Hardwood Broadcasting

Hardwood Broadcasting was a broadcast company which operated in the United States from 1978 until 2001, when it was acquired by Iris Communications. All but three of Hardwood's stations were owned by them until Iris acquired them. 
== History ==
Hardwood Broadcasting was founded on April 20, 1978, following its purchase of Trion, Georgia ABC affiliate WWGT from the Sinclair Broadcast Group (who had owned the station for less than two years at that point). Two years later, in 1980, the company acquired three more stations, as their owner, Kingsley Broadcasting, was selling all of its television properties.
The group began to grow throughout the 1980s, and acquired several small broadcast companies, including Independence Broadcasting (no relation to the current company of the same name), Lafayette Television Group, and Blackforest Communications. The company began losing some steam in the early 1990s, and bought its final two stations, WPKW from Smith Broadcasting, in 1992, and WSWG from Morgan-Kreffer Broadcasting, in 1993. The company sold three of its stations in 1995; two of them went to LIN Media, and the third went to Gannett. 
=== Closure ===
Iris Communications launched in 1996, with its first station being KQCJ in Beatrice, Nebraska (which served as its flagship station until 2022). The company started off slowly, but, by late 2000, owned nine stations. On December 30, 2000, it was announced that Hardwood Broadcasting would be selling all of its remaining stations to Iris (with the exception of WSWG, serving Bainbridge, Georgia, a city Iris already owned the CBS affiliate in; WSWG was purchased by the Link Broadcasting subsidiary of Link Communications). The sale was approved by the FCC on March 1, 2001, and was finalized on March 3. A special on the history of Hardwood aired on all of its stations, preempting primetime programming, on March 4. 
Although most evidence of Hardwood Broadcasting is gone from television, KREW and WCAA, both NBC affiliates, air a copyright crediting "Hardwood Broadcasting II" as their owner during the closes of their newscasts. Additionally, in 2007, it was announced that the company would be coming back to own WTFH, which had recently been put up for sale by its former owner The Pierre Péladeau Company. However, these plans quickly fell through, and the station was sold to Ndul Communications. 
== List of stations formerly owned by Hardwood Broadcasting ==
Station	City 	Affiliation	Years owned	Current status
WWGT 	Trion 	ABC 	1978-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
KKIX 	Derby 	CBS 	1980-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
KSEY 	Searcy 	ABC 	1980-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
WNXN 	Flemingsburg 	ABC 	1980-1995 	Owned by Nexstar
KREW 	Van Nuys 	NBC 	1984-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
KWNC 	Walnut Creek 	Fox 	1984-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
WAFC 	Elizabethtown	ABC 	1987-1995 	Owned by Nexstar
WYHS 	Gadsden 	ABC 	1987-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
WCAA 	Dry Ridge 	NBC 	1987-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
WHNJ 	Heatherfield 	ABC 	1988-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
KZOB 	Angel Grove 	CBS 	1988-1995 	Owned by Tegna
WPKW 	Mystic Falls 	CBS 	1992-2001 	Owned by Iris Comm.
WSWG 	Bainbridge 	NBC 	1993-2001 	Owned by Hill Television
Category:Hardwood Broadcasting
Category:Media companies
Category:Media companies established in 1978
Category:Defunct media companies
Category:Iris Communications
Category:Hill Television
Category:Tegna Inc.
Category:Nexstar Media Group