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| City | Peoria, Illinois |
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| Ownership | |
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| WEEK-TV | |
| History | |
First air date | October 18, 1953 (1953-10-18) |
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Former channel numbers |
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Call sign meaning | The Heart of Illinois |
| Technical information[2] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 6866 |
| ERP | 402 kW |
| HAAT | 211.6 m (694 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 40°37′46″N89°32′53″W / 40.62944°N 89.54806°W /40.62944; -89.54806 (WHOI) |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
WHOI (channel 19), known asMyTeam, is anindependent television station inPeoria, Illinois, United States. It is owned byGray Media alongsideNBC,ABC andThe CW Plus affiliateWEEK-TV (channel 25). The two stations share studios and transmitter facilities on Springfield Road (alongI-474) inEast Peoria.
Channel 19 is the second-oldest TV station in Peoria, beginning broadcasting as WTVH on October 18, 1953. Operating from facilities inCreve Coeur, it was a primary affiliate ofCBS until the end of 1957, when it shifted toABC. The station traded hands several times from the 1960s to the 1980s. When it was co-owned withWIRL radio from 1965 to 1971, it was known as WIRL-TV; after its acquisition by Forward Communications, it changedcall signs to WRAU-TV. It was the typical second-place finisher in local news ratings behind WEEK-TV until the station was struck for 219 days by members of theInternational Brotherhood of Electrical Workers from December 1982 to July 1983, thereafter falling into a fight withWMBD-TV for third place.
Relaunched in 1985 as WHOI—as part of a promotional campaign linking it to the "heart of Illinois"—the station went through continued corporate and staff turnover, never rising above second place in the ratings and more frequently sinking to third. WHOI ran the area's cable-only outlet ofThe WB and later offered a subchannel affiliated withThe CW. In 2009, then-ownerBarrington Broadcasting entered into a pact withGranite Broadcasting, then-owner of WEEK-TV, to consolidate the two stations' operations under Granite management. In 2016, WEEK-TV acquired the ABC and CW affiliations from WHOI, leaving channel 19 to broadcastdigital multicast television networks. In 2025, the WHOI license was transferred to Gray in a trade withSinclair Broadcast Group, and channel 19 was relaunched with its present mix of sports-related programming,MyNetworkTV syndication, and newscasts from WEEK.
In March 1951, during a self-imposedfreeze on new television applications, theFederal Communications Commission (FCC) proposed a table of city-by-city channel assignments that included, for the first time,ultra high frequency (UHF) broadcasting. Three channels were proposed to Peoria:Very high frequency (VHF) channel 8 and UHF channels37 (reserved for educational use) and 43.[3] Radio stationWMBD, citing that a city the size of Peoria required an additional assignment, petitioned the FCC to add channel 12 there; While this plan was denied, the FCC concluded that an additional channel at Peoria was warranted, and UHF channel 19 was added instead.[4]
After the FCC lifted its multi-year freeze in 1952,[5] two parties applied to the FCC for channel 19 in Peoria: the Hilltop Broadcasting Company, the new owner ofWWXL (1590 AM), andWPEO.[6] While the hearing was on, WWXL, which Hilltop had acquired out of bankruptcy, began broadcasting under the new call sign WTVH.[7]
WTVH-TV began broadcasting on October 18, 1953, as Peoria's second television station. It aired programs fromCBS,ABC, and theDuMont Television Network. The studio and transmitter were located on Stewart Street inCreve Coeur.[8] A year later, thePeoria Journal-Star newspaper company, then publisher of the morningStar and afternoonJournal, acquired a controlling interest in Hilltop and the WTVH stations.[9] The AM station was shut down before the end of the year to focus efforts on channel 19.[10] Even though CBS programs had been on the schedule from the start, WTVH was not a primary CBS affiliate until September 1954.[11] Veteran Illinois broadcasterDoug Quick theorized that uncertainty about the availability of aVHF channel in the Peoria area, channel 8, or whether CBS's Peoria radio affiliate,WMBD, would obtain a permit for a Peoria TV station were reasons for CBS's late commitment.[12]
In technical terms, WTVH-TV broadcast with less power thanWEEK-TV (channel 43) when it launched, with aneffective radiated power (ERP) of 25,000 watts.The Pantagraph reported that reception of channel 19 was poor in theBloomington–Normal area when it launched.[13] The ERP was increased to 214,000 watts in November 1954 with the installation of a new transmitter.[14] In 1955, the station purchased a new, 1,000-foot (300 m) tower to replace the existing 240-foot (73 m) mast at Creve Coeur.[15]
