purchase of channel 5 could become final. The News Corporation had been publishing the New York Post since 1976, and Federal Communications Commission rules of the time did not allow common ownership of newspapers and broadcast licenses in the same city. Murdoch was granted a temporary waiver of this prohibition in order to complete the Metromedia television purchase. Newscorp would sell the Post in 1988, but reacquired the paper five years later with a permanent waiver of the cross-ownership rules.

Starting in the late summer of 1986, WNYW produced the nightly newsmagazine A Current Affair, one of the first shows to be labeled under the tag "tabloid television". Originally a local program, it was first anchored by Maury Povich, formerly of WTTG (and who would later do double-duty, albeit briefly on WNYW's newscasts as an anchor). Within months of its launch, A Current Affair was on the other Fox-owned stations and in 1988 the series went into national syndication, where it remained until its cancellation in 1996.

On August 1, 1988, the station dropped the morning cartoons in favor of a morning newscast called Good Day New York. [citation needed] WNYW became the first Fox-owned station as well as Fox affiliate with a weekday morning newscast, and within five years of its launch it became the top-rated morning show in the New York market. [citation needed] The success of Good Day New York has led to other Fox-owned stations launching morning shows of their own, notably Fox Morning News on WTTG, Fox News in the Morning on WFLD-TV in Chicago and Good Day L.A. on KTTV in Los Angeles. From 1999 to 2001, WNYW was the broadcast home of the New York Yankees, displacing long-time incumbent WPIX (WNYW still airs Yankees games that are part of the Fox network package). This coverage of the Yankees preempted FOX's coverage of NASCAR for a number of races during the 2001 season. [citation needed]

In 1994, the National Football League signed a deal with Fox to air National Football Conference road games. This meant that WNYW has served as the primary station for the New York Giants since that season.

In 2001, Fox bought most of the television interests of Chris-Craft Industries, including WNYW's former rival, WWOR-TV. In the fall of 2001, WNYW dropped the Fox Kids weekday block and moved it to WWOR-TV, where it ran for a few more months before being cancelled at the end of the year. Some office functions have been merged, but most of the stations' operations remain separate. Fox announced plans to merge the two stations' operations in 2004, with WWOR-TV moving from its studios in Secaucus to the Fox Television Center. However, it backed off later in the year under pressure from New Jersey's congressional delegation.

WNYW was the first TV station to break the news of the September 11 attacks. Anchor Jim Ryan with street reporting from Dick Oliver was on the air to deliver the first public report of the event. He broke into a Zoolander commercial at 8:48 a.m. ET. But as a result, the transmitter facilities of WNYW as well as eight other local television stations and several radio stations were destroyed. WNYW has been transmitting its signal from the Empire State Building since. The station had previously transmitted from the Empire State Building until moving to the World Trade Center in the 1970s.

On September 16, 2009 during the 10 p.m. newscast, anchor Ernie Anastos cursed live on air while engaging in banter with chief meteorologist Nick Gregory.[1] The video in which Anastos said to Gregory, "I guess it takes a tough man to make a tender forecast" and then added, "keep fucking that chicken", gained some notoriety when it and multiple other videos of the on-air gaffe were uploaded on YouTube,[2] and made him and WNYW the subject of a joke on ABC's Jimmy Kimmel Live!. Anastos apologized for the incident the following night's 10 p.m. newscast, saying "I misspoke during last night's broadcast, I apologize for my remarks to anyone who may have been offended."[3]

Digital television

Digital channels

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming
5.1 720p 16:9 WNYW Main WNYW-TV Programming / Fox
9.2 480i 4:3 WWOR-TV Simulcast of WWOR-TV

WNYW also has a Mobile DTV feed of subchannel 5.1, via its SD simulcast on WWOR-TV 9.2, broadcasting at 1.83 Mbit/s.[4][5]

Analog-to-digital conversion

At 11:59 p.m. ET on June 12, 2009, WNYW discontinued regular analog programming on channel 5.[6] The station's analog signal faded to black during the closing credits of The Simpsons, although it did not show the copyright or closing logos. It remained on its pre-transition channel 44,[7] using PSIP to display WNYW's virtual channel as 5. It carried WWOR's programming on digital subchannel 5.2 until 2009 when it changed the PSIP data to identify the virtual channel carrying WWOR's programming to 9.2. Subchannel 9.2 still remains multiplexed with WNYW 5.1 on RF channel 44.

