WQHG

**WQHG**, virtual channel 5 (UHF digital channel 25) is a Fox owned-and-operated television station licensed to Quahog, Rhode Island, United States. The station is owned by the Fox Television Stations subsidiary of 21st Century Fox.

## History

### Early history

WQHG signed on for the first time on September 22, 1948. It was Rhode Island's first television station. The station was originally owned by Toledo, Ohio-based Fort Industry Company, along with WQHG radio (AM 920, now; and FM 95.5, now occupied by). Fort Industry would later be renamed Storer Broadcasting after the company's founder, George B. Storer.

WQHG initially carried programming from all four networks of the time (NBC, ABC, DuMont, and CBS), but originally was a primary CBS affiliate due to Storer founder George Storer being a member of the CBS board, and most of its stations were CBS affiliates. Despite this, WQHG only carried a little more than half of CBS's program schedule during its early years on the air; WQHG also broadcast about half of the NBC network schedule and a couple of shows each from ABC and DuMont every week. It lost ABC in 1953 when WTFR-TV signed on, and lost NBC in 1