WLKY
kW | |
HAAT | 391.6 m (1,285 ft) |
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Transmitter coordinates | 38°22′8.4″N 85°49′47.6″W / 38.369000°N 85.829889°W |
Links | |
Public license information | |
Website | www |
WLKY (channel 32) is a
History
As an ABC affiliate
The station, initially operating an
Kentuckiana Television sold WLKY to Sonderling Broadcasting (which would acquire several radio and television stations in mid-sized markets such as WAST (now
In February 1979, WLKY was forced off the air for three days when the station's transmission facility was directly hit by a lightning strike. The uncertainty of when to return to the air prompted the station to purchase airtime on then-Independent station WDRB (now a Fox affiliate) in order to broadcast their local newscasts, as well as the final two episodes of the long-awaited miniseries Roots: The Next Generations through ABC.[2]: 289
In the spring of 1983, Gannett sold WLKY and
Switch to CBS
On September 8, 1990, WLKY swapped network affiliations with WHAS-TV (by then, owned by the
By this time, however, cable television had gained significant penetration in the Louisville area. Indeed, to this day, cable and satellite are all but essential for acceptable television in much of the
The switch to CBS provided a major windfall for WLKY that winter, as it became Louisville's home for the
Sale to Hearst-Argyle
Pulitzer sold its entire broadcasting division, including WLKY, to what was then Hearst-Argyle Television in 1998. Hearst's aggressive marketing helped make the station a factor in the ratings for the first time in memory, and by the dawn of the new millennium, it was waging a spirited battle with WAVE for the second place slot in the market behind long-dominant WHAS-TV.
Time Warner Cable carriage dispute
On July 9, 2012, WLKY's parent company Hearst Television became involved in a
Programming
WLKY carries the entire CBS network schedule; however, it is the only CBS affiliate that airs The Young and the Restless on a tape delay, airing at 4 p.m., leading into the 5 p.m. newscast. (Since February 2022, an exception has existed on days when CBS airs UEFA Champions League matches; in those cases, Y&R airs in the regular 12:30 p.m. slot with the noon newscast cut to 30 minutes.) Fellow CBS affiliate WNCN in Raleigh, North Carolina also ran the soap opera in the 4 p.m. timeslot from 2016 to 2022.
News operation
WLKY-TV presently broadcasts 41 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 6+1⁄2 hours each weekday, four hours on Saturdays and 5+1⁄2 hours on Sundays); in addition, the station produces the half-hour sports highlight and discussion program Sports Saturday, which airs Saturday nights at 11:35 p.m. WLKY runs an hour-long newscast in the noon timeslot on weekdays, a rarity for both a CBS affiliate and a Hearst-owned station. It is considered a rarity as a CBS affiliate in the fact that CBS' recommended time slot for its daytime shows in the Eastern Time Zone places the aforementioned The Young and the Restless at 12:30 p.m. and
For most of its tenure as an ABC affiliate, WLKY was one of that network's weaker stations in terms of local viewership, usually ranking third in the
In 2008, WLKY changed its branding from WLKY NewsChannel 32 to WLKY News. The station's news helicopter "NewsChopper 32" was also renamed as the "WLKY NewsChopper", and a new graphics package also made its debut. In February 2010, WLKY became the third station in the Louisville market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in a
In February 2012, WLKY debuted a two-hour extension of its weekday morning newscast, airing from 7 to 9 a.m., on its MeTV affiliated second digital subchannel. It competes with the longer-established in-house morning newscast in that timeslot on WDRB.[11] On September 17 of that year, WLKY launched a half-hour 10 p.m. newscast on that same subchannel to compete with WDRB's hour-long prime time newscast (which debuted in 1990) and what was then a WHAS-TV-produced half-hour newscast on CW affiliate WBKI-TV (channel 34) in that slot (the WHAS-TV newscast on WBKI-TV officially ended its run on October 26, 2012; thereafter, syndicated programming replaced the 10 p.m. newscast).[12] WLKY also truncated its morning news program on the MeTV subchannel to one hour, 7–8 a.m., on that date.