News operation

WNYW's HD news open, from November 2008-November 2012.

WNYW broadcasts a total of 44 hours of local newscasts each week (eight hours on weekdays and two hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); this gives the station the largest local news output of any television station in the New York City market and the state of New York in general, surpassing area CW affiliate WPIX's weekly news total by six hours. As is standard with Fox stations that carry early evening weekend newscasts, WNYW's Saturday and Sunday 6 p.m. newscasts are subject to delay or preemption due to network sports coverage.

The station is home to one of America's longest-running primetime local newscasts. The 10 O’Clock News (now Fox 5 News at Ten) premiered on March 13, 1967, as New York's first primetime newscast. Each night, The 10 O'Clock News was preceded by the simple, but now-famous announcement: "It's 10:00 p.m. ... Do you know where your children are?"[8] which was coined by Mel Epstein. Staff announcer Tom Gregory was one of the first people to say this famous line that WNEW pioneered. Other television stations in the country have adopted this for their own 10 p.m. (or 11 p.m.) slots (which may depend on the start of the local youth curfew in each market). Celebrities were often used in the 1980s to read the slogan, and for a time in the late 1970s, the station added a warmer announcement earlier in the day: "It's 6:00 p.m. ... Have you hugged your child today?"

Another popular segment on The 10 O'Clock News, starting in 1975 and continuing to 1985, were nightly op-ed debates which pitted conservative Martin Abend against liberal Professor Sidney Offit. The debates could become shrill with Abend often descending into acrimonious personal invective. [citation needed]

WNYW also aired a 7 p.m. newscast from 1987 to 1993, known as Fox News at Seven. In August 1988, WNYW launched Good Day New York, a program comparable to the Today Show, Good Morning America or The Early Show. In 1991 a new and eventually very popular music package was composed for the show by Edd Kalehoff, a New York composer who is best known for composing the themes and music cues for several game shows, notably The Price Is Right. Since the Fox takeover, WNYW's newscasts have become more tabloid in style and has been fodder for jokes, even to the point of being parodied on Saturday Night Live, and the consumer reporting segment The Problem Solvers receiving the same treatment on The Daily Show. [citation needed]

Fox 5 reporter Lisa Evers reporting on a January 2012 fire in Union City, New Jersey.

In 2002, WNYW added a 90-minute block of newscasts from 5-6:30 p.m. on weekdays, giving the station just under 40 hours of local news per week, which is the most of any television station in New York City. In 2004, two events occurred involving the WNYW news department. Longtime anchor John Roland, a 35-year veteran of channel 5, retired from the station on June 4, 2004. Len Cannon, a former NBC News correspondent who had joined WNYW as a reporter and anchor some time earlier, was initially named as Roland's replacement. Then, several months later, veteran New York City anchorman Ernie Anastos signed a multi-year contract with WNYW, despite the fact that he was at the time anchoring at WCBS-TV. The signing would displace Cannon as lead anchor, and shortly after it was announced, he asked for, and was granted, a release from contractual obligations with the station. Anastos joined WNYW in July 2005, and Cannon joined KHOU-TV in Houston as its lead anchor in the spring of 2006.

In areas of New Jersey where the New York and Philadelphia markets overlap, both WNYW and sister station WWOR-TV share resources with Philadelphia sister station WTXF-TV. The stations share reporters for stories occurring in New Jersey counties served by both markets.

