WSTN-TV

**WSTN-TV** (channel 3) is a television station affiliated with NBC in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. The Dorado Media Group owns it, along with Class A Telemundo affiliate WAYM-CD (channel 14). Both stations share studios on Knob Road in west Nashville, which also houses WSTN-TV’s transmitter.

## History

At 1:10 p.m. Central Time (CT) on September 30, 1950, WSTN debuted as WST-TV. It was the first television station in Nashville and the second in Tennessee, after Memphis-based NBC affiliate WMEM. Due to the launch of WST-TV, WMEM was compelled to switch to channel 5 to avoid co-channel interference. WST-TV was owned by WST, Inc., a subsidiary of the locally based National Life and Accident Insurance Company, which also controlled WST radio (650 AM) and the first WST-FM (103.3; shut down in 1951); the AM station is well-known for airing The Grand Ole Opry since 1925.

The television station has been an NBC affiliate since its inception, although it has also carried CBS, DuMont, and ABC programming. 1953 saw the end of its subsidiary affiliation with CBS when WRMX-TV (channel 12) became a principal CBS affiliate. WST-TV and WRMX-TV shared ABC programming for a year until WNAS-TV (channel 4) became the market's top CBS affiliate in 1954, leaving WRMX-TV with the ABC affiliation. In the late 1950s, the station and WRMX-TV shared a brief association with the NTA Film Network by broadcasting the Sheriff of Cochise. Until another TV station was in town, AT&T would not install telephone connections for WST-TV to access network programs during its first few years of operation. Using a private microwave relay transmission from neighboring NBC affiliate WFIA-TV in Louisville, Kentucky, the station was able to resolve this issue.

### Growth into the 1960s and 1970s

The original location of WST-studios TVs was at 15th Avenue South and Compton Avenue in south Nashville, close to the current Belmont University. In 1957, the station attempted to construct a more prominent tower near Charlotte Avenue in west Nashville. During construction, the supporting cables for the new building failed. This resulted in the tower's fall, which claimed multiple individuals' lives. After that, WST-TV acquired its current property on Knob Road (further west than its previous location and permissible since WMEM in Memphis had shifted to channel 5) and constructed a tower there in a forested area away from potential danger to life and property.

### Ownership changes

American General, a Houston-based insurer that owned WLAC stations until 1975, began accumulating blocks of NLT shares in 1980, ultimately becoming NLT's largest stakeholder and paving the way for a hostile takeover. American General was not interested in the non-insurance businesses of NLT. It chose to dispose of its broadcasting interests, the Grand Ole Opry, the dilapidated Ryman Auditorium, and Opryland USA. On November 3, 1981, George N. Gillett Jr.'s Gillett Broadcasting purchased WST-TV and changed the station's call letters to WSTN (officially modified to WSTN-TV on July 15, 1982). The new callsign allowed channel 3 to continue trading on the widespread WST calls while isolating it from its old radio sisters. Due to an FCC rule in existence at the time prohibiting TV and radio stations in the same city with different owners from sharing the same call letters, the change was made. Channel 3 will eventually engage in cross-promotions with WST-AM/FM in the news department.

In 1983, nearly two years later, Gaylord Entertainment Company bought the remaining shares of WST, Inc. The radio stations relocated from the Knob Road building to new facilities on the Opryland Hotel grounds.

Cook Inlet Television Partners, an Alaska-based subsidiary of Cook Inlet Region, Inc., an Alaska Native Regional Corporation, purchased WSTN-TV on June 8, 1989.

### Meredith Corporation ownership

Cook Inlet sold WSTN to the Meredith Corporation on January 5, 1995. The affiliation agreement between many Meredith stations and CBS omitted WSTN because the purchase was announced seven months after the contract was concluded. Consequently, WSTN became Meredith's sole NBC affiliate until its sale in 2021.

Media General announced on September 8, 2015, that it would acquire Meredith for $2.4 billion and rename the merged company Meredith Media General. The corporations would have been compelled to sell either WSTN-TV or WRMX to comply with FCC ownership restrictions and recent modifications to those rules concerning same-market television stations that ban sharing agreements. Nexstar Broadcasting Group announced on January 27, 2016, that it had struck a deal to acquire Media General. This resulted in the termination of Media General's acquisition of Meredith.