DuMont ceased its existence as a network in 1955;[16] when Peoria's third station,WMBD-TV (channel 31), began broadcasting on January 1, 1958, it became the CBS affiliate.[17][18] The change resulted in a curtailed broadcast day, as at the time ABC provided less programming than CBS.[12] In 1959, Hilltop sold WTVH to the Metropolitan Broadcasting Corporation for $610,000.[19][20] Metropolitan Broadcasting renamed itselfMetromedia in 1961.[21]
In 1965, Metromedia, looking to make room in its portfolio for purchases in larger markets, sold WTVH to the Twelve Ninety Radio Corporation, headed by the Small family and owner of Peoria radio stationWIRL (1290 AM).[22] The new ownership changed thecall sign to WIRL-TV on September 13.[23] The acquisition of channel 19 was WIRL's second effort to expand into television. In June 1956, the FCC granted WIRL a construction permit for VHF channel 8, but it stayed the grant pending a proceeding on whether channel 8 would remain in Peoria.[24] The channel allocation was moved to theQuad Cities area in an action reaffirmed by the FCC in 1962.[25] The station held a permit for channel 25, which was deleted in 1963,[26] enabling WEEK-TV to move from channel 43 to 25 the next year.[27][28]
Forward Communications Corporation ofWausau, Wisconsin, acquired the station in a sale completed in April 1971[29] and changed the call sign to WRAU-TV the following May 1. The news departments of WIRL radio and the newly renamed channel 19 were separated at this time.[30] To make room for a number of employees that had been working in a downtown Peoria office and the news staff, which had previously worked out of the WIRL radio studios, the Creve Coeur studio was expanded.[31] A new, higher-power transmitter was purchased to improve the signal.[12] Under Forward, WRAU-TV's newscasts generally rated second behind WEEK-TV. This changed beginning in December 1982, when workers from theInternational Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) struck the station for 219 days—longer than the concurrent strike againstCaterpillar Inc. by theUnited Auto Workers. Local unions organized a boycott of WRAU-TV advertisers, the station was barred from news conferences in the Caterpillar strike, and news ratings fell to a much more distant second, with non-union technicians producing three newscasts a day.[32][33] By 1984, channel 19 had fallen behind WMBD-TV in the 10 p.m. news ratings.[34]
Forward Communications was sold in late 1984 toWesray Capital Corporation, which retained the Forward name for its media holdings.[35] The sale coincided with an overhaul of channel 19's image. Longtime newscaster Clark Smith was fired after 14 years in 1984.[34] The station adopted its present call sign of WHOI on March 17, 1985, as part of a promotional campaign billing the station as "the new heart of Illinois".[36][37]
Wesray sold the Forward stations to Adams Communications in 1988,[38] but the deal left Adams highly leveraged and ill-prepared to confront declines in the value of broadcast properties, prompting it to default on $283 million of debt in 1991.[39] Brissette Broadcasting was formed the next year when Paul Brissette, who had been the vice president of Adams Communications's television stations division, bought out the business for $257 million.[40] Brissette's management period saw a number of issues in the news department. Ratings fell in 1992, when the station lost the rights to telecast the popular game showJeopardy! to WMBD and a new news show,Eyewitness Agenda, proved a ratings failure.[41][42] Recognized news personalities defected to other local stations, including weathercaster Lee Ranson, who had been with channel 19 for 22 years and was described by Mark Gibson ofThe Pantagraph as "the one constant" at the station through its various changes in ownership and management.[43] In 1994, Brissette Broadcasting fired the general manager, news director, general sales manager, and an assignment editor in a station shakeup; Greg Brissette, son of company owner Paul, was installed as the interim manager,[44] and a newtabloid journalism–type news format was implemented.[45] WHOI carried some programming fromUPN, includingStar Trek: Voyager, from the network's launch in January 1995[46] untilWAOE (channel 59) went on the air in 1999.[47]
In 1996, as part of a $270 million merger, Brissette was folded intoBenedek Broadcasting after the company was unable to expand by adding stations.[48] Two years later, WHOI broughtThe WB network to the Peoria–Bloomington market by launching WBPE, the local cable-only outlet ofThe WB 100+ Station Group.[49] Financial problems later developed at Benedek; theearly 2000s recession reduced ad sales and caused the company to miss interest payments on a set of bonds it issued in 1996, prompting a filing forChapter 11 bankruptcy.[50] While most of Benedek's stations were sold toGray Television, some—including WHOI—went to Chelsey Broadcasting, an affiliate of the Chelsey Capital hedge fund, after Gray determined that not all the stations fit the company's focus at the time on larger markets and CBS affiliates.[51] On August 1, 2003, WHOI began broadcasting a digital signal on channel 40.[52]