On April 3, 2006, WNYW revamped their entire on-air appearance with a new set, new music, new graphics, and a new logo. The new graphics and logo package was later standardized for all of News Corp.'s Fox stations. WNYW also was the first to launch a MyFox website, which featured expanded content, more videos, and new community features such as blogs and photo galleries. In 2012, the MyFox site was switched to one developed by Worldnow.[9]

On November 9, 2008, WNYW began broadcasting their newscasts in high-definition, becoming the fifth New York City television station to do so. On July 13, 2009, a fifth hour of Good Day New York was added, from 9-10 a.m. In exchange for the hour, the midday newscast was dropped. In the fall of 2009, WNYW began sharing its news helicopter with NBC owned-and-operated WNBC. The SkyFox HD helicopter operated by WNYW on-air was renamed "Chopper 5"; However, as of 2010, the SkyFox name has been reinstated for on-air use, while the "Chopper 4" name continued to be used by WNBC. This agreement ended in mid-to-late 2012 when WNBC regained its own helicopter. WNYW now has a helicopter-sharing agreement with CBS owned-and-operated WCBS.

As of November 2012, WNYW is one of only two remaining major news stations in the New York City market to continue to present field video in standard definition widescreen; the other is sister station WWOR-TV. The other stations are now broadcasting all or most of their field video in high definition.

News/station presentation

Newscast titles

  • Late Night News (1944–1945)
  • TV-5 Late Report (1945–1962)
  • TV-5 24 Hours (1962–1967)
  • The 10 O'Clock News (1967–2001)[10]
  • Channel 5 News (1980s–1986)
  • Fox Channel 5 News (1986–1997)
  • Good Day New York (morning newscast; 1988–present)[11]
  • Fox 5 News (1997–present)[12]

Station slogans

News team[15]

Anchors

  • Ernie Anastos - weeknights at 5:00 p.m.
  • Dari Alexander - weeknights at 5:00 and 10:00 p.m.
  • Steve Lacy - weeknights at 6:00 and 10:00 p.m.
  • Christina Park - weekends at 6:00 and 10:00 p.m.
  • Greg Kelly - weekday mornings on Good Day New York (7:00-10:00 a.m.)
  • Rosanna Scotto - weekday mornings on Good Day New York (7:00-10:00 a.m.)
  • Vacant - weekday mornings on Good Day Early Call (4:30-5:00) and Good Day Wake Up (5:00-7:00 a.m.); Tai Hernandez, Juliet Huddy and Kerry Drew have been used as Interims
  • Vacant - weekday mornings on Good Day Early Call (4:30-5:00) and Good Day Wake Up (5:00-7:00 a.m.); Antwan Lewis is the Interim


NY Weather Authority

  • Nick Gregory (AMS Seal of Approval) - chief meteorologist; weeknights at 5:00, 6:00 and 10:00 p.m.
  • Mike Woods (AMS Seal of Approval) - meteorologist; weekday mornings on Good Day Early Call (4:30-5:00), Good Day Wake Up (5:00-7:00) and Good Day New York (7:00-10:00 a.m.)
  • Audrey Puente - weekends at 6:00 and 10:00 p.m.

Sports team

  • Russ Salzburg - sports anchor; weeknights at 6:00 and 10:00 p.m.
  • Duke Castiglione - sports anchor; weekday mornings on Good Day New York (7:00-10:00 a.m.) and Sundays at 6:00 p.m., also co-host of Sports Extra (Sundays at 10:30 p.m.)
  • Ryan Asselta - sports anchor; Saturdays at 6:00 and 10:00 p.m.; also fill-in and co-host of "Sports Extra" (Sundays at 10:30 p.m.)

Reporters

  • Dan Bowens - general assignment reporter
  • Ti-Hua Chang - general assignment reporter
  • Arnold Diaz - chief investigative correspondent
  • Lisa Evers - general assignment reporter
  • Antwan Lewis - weekday morning reporter (4:30-10:00 a.m.)
  • Robert Moses - weekday morning reporter (4:30-10:00 a.m.)
  • Tai Hernandez - weekday morning reporter (4:30-10:00 a.m.); also fill-in anchor
  • John Huddy - weekday morning reporter (4:30-10:00 a.m.)
  • Jill Nicolini - weekday morning entertainment reporter (4:30-10:00 a.m.)
  • Roshini "Dr. Raj" Rajapaksa - medical reporter
  • Ines Rosales - weekday morning traffic reporter ("NY Traffic Authority" from 4:30-10:00 a.m.)
  • Linda Schmidt - general assignment reporter
  • Joel Waldman - investigative reporter

Freelance Reporters

  • Lidia Curanaj
  • Stacey Delikat
  • Kerry Drew
  • Anna Gilligan
  • Teresa Priolo

Notable former on-air staff

D Denotes person is deceased.

