WHDF

WHDF
Florence/Huntsville/Decatur, Alabama
United States
City Florence
Branding The Valley's CW
Channels Digital: 14 (UHF)
Virtual: 15 (PSIP)
Subchannels 15.1 The CW
Affiliations The CW (2006–present)
Owner Lockwood Broadcast Group
(Huntsville TV, LLC)
First air date October 28, 1957 (1957-10-28)
Call letters' meaning Huntsville
Decatur
Florence[1]
Former callsigns WOWL-TV (1957–2000)
Former channel number(s) 15 (UHF analog, 1957–2009)
Former affiliations NBC (1957–2000)
UPN (2000–2006)
Transmitter power 1000 kW
Height 431 m
Facility ID 65128
Transmitter coordinates 35°0′5.7″N 87°8′3.9″W / 35.001583°N 87.134417°W / 35.001583; -87.134417
Licensing authority FCC
Public license information: Profile
CDBS
Website www.thevalleyscw.tv

WHDF is The CW-affiliated television station for the Tennessee Valley area of North Alabama. Licensed to Florence, the station broadcasts a high definition digital signal on UHF channel 14 from a transmitter located southeast of Minor Hill, Tennessee, just 500 yards (450 m) north of the Alabama state line. Owned by Lockwood Broadcast Group, WHDF maintains studios on Cypress Mill Road in Florence, with a Huntsville sales office on Andrew Jackson Way, in the Five Points neighborhood.

History

The station began on October 28, 1957 as WOWL-TV, based in Florence. The station was owned by Richard "Dick" Biddle. Up until late 1999, that station broadcast NBC programs to northwestern Alabama and portions of southern middle Tennessee and northeastern Mississippi; it carried also some popular CBS shows like the soap opera As the World Turns.

WOWL-TV always faced competing NBC affiliates in Huntsville or Decatur or even Tupelo (WTVA), whose signals reached much of its broadcast area. However, it retained viewership in the Shoals region (Florence, Sheffield, Muscle Shoals, Tuscumbia and areas known as "The Shoals" recently and referred to as "The Quad Cities" years ago) by offering local newscasts, which for most of the station's 40-plus years were the only TV newscasts concerned specifically with northwestern Alabama. Over time, though, with the Huntsville stations expanding news bureaus of their own into the Shoals, WOWL lost much of its traditional advantage in that regard. Put together with NBC's ratings declines of the 1990s, the owners opted to sell to outside interests, who swapped network affiliation to the upstart United Paramount Network (UPN) and moved the transmitter and tower to Giles County, Tennessee. The relocation was undertaken in order to re-position the station to serve the entire Huntsville-Decatur-Florence market, not just northwestern Alabama as in the past.

In 2004 Lockwood Broadcast Group acquired WHDF. Lockwood Broadcast Group's Broadcast Operation Service Solution provides content delivery and back-office function from Lockwood's Richmond, Virginia Operation Headquarters. Completed in 2007, the "hub" facility has remotely operated WHDF since that year.[2]

In September 2006, both UPN and The WB television network ceased operations. A single new network, The CW, replaced those two struggling entities. WHDF, the UPN affiliate, was granted the northern Alabama affiliation rights for the new network earlier that year, and rebranded as The Valley's CW at Midnight on July 27, 2006. (The former WB affiliate, meanwhile, became WAMY-TV, affiliated with My Network TV.)

Local employees at WHDF's Florence and Huntsville facilities total fewer than ten, according to census business statistics in 2010.

Digital television

Digital channel

Channel Video Aspect PSIP Short Name Programming[3]
15.1 1080i 16:9 WHDF-DT Main WHDF programming / The CW

Analog-to-digital conversion

WHDF shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 15, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.[4] The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 14,[5] using PSIP to display WHDF's virtual channel as 15 on digital television receivers.

References

  1. ↑ Nelson, Bob (2008-10-18). "Call Letter Origins". The Broadcast Archive. Retrieved 2008-10-31.
  2. ↑ http://www.lockwoodbroadcast.com/
  3. ↑ RabbitEars TV Query for WHDF
  4. ↑ List of Digital Full-Power Stations
  5. ↑ CDBS Print
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