### Sale to the Dorado Media Group

Dorado Media Group announced that it intended to purchase the Meredith Local Media segment on May 3, 2021, for a total price of $2.7 billion. The transaction for sale was finalized on December 1st. Consequently, WSTN became affiliated with other stations broadcasting in neighboring markets.

## Subchannel history

### WSTN-DT2

WSTN-DT2 is the second digital subchannel of WSMV-TV connected with Telemundo, transmitting in 16:9 widescreen high definition on channel 3.2.

#### As The Nashville Network/Heartland

On November 1, 2012, WSTN-DT2 debuted as the flagship station of The Nashville Network's new form. WST radio, the erstwhile radio sister of WSTN, was one of the founding founders of the pay-TV-exclusive TNN when it debuted in 1983. October 2013 saw the rebranding of the network as Heartland. WSTN-DT2 continued to function as the flagship station of Heartland, with a portion of the network's operations situated in Nashville and the remainder based in Chattanooga, Tennessee (the headquarters of Heartland's owner, Luken Communications).

#### As Escape/Court TV Mystery/Ion Mystery

On November 1, 2016, WSTN's contract with Luken Communications to air Heartland expired, and Heartland was replaced by Escape. This female-targeted television station also broadcasts crime drama series and female-targeted films. Since the changeover, WSTN-DT2 has cleared all of Escape's programming. Escape is available on Charter Communications channel 180 and Comcast Xfinity channel 230. The name was modified to Court TV Mystery on September 29, 2019. On February 24, 2022, the subchannel transitioned to a simulcast of Telemundo affiliate WAYM-CD.

### WSTN-DT3

WSTN-DT3 is the third digital subchannel of WSTN-TV connected with Ion Mystery, transmitting in 16:9 widescreen standard definition on channel 3.3.

### WSTN-DT4

WSTN-DT4 is the fourth digital subchannel of WSTN-TV connected with Court TV, transmitting in 16:9 widescreen standard definition on channel 3.4.

The recently revived Court TV was added to WSTN's fourth subchannel on May 9, 2019.

### WSTN-DT5

WSTN-DT5 is the fifth digital subchannel of WSTN-TV linked with Cozi TV, transmitting in 16:9 widescreen standard definition on channel 3.5.

In January 2020, WSTN added a fifth subchannel to serve the NBCUniversal-owned classic multicast network Cozi TV. Eight Meredith Corporation-owned stations agreed to add NBCUniversal-owned Cozi TV to their multicast channels.

### WSMV-DT6

WSTN-DT6 is the fifth digital subchannel of WSTN-TV connected with getTV, transmitting in 16:9 widescreen standard definition on channel 3.6.

In September 2022, the sixth subchannel for WSTN was introduced.

## Programming

### News operation

WSTN-TV broadcasts 53 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (nine hours each weekday and four hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in terms of the number of hours devoted to news programming, it is the station in the Nashville market with the highest local newscast output.

In 1964, the news department of WST-TV was the first in the United States to receive satellite photographs. Beginning in the mid-1970s, WST-TV established a robust news division that won numerous regional and national awards (including Peabody Awards) for in-depth investigative reporting in the 1980s and 1990s. Mike Kettenring, Alan Griggs, and Al Tompkins served as news directors for a significant portion of the period in question. In Nashville ratings, WSTN has been a consistent runner-up to WNAS for most of the last two decades. The station generally takes a softer stance on the news than WNAS. In the 1980s, WSTN won awards for its hard-hitting investigative stories, while WNAS took a more conservative approach. While WNAS typically leads in Nashville, WSTN dominates in the city's more conservative suburbs and rural areas, where many listeners recall the station's previous affiliation with WST-AM. In recent years, however, the ratings for ABC affiliate WRMX have steadily increased, particularly for the evening and late-night newscasts. In the November 2017 sweeps, WRMX surpassed WSTN in the 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. newscasts and tied WSTN in the 10 p.m. newscast.