Cable and satellite carriage

2010 Cablevision carriage dispute

At midnight on October 15, 2010, News Corporation pulled the signal of WNYW, along with MyNetworkTV affiliate WWOR, Fox Business Network, Fox Deportes and National Geographic Wild from Cablevision systems in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut (News Corporation also pulled WNYW sister station WTXF (channel 29) in Philadelphia, from Cablevision's Central Jersey systems in Mercer, Monmouth, and Ocean County). The removal of these channels was due to an impasse between Fox and Cablevision on a retransmission agreement renewal in which Cablevision claims that News Corporation demanded $150 million a year for access to 12 Fox channels, including those that News Corporation had removed in response to the dispute.[16]

Cablevision called this an "act of corporate greed" on News Corporation's part, stating "This is an unfortunate attempt to get unreasonable and unfair fee increases from Cablevision and our customers."[17] News Corporation responded to Cablevision's claims, stating "During the past year we’ve submitted numerous proposals to Cablevision in an effort to make sure you continue to receive Fox’s programming. Unfortunately, Cablevision has refused to recognize how much you value our programming and as of October 16, has dropped Fox’s television stations in New York (WNYW 5 and WWOR 9) and Philadelphia (WTXF 29) and Fox Networks’ cable channels: FOX Deportes, Nat Geo WILD, and Fox Business Network."[18]

As of October 30, 2010 WNYW and WWOR returned to Cablevision systems in the New York metropolitan area. On October 14, 2010 Cablevision said that it was willing to submit to binding arbitration and called on Fox not to pull the plug on the channels, though News Corporation chose to reject Cablevision's call for arbitration, stating that it would "reward Cablevision for refusing to negotiate fairly".

WNYW was portrayed in an episode of the Fox animated comedy Futurama, titled "When Aliens Attack", in which the station was accidentally knocked off the air by Philip J. Fry in 1999. That resulted in angry Omicronians invading Earth in the year 3000 (having received the broadcast signal 1000 years later being 1000 light-years away) and demanding to see the end of a program which had been cut off for them.

Notes

  1. ^ http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/18/nyregion/18anastos.html
  2. ^ YouTube - Ernie Anastos: "Keep fucking that chicken"
  3. ^ Fox anchor Ernie Anastos apologizes for chicken expletive
  4. ^ http://www.rabbitears.info/market.php?request=atscmph
  5. ^ http://www.mdtvsignalmap.com/
  6. ^ http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-06-1082A2.pdf
  7. ^ CDBS Print
  8. ^ Elliot, Stuart (March 16, 2007). "Do You Know Where Your Slogan Is?". The New York Times. accessed on April 11, 2007
  9. ^ Jessell, Harry A. "Fox Stations Moving to WorldNow Platforms". TVNewsCheck. Retrieved 20 April 2012.
  10. ^ YouTube - WNEW (now WNYW) New York Channel 5-"The 10 O' Clock Weekend News" 1982 Tease and Open
  11. ^ YouTube - WNYW Good Day NY 1988 Open
  12. ^ YouTube - WNYW Fox 5 10pm News Open
  13. ^ YouTube - WNYW Tough Enough Promos 1991
  14. ^ YouTube - WNYW - Fox 5 News @ 10 Open - 2005
  15. ^ Fox 5 Personalities, MyFoxNY.com. Retrieved April 28, 2012.
  16. ^ Fox Pulls Channels From Cablevision, TVNewsCheck.com, October 16, 2010. Accessed October 17, 2010.
  17. ^ Cablevision
  18. ^ KeepFoxOn :: Stories

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to WNYW.
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