Notable former on-air staff
- Michael Gargiulo – reporter (now morning anchor for WNBC in New York City)
- Mark Giangreco – sports anchor (former sports director for WLS-TV in Chicago)
- Dan Lewis – anchor (former evening anchor for KOMO-TV in Seattle)
- Tom Mintier – reporter (later at CNN; died in 2016)
- Diane Sawyer – reporter and weather anchor (1967–1970; former anchor of World News)[2]: 287
- announcer (1986–1990; did voice-overs for rival WAVE)
Technical information
Subchannels
The station's signal is
Channel | Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming |
---|---|---|---|---|
32.1 | 1080i | 16:9 |
WLKY-HD | Main WLKY programming / CBS |
32.2 | 480i | WLKY-SD | MeTV | |
32.3 | SHOP-LC | Shop LC | ||
32.4 | Story | Story Television | ||
32.5 | TheGrio | TheGrio | ||
32.6 | QVC 2 | QVC2
| ||
58.4 | 480i | 16:9 | Movies! | Movies! (WBKI) |
On September 1, 2011, WLKY began carrying the Weigel Broadcasting-owned classic television network MeTV on digital subchannel 32.2, which is also available on Spectrum 188. 32.2 carries CBS programming in case of breaking news or severe weather coverage and special local programming on 32.1. In May 2021, Shop LC was added as part of a bulk group deal with Hearst, though as the network already pays for lifeline cable and satellite carriage, its carriage on WLKY is mainly for the benefit of over-the-air viewers.
Analog-to-digital conversion
WLKY discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over UHF channel 32, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 26,[14][15] using virtual channel 32.
As part of the
Out-of-market coverage
Frankfort
WLKY-TV is available in Kentucky's state capital city of Frankfort (part of the Lexington media market) via Windjammer Communications as well as the Frankfort Plant Board's cable system.[17] The Frankfort area can also pick up WLKY and other Louisville stations along with the Lexington stations with an antenna.
Southern Kentucky
From 1990 until 2007, WLKY (and before the affiliation switch, WHAS-TV),
Northwest Kentucky
In the Evansville, Indiana, market, Crystal Broadband Networks carries WLKY on CBN channel 2 on its lineup for the system's customers in
References
- ^ "Facility Technical Data for WLKY". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
- ^ ISBN 9781879688933.
- ^ Pulitzer Publishing Company's television station in Louisville, WLKY-TV, to join the CBS Television Network as a new affiliate in September, PR Newswire. August 14, 1990.
- The Courier-Journal, April 6, 2008.
- ^ "Time Warner Cable Drops ABC, NBC Affiliates From Packages in 13 Markets - Adweek". AdWeek. July 10, 2012.
- ^ "Time Warner-Hearst Retrans Fight Escalates Over Signal Imports - Adweek". AdWeek. July 10, 2012.
- ^ "The TV Guy - Hal Boedeker". Archived from the original on July 14, 2012.
- ^ "Hearst TV, Time Warner Cable End Viewer Blackout".
- ^ "WLKY, DirecTV Reach Impasse in Negotiations". WLKY News.
- ^ Redding, Rick. "At the Sweeps Half, WLKY Winning". LouisvilleKY.com. Archived from the original on March 13, 2012. Retrieved August 2, 2011.
- ^ WLKY Adding News Hours in Mornings on Digital Channel Archived May 8, 2014, at the Wayback Machine, LouisvilleKY.com, January 30, 2012.
- ^ LOUISVILLE: WLKY launching 10 p.m. newscast tonight Archived May 8, 2014, at the Wayback Machine, September 17, 2012.
- ^ "Digital TV Market Listing for WLKY". RabbitEars.Info. Retrieved January 26, 2017.
- ^ "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and Second Rounds" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on August 29, 2013. Retrieved March 24, 2012.
- ^ "CDBS Print".
- ^ "UPDATED List of Participants in the Analog Nightlight Program" (PDF). Federal Communications Commission. June 12, 2009. Retrieved June 4, 2012.
- ^ Frankfort Plant Board - Preferred Cable Lineup
- Park City Daily News. Bowling Green, Kentucky. September 8, 1990. p. 2A. Retrieved February 18, 2024 – via Google Books.
- ^ "WLKY-32 is added to cable lineup". Park City Daily News. Bowling Green, Kentucky. January 8, 1991. p. 2A. Retrieved February 18, 2024 – via Google Books.
- ^ "Channel Lineup - Mediacom".
- ^ "Channel Lineup - Mediacom".
- ^ "SCRTC Cable Channel Lineup for Barren/Metcalfe/Hart County (2015)" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on June 26, 2015. Retrieved April 23, 2015.
- ^ "CBN Channel Lineup".