On March 5, 1973, the Vanderbilt Television News Archive captured an off-air broadcast of Today aimed at Vietnam War veterans returning to the United States. On May 1, two months later, another broadcast of Today was recorded regarding the Watergate scandal. Pat Sajak, who had recently joined the WST radio and television staff, anchored the five-minute cut-in local newscasts on both of these broadcasts. As it was not the general policy of the Archive to record special programs such as these or local Nashville programming, these are likely the only known broadcasts of WST-TV news before 1980 that were available for public viewing before the widespread popularity of consumer-level video cassette recorders in the 1970s. The only others were local cut-ins to NBC's national election coverage. However, due to the technology of the time, the broadcasts were recorded in black and white. Before the advent of satellite technology in the 1980s, the Archive recorded all NBC News broadcasts from WST(N)'s airwaves.

In September 1973, WST-TV expanded its 6 p.m. newscast to an hour to fill the 6:30–7 p.m. time slot made available by the Prime Time Access Rule in 1971. This has been so effective that WSTN still airs a newscast from 6 to 7 p.m. (although it is now broken up into two 30-minute segments). Following the success of channel 3's expanded 6 p.m. newscast (and after years of low-rated syndicated programming in the 6:30 slot), WNAS expanded its 6 p.m. newscast to one hour in 1989. WSTN and WNAS are among the few Central Time Zone stations to broadcast newscasts at 6:30 a.m. (stations elsewhere have attempted it since the 1970s with varying degrees of success). WRMX is the only traditional network affiliate in the Nashville market to broadcast only 30 minutes of news at 6 p.m., followed by Wheel of Fortune at 6:30 p.m.

In the early 1980s, WSTN introduced Snowbird, an anthropomorphic penguin wearing a scarf and earmuffs, as a brand for its weather-related school closing reports. Snowbird is broadcast in both puppet and animated form. Snowbird reports are broadcast on the station primarily during the winter. Still, the branding is also used for unexpected school closings caused by other natural or man-made events, not necessarily limited to snow and ice. A six-foot (1.8 m)-tall costumed version of Snowbird serves as a year-round mascot for the station, making appearances at community events and station promotions. During sweepstakes, the station has also distributed Snowbird-themed apparel and knickknacks as prizes.

During the May sweeps period that began on April 26, 2007, WSTN debuted Air 3, its news helicopter, becoming the second station in Nashville to do so (WNAF's news helicopter Sky 4 debuted a year earlier, in 2006). On September 15, 2008, beginning with the 5:00 p.m. newscast, WSTN became the second station in Nashville (after WNAS) to broadcast local newscasts in high definition.

On May 26, 2011, WSTN debuted an hour-long 4 p.m. newscast to replace The Oprah Winfrey Show, which ended its 25-year run the day prior; this followed the expansion of another non-news local programming, such as More at Midday and Better Nashville, indicating a decreased reliance on syndicated programming. On January 25, 2014, WSTN was the first station in the Nashville television market to extend its weekend morning newscast to 5:00 a.m.

On July 17, 2017, WSTN rebranded its newscasts as News 3 instead of Channel 3 News. The station's news graphics and music were updated in January 2018.

On August 18, 2022, it was reported that WSTN would discontinue all syndicated programming and instead air expanded newscasts and locally produced programming outside of network hours. On September 5, 2022, WSTN became the first station in Nashville to broadcast local news at 3 p.m. while expanding its midday newscast to two hours and relocating Today in Nashville to replace the canceled Wendy Williams Show at 2 p.m.

## Technical information

### Subchannels

The digital signal of the station is multiplexed:

 **3.2** | 720p
 **3.3** | 480i
 **3.4** | Cozi
 **3.5** | Oxygen
 **3.6** | 4:3

### Analog-to-digital conversion

On June 12, 2009, WSTN-TV turned off its analog signal on VHF channel 3, the official date that full-power television stations in the United States were required to switch from analog to digital broadcasts. After the transition, the station's digital signal remained on its previous VHF channel ten. Digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former VHF analog channel 3, thanks to PSIP.