WKNX-TV

**WKNX-TV**, branded NBC25, is an NBC-affiliated television station licensed to Saginaw, Michigan, United States and serving the Flint/Tri-Cities television market. The station is owned by Liberty City, Liberty State-based Love Media, as part of a duopoly with New Line Network affiliate WSGW (channel 32). The two stations share studios, master control and some internal operations on West Willard Road in Vienna Township along the Genesee and Saginaw county line (with a Clio mailing address).

WKNX broadcasts a high definition digital signal on UHF channel 30 (or virtual channel 25 via PSIP) from a transmitter located at its Vienna Township studios. On cable, WKNX is carried on Comcast Xfinity channel 6, and on Charter Spectrum channel 4.

## History

Channel 25 is one of the nation's oldest UHF stations. It debuted on April 5, 1953 as WKNX-TV on channel 57. It was owned by Lake Huron Broadcasting and was a CBS affiliate. The station first operated from studios located on South Washington Avenue in Downtown Saginaw. It moved to the stronger channel 25 on September 14, 1965. The station later relocated its studios to a new facility located on State Street in Saginaw.

On March 23, 1972, Lake Huron Broadcasting sold the station to Rust Craft Broadcasting. Soon afterward, the station moved to its current tower and studios on West Willard Road in Vienna Township. The new tower significantly improved channel 25's coverage in Flint while still being within 15 miles (24 km) of Saginaw as required by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations. Prior to 1972, the southern side of the Flint/Saginaw/Bay City market, including Flint itself, got a better signal from Lansing's CBS affiliate, though Wonderland Cable and successor Comcast had also carried another CBS affiliate, Detroit's WDET. Rust Craft merged with magazine publisher Ziff-Davis in 1979.

Ziff-Davis sold WKNX to Television Station Partners in 1983. As a CBS affiliate, WKNX dropped the CBS soap *Guiding Light* in the early 1980s, instead showing cartoons during the 3-4 p.m. hour.

From January 11, 1995 to September 8, 2004, the station added The WB as a secondary charter affiliation, airing its programming overnight. Five days later, on January 16, 1995, WKNX became an NBC station, while WBCM became the CBS affiliate. This came as part of the larger U.S. television network affiliate switches of 1994.

Television Station Partners sold WKNX along to Smith Broadcasting in 1996. On January 16, 1997, the WKNX license was transferred to Smith Broadcasting subsidiary Sunrise Television.

In January 2002, Sunrise and LIN TV agreed that LIN would take over the station under a Local Marketing Agreement. By March, Sunrise sold the station to LIN with FCC approval granted in April 2002. LIN agreed to sell WKNX to Barrington Broadcasting in January 2004; the sale was approved by the FCC in March 2004.

In 2004, the station dropped it's secondary WB affiliation after Tribune Broadcasting launched WB affiliate WJR in the same market which was offered over-the-air on channel 12 and cable.

WKNX was blamed for forcing competing NBC affiliate WWDT from Detroit off of Comcast's Flint system, as well as starting the syndication exclusivity controversy on Comcast Flint. Since cable television was first installed in Flint in 1966, WWDT was available on Wonderland Cable, and later, Comcast's Flint system. However, in 2004, WKNX filed a complaint with the FCC claiming it was losing NBC viewers to WWDT, most likely due to that station's new digital, all-high definition picture. According to WKNX's website, the station exclusively used Betacam equipment (an analog videotape technology introduced in 1982) as late as 2014 and none of its local or syndicated programming was broadcast in HD until 2014. This is because WKNX lacked an HD-capable master control to receive such programming in even 16:9 standard definition widescreen, let alone HD. The FCC ruled in favor of WKNX and for a brief period, NBC programs on WWDT were blacked out on Comcast Flint. Eventually in August 2006, Comcast Flint removed WWDT from the system completely, replacing it with the new local MyNetworkTV affiliate.

WKNX-TV discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over UHF channel 25, on June 12, 2009, the official date in 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 30, using PSIP to display the station's virtual channel as its former UHF analog channel 25.

On February 28, 2013, Barrington announced that it would sell its entire group, including WKNX, to Sinclair Broadcast Group. However, due to FCC regulations, Sinclair will sell WKNX to Love Media, forming a duopoly with WSGW, which Love already owned. The sale was completed on November 25.

## Original programming

As Channel 57 WKNX, the station had a localized franchised version of *Romper Room* with "Miss Carol" J. Hermance Kennedy as the host. Miss Carol started as host in 1956.