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| City | Springfield, Ohio |
| Channels | |
| Branding | Dayton's CW;2 News |
| Programming | |
| Affiliations | |
| Ownership | |
| Owner |
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| Operator | Nexstar Media Group |
| WDTN | |
| History | |
First air date | September 7, 1980 (45 years ago) (1980-09-07) |
Former call signs |
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Former channel numbers |
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Call sign meaning | "The WB, Dayton" |
| Technical information[1] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 70138 |
| ERP | 1,000kW |
| HAAT | 330 m (1,083 ft) |
| Transmitter coordinates | 39°43′8″N84°15′21.1″W / 39.71889°N 84.255861°W /39.71889; -84.255861[2] |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Website | www |
WBDT (channel 26) is atelevision station licensed toSpringfield, Ohio, United States, serving theDayton area as ade factoowned-and-operated station ofThe CW. It is owned byVaughan Media, which maintains alocal marketing agreement (LMA) withNexstar Media Group, owner ofNBC affiliateWDTN (channel 2) and majority owner of The CW, for the provision of certain services. The two stations share studios on South Dixie Drive inMoraine, Ohio. Through achannel sharing agreement, WBDT, along withRichmond, Indiana–licensedIon Television O&OWKOI-TV (channel 43), share WDTN's digital channel from WDTN's transmitter facility on Frytown Road in southwest Dayton.
WBDT serves as the default CW affiliate for theLimamarket, which had been served bycable-only affiliateWest Central Ohio CW until early 2010.
Channel 26 first appeared in southwest Ohio on July 14, 1968, asindependent WSWO-TV, under the ownership of Southwestern Ohio Television. WSWO-TV ran a local live version ofBozo the Clown (portrayed byannouncer Dave Eaton, who was previously with the former WKTR-TV inKettering, nowPBS member stationWPTD [channel 16]), as well as other local shows. The station suddenly wentdark on June 19, 1970, after it lost a bid to obtain theABC affiliation for Dayton toWKEF (channel 22); it soon thereafter filed forbankruptcy.
WSWO-TV briefly returned to the air on June 17, 1972, under the ownership of Lester W. White, but fell silent again at the beginning of December after White defaulted on a loan. White was additionally discovered to have stolen equipment from multiple television stations, most notablyWHIZ-TV inZanesville, and arrested two days before a court ordered the station closed.
The current incarnation of channel 26 dates from September 7, 1980, when Miami Valley Christian Television (MVCT) returned it to the air as aChristian-oriented station under thecall sign WTJC (for "Witnessing 'TilJesus Comes"). WTJC airedreligious programming during most of its daytime and weekend schedule (includingThe 700 Club,PTL andJerry Falwell), although it also aired lifestyle programming such asThe Joy of Gardening,cartoons, andchildren's programming in late weekday afternoon slots. There were also family-friendly reruns in early evenings and a local newscast. WTJC's Saturday schedule includedwesterns, sportsmen/hunting/wildlife shows, andThe Lawrence Welk Show.
WhenWRGT-TV signed on in 1984, MVCT sold most of its secular programming inventory to that station, and switched WTJC to a mostly-religious format (with the exception of a few children's shows, and Saturday morning sporting and hunting shows). Over the next few years, several ministries that bought time on WTJC became involved in scandals. Due to the scandals, donations to the ministries, and to MVCT, declined. The primary owner of MVCT, Marvin Sparks, bought out his partners' shares in 1991 and in turn sold them to Video Mall Communications. WTJC then airedhome shopping andpaid programming eighteen hours a day, with religious shows the rest of the broadcast day.
In the mid-1990s, Abry Communications (which had purchased WRGT-TV's owner,Act III Broadcasting) approached MVCT with a proposal to manage WTJC for 18 hours a day. MVCT declined and chose instead to sell the station toPaxson Communications in 1995. Paxson kept a similar lineup for WTJC, airing religious programming in early mornings, infomercials for most of the day and worship music overnight. On January 20, 1998, WTJC's call sign was changed to WDPX (for "Dayton Pax TV"). Accordingly, on August 31 of that year, the station became a charter affiliate of Pax (nowIon Television).
In June 1999, Paxson sold the station toACME Communications, which dropped half of Pax's programming for a primary affiliation withThe WB, along with syndicated programming. The previous WB affiliate waslow-power station WUCT-LP (nowWRCX-LD); WB programming in the Dayton area could also be seen on theWGN cable channel and onColumbus WB affiliateWWHO. On June 9, 1999, ACME also changed WDPX's call sign to the current WBDT. ACME ran the station as a dual WB and Pax affiliate, signing a five-year affiliation deal with Pax upon the sale of the station from Paxson. As a dual WB and Pax affiliate, WBDT aired a mix of syndicated, WB and Pax TV programming. WBDT maintained a secondary affiliation with Pax until mid-2004 at the latest, airing its prime time lineup on weekday mornings from 9 a.m. to noon, early Sunday mornings from 1 to 4 a.m., and early Monday mornings from midnight to 4 a.m. In the station's early days as a WB affiliate, Pax's flagshipTouched by an Angel continued to air at its regularly scheduled time of 7 p.m., leading into WB prime time programming. In 2004,Diagnosis: Murder was moved to 1 p.m., while the remainder of Pax's programming was moved to overnights. The station finally dropped the remainder of Pax's programming in September 2004, filling the morning hours previously programmed with the network's programming with off-network sitcoms, talk shows, infomercials, and court shows.