Barrington Broadcasting ofHoffman Estates, Illinois, purchased WHOI andKHQA-TV inHannibal, Missouri, from Chelsey in 2004. The acquisition was among the first for the company, which had already been managing Chelsey's stations for a year and whose founder, Jim Yager, was the former president of Benedek.[53][54] When The WB merged withUPN to formThe CW in 2006, WBPE obtained the affiliation and changed its name to Peoria's CW,[55] being broadcast as adigital subchannel of WHOI.[56] WHOI was the last major Peoria television station to broadcast an analog signal; most stations in the market switched on the original February 17, 2009,digital television transition date, except for WHOI,[57] which completed its switchover on the June 12 final date.[58]
Despite occasional credible efforts, WHOI remained mostly in third place in news ratings in the 1990s and 2000s. By 1999, the market's news race looked like a two-station fight between perennial leader WEEK and a revitalized WMBD; each of their evening newscasts attracted audience shares of 20 percent or more, while WHOI's best-performing newscast mustered a 12-percent share.[59] Though channel 19 improved its ratings steadily in the early- and mid-2000s, the 2006 defection of anchor Paul Ferrante to WMBD caused ratings to slide, particularly among women aged 25–54.[60]
On March 2, 2009, it was made public that WEEK-TV would take over the operations of WHOI throughjoint sales andshared services agreements. It resulted in WHOI closing its longtime studios near its transmitter in Creve Coeur and moving into WEEK-TV's facility on Springfield Road, alongI-474, inEast Peoria. Sixteen employees were transferred to WEEK-TV, but as many as thirty werelaid off immediately.[61] The alliance was one of two announced on the same day between Barrington andGranite Broadcasting, owner of WEEK-TV. In the other, inSyracuse, New York, Barrington'sWSTM-TV assumed the operations ofWTVH.[62] WEEK and WHOI began airing simulcast weekend newscasts after the change.[63] Granite then shifted playout operations, as well as weekend weather forecasting, for WEEK-TV, WHOI, and WAOE to a hub facility inFort Wayne, Indiana.[64] Barrington was acquired bySinclair Broadcast Group in 2013,[65][66] andQuincy Newspapers acquired WEEK-TV among other stations from Granite in a deal announced in 2014 and completed in 2015.[67] The Quincy/Granite sale was completed on November 2, 2015.[68]
On July 26, 2016, Quincy Media announced that it had acquired WHOI's ABC and CW affiliations from Sinclair and would consolidate them onto subchannels of WEEK beginning August 1, 2016.[69] At the same time, Quincy-ownedWSJV inSouth Bend, Indiana, relinquished its Fox affiliation to Sinclair-ownedWSBT-TV.[70] The ABC and CW subchannels were simulcast on WHOI for 60 days following the consolidation.[71][a] After the end of the transition period,Comet TV, adiginet owned by Sinclair, moved to WHOI's main 19.1 channel.[73] In 2020, the main channel was switched toTBD, another Sinclair-owned diginet, with Comet moved to 19.2.[74]
Gray Media, which purchased Quincy in 2021,[75] and Sinclair filed with the FCC in 2025 to trade WSJV for WHOI, which resulted in Gray owning both the WEEK-TV and WHOI licenses.[76] On September 29 of that year, the diginet was moved to 19.5, and WHOI was relaunched as a newindependent station known as MyTeam. MyTeam's schedule places an emphasis on sports programming, including local high school and college sports, programming from St. Louis-based sister serviceMatrix Midwest, as well as the WEEK-producedSports Overtime. Outside of sports programming, it also carries WEEK-produced half-hour 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. newscasts and syndicated programming (includingMyNetworkTV).[77]
WHOI's transmitter is co-sited with its studios on Springfield Road (alongI-474) inEast Peoria.[2] The station's signal ismultiplexed:
| Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19.1 | 720p | 16:9 | TEAM | Independent,MyNetworkTV[77] |
| 19.2 | 480i | Charge! | Charge! | |
| 19.3 | Comet | Comet | ||
| 19.4 | 1080i | STAD | Stadium | |
| 19.5 | 480i | ROAR | Roar | |
| 19.6 | MeTV | MeTV |
Broadcast television stations by affiliation in the state ofIllinois | ||
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Includes stations in out-of-state TV markets, but reaching a portion of Illinois | ||
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| ATSC 3.0 | ||
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