WJCT, Inc. is anon-profit public media organization inJacksonville, Florida, United States. It operatesPBS member television stationWJCT "Jax PBS" (channel 7) andNPR member radio stationWJCT-FM 89.9, as well as their associated digital platforms.[1] The company's studios and offices are located on Festival Park Avenue in theStadium District in downtown Jacksonville.
In 1952, following a four-year-long freeze on awarding station licenses, theFederal Communications Commission (FCC) revised its channel allocation table and reserved 242 frequencies, including channel 7 in Jacksonville, fornoncommercial educational use. In Jacksonville,podiatrist Dr. Heywood Dowling launched a campaign to bring educational television to theFirst Coast region. While many other public stations at the time were affiliated with universities, Dowling proposed that Jacksonville's station be owned and funded by the community. Civic leaders embraced the concept, and after years of fundraising, the FCC issued aconstruction permit for channel 7 on February 27, 1957.[2][3][4]
WJCT television first went on the air on September 10, 1958. Its first broadcast was a report by then-Florida governorLeRoy Collins on educational television. As Channel 7 initially had no production facility of its own, it used the studios of the city's two commercial stations, WMBR-TV (channel 4, nowWJXT) and WFGA-TV (channel 12, nowWTLV).[4] It was Florida's second public television station, followingWTHS-TV inMiami. Its service area extended past Jacksonville toLive Oak,St. Augustine, andPalatka, Florida, andFolkston, Georgia. Its first month was dedicated to national programs fromNational Educational Television.[5]
WJCT added radio stationWJCT-FM in 1972. Originally on air under the name "Stereo 90", WJCT-FM's broadcasting covered music, fine arts, news, and public affairs. In October 1973, WJCT produced its first television and radiosimulcast of a concert by theJacksonville Symphony Orchestra.[5][4]
In 2014, WJCT spearheaded the Digital Convergence Alliance Network Operations Center (DCA-NOC), a central master control operation funded by a grant from theCorporation for Public Broadcasting. This was the first network operations center developed in a partnership of 11 public broadcasting companies.[5]
The schedule of WJCT television, known as "Jax PBS", includes programming fromPBS and other programming services, including theBBC andAmerican Public Television. WJCT also produces and broadcasts local news,public affairs programs, and documentaries. Subchannels includeCreate,PBS Kids, andWorld.
On April 6, 2009, as part of the television industry's conversion to digital broadcasting, WJCT commenced operation on digital channel 9, and its analog signal on channel 7 left the air for good.[6][7]
WJCT-FM (89.9 MHz) is the primary public radio station in Jacksonville, offering four streams of programming over itsHD Radio signal and online. The main subchannel and analog broadcast consists of nationally syndicated public talk shows as well asFirst Coast Connect, its flagship local news program. Additional subchannels carry theClassical 24 classical music service and two other music services: Anthology, a mix of music from the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, and The Independent, focusing on new and local music. WJCT also operates the regionalradio reading service, broadcast as an analog subcarrier for the visually impaired and streamed online.
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