On September 18, 2006, WBDT became themarket'sCW outlet after The WB andUPN merged. It became a strong affiliate with the new network in terms of prime time ratings—strong enough for The CW to designate WBDT the "#1 CW affiliate" in the nation in March 2007. In that same month, the station became the first in the area (and one of the few in the entire country) to broadcast in a1080i high definition16:9 format 24 hours a day, broadcasting on digital UHF channel 18.
On June 4, 2010, it was announced that theLIN TV Corporation (owner of WDTN) would begin to operate WBDT through shared service and joint sales agreements.[3][4] WBDT was to leave its longtime studios on Corporate Place, off Byers Road inMiamisburg, in October and move to WDTN's facility in Moraine. As of January 27, 2013, the former WBDT studio facility is now occupied bySinclair Broadcast Group's virtual duopoly of ABC affiliate WKEF andFox affiliateWRGT-TV (the move made them the last network-affiliated stations in Dayton to have upgraded their local programming, including newscasts, to high definition).
Three months after ACME and LIN TV reached their operations and sales agreements, LIN TV exercised an option to purchase WBDT along with another LIN TV-operated ACME station, fellow CW affiliateWCWF inGreen Bay, Wisconsin.[5] LIN TV requested that WBDT's license be assigned to a subsidiary of Vaughan Media (owner of CW affiliateKNVA inAustin, Texas, which was also operated by LIN TV). LIN TV held a 4.5% equity stake in Vaughan Media, but controlled most of that company's voting stock, effectively making it ashell corporation for LIN TV.[6] TheFCC approved the sale and license transfer in April 2011; the commission also denied objections from area cable operatorsTime Warner Cable andBuckeye Cablevision, who claimed that retransmission fees for WBDT would increase as a result of the sale.[7] The sale of WBDT was consummated on May 20, 2011.[8][9]
On March 4, 2011, LIN TV's contract withDish Network expired, and all TV stations owned or operated by LIN, including both WBDT and WDTN, were pulled from Dish.[10][11][12][13][14] On March 13, LIN and Dish entered into a retransmission consent agreement, and all affected channels were restored.[15][16][17][18]
On March 21, 2014,Media General announced that it would purchase LIN Media and its stations, including WDTN and the SSA and JSA with WBDT, in a $1.6 billion merger.[19] The FCC approved the merger on December 12, 2014, but a condition of the deal required Media General to end the JSA between WBDT and WDTN due to tighter scrutiny of such deals by the FCC. Media General received a two-year waiver to end the JSA between WDTN and WBDT.[20] The merger was completed on December 19.[21]
Acarriage dispute with Dish Network, beginning at 7 p.m. on December 2, 2020, resulted in the removal of WBDT and sister station WDTN from the platform, along with 164 Nexstar stations in 115 markets.[22]
On September 16, 2002, the nationally syndicated morning showThe Daily Buzz premiered from WBDT's studios. The program, then produced by then-parent ACME Communications, remained based at the station until its August 2004 move to the facilities of former sister stationWKCF inLake Mary, Florida, nearOrlando.
On August 20, 2007, WDTN began to produce a nightly half-hour prime time newscast for WBDT known as2 News at 10 on Dayton's CW.[23] On the 26th day of its broadcast, this show achieved higher ratings than WRGT-TV's nightly prime time news (produced by WKEF) in Dayton's metered market households.
On July 21, 2012, WDTN began broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. The WBDT shows were included in the upgrade.
On January 7, 2013, WBDT began airing a weekday news program from 7 to 9 a.m., called2 News Today on Dayton's CW. Since the cancellation ofThe Daily Buzz, the station also simulcasts the 5 to 7 a.m. WDTN edition as well. On September 9, 2013, WBDT expanded the prime time 10 p.m. WDTN-produced newscast to an hour.[24]
The station's signal ismultiplexed:
| License | Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WDTN | 2.1 | 1080i | 16:9 | WDTN HD | NBC |
| 2.2 | 480i | ESCAPE | Ion Mystery | ||
| 45.4 | Charge! | Charge! (WRGT-TV) | |||
| WBDT | 26.1 | 1080i | WBDT HD | The CW | |
| 26.2 | 480i | Bounce | Bounce TV | ||
| WKOI-TV | 43.1 | ION TV | Ion |
WBDT shut down its analog signal, overUHF channel 26, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full-power television stations in the United Statestransitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 18 to channel 26 for post-transition operations.[26][27]
Initially, WBDT aired astandard definitionsimulcast of its HD programming on its DT2 subchannel. After several months, this subchannel was dropped. On September 26, 2011, WBDT began airingBounce TV on DT2, becoming a charter affiliate of the network.[28] On November 30, 2015, WBDT added a third subchannel to carryIon Television (the network was also added by other Media General stations); the station had carried Pax, the forerunner of Ion Television, as a secondary affiliate, ending in 2004. On February 1, 2018, Ion Television was moved to sister station WDTN's DT3 subchannel, replacing theJustice Network; WBDT's third subchannel was dropped.
On April 14, 2017, it was reported that WBDT's over-the-air spectrum had been sold in the FCC'sspectrum reallocation auction, fetching $27.3 million, with the FCC listing the station as set to go off the air. However, Joe Abouzeid, president and general manager of the station, characterized the auction as an "engineering exercise" and stated that the station would not go off the air or move to a new channel.[29]
In spite of the station manager's earlier denial, WBDT began sharing sister station WDTN's digital channel on June 29, 2018.[30][31]
Broadcast television stations by affiliation in the state ofOhio | ||
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Includes stations in out-of-state TV markets, but reaching a portion of Ohio | ||
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| CBS | ||
| Fox | ||
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| The CW | ||
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** Owned by third parties but operated by Nexstar through various agreements. | ||
