WFAA-TV

Encyclopedia : W : WF : WFA : WFAA-TV

---

WFAA-TV ("WFAA 8") is the ABC television affiliate serving the Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas DMA. Its transmitter is located in Cedar Hill. It is the flagship station of the Belo Corporation, which also owns The Dallas Morning News.

History

WFAA signed on as DuMont affiliate KBTV on September 17, 1949. (Note: The callsign KBTV was used for years by Channel 9, the ABC (now NBC) affiliate in Denver, but now belongs to Channel 4, the Beaumont, Texas NBC station.) WFAA was the first TV station in Dallas and the second in the Metroplex behind WBAP-TV (now KXAS). The station became WFAA (after sister radio station WFAA-AM) on March 21, 1950, not long after the station was purchased by Belo in the midst of a FCC television license freeze from 1948 to 1952. It became a dual affiliate of ABC and NBC in 1951 before becoming a full ABC affiliate in 1957.

WFAA was the first station to break the news that President Kennedy was shot to death on November 22, 1963. The station conducted the first live television interview with Abraham Zapruder, who shot the famous Zapruder film, about an hour and a half after the President's death. WFAA and its live remote unit fed much coverage of the assassination and its aftermath to the ABC network over the next four days. The shocking and unexpected shooting of accused assassin Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby in the basement of Dallas Police Headquarters, however, was not broadcast live (as on NBC) or on tape (as on CBS a minute later) by WFAA/ABC as their live truck was positioned elsewhere at the time. ABC was thus only able to show delayed newsreel footage of the historic event.

WFAA dominated the Metroplex ratings for local news from the mid 1970s until the late 1990s, with talent such as Tracy Rowlett, Iola Johnson, Bob Gooding, John Criswell, Chip Moody, John McCaa, Gloria Campos, Scott Sams, Verne Lundquist, Dale Hansen, and Troy Dungan. Former News Director turned Belo executive Marty Haag is credited for leading the station to ratings dominance and national prominence.

WFAA became the first TV station in the Dallas/Fort Worth area to broadcast in HDTV in February 1997. The station is the only ABC affiliate to broadcast HDTV in 1080i format; other ABC affiliates broadcast in 720p.

Newscasts

Monday-Friday

• News 8 Daybreak - 5 a.m.-7 a.m.
• Good Morning Texas - 9 a.m.-10 a.m.
• News 8 Midday - noon-1 p.m.
• News 8 at 5 - 5 p.m.-5:30 p.m.
• News 8 at 6 - 6 p.m.-6:30 p.m.
• The News 8 Update - 10 p.m.-10:35 p.m.

Saturday

• News 8 Daybreak Saturday - 7 a.m.-8:30 a.m.
• News 8 at 6 - 6 p.m.-6:30 p.m.
• The News 8 Update - 10 p.m.-10:35 p.m.

Sunday

• News 8 Daybreak Sunday - 8 a.m.-9:30 a.m.
• News 8 at 5:30 - 5:30 p.m.-6 p.m.
• The News 8 Update - 10 p.m.-10:20 p.m.
• Dale Hansen's Sports Special - 10:20 p.m.-10:45 p.m.
• Dodge High School Sports Special - 10:45 p.m.-11 p.m.

Trivia

• WFAA-TV is one of the few television stations west of the Mississippi River with a callsign beginning with a W. The FCC normally assigns stations west of the Mississippi callsigns that begin with K; W is only used east of the Mississippi. The reason WFAA-TV is different is that its callsign came from its sibling WFAA-AM, whose callsign predates this FCC policy.
• WFAA is the only station in the Metroplex market not to be owned and operated by any major network.

Ratings

WFAA has traditionally been one of the highest-rated local news operations in the country and was dominant in the Dallas-Fort Worth marketplace for years. However, over the past ten years WFAA has lost over half its local news audience - sometimes much more - in every local news time period. As of the May 2006 Nielsen ratings period, WFAA finds itself firmly in third place at 6AM and 10PM and now also finds its long-standing 5PM and 6PM dominance threatened by competitors KXAS and KDFW.

WFAA had also a FM radio station in Dallas. It was 97.9, but now WFAA does not own it and it is currently an urban radio station called KBFB-FM, 97.9 The Beat.

References

• Shannon, Mike (January, 2004). [Dallas-Fort Worth TV Station History. ''The History of Dallas-Fort Worth Radio and Television].

External links

• [WFAA-TV Website]
• [Query the FCC's TV station database for WFAA-TV]

 

---

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

Search Titles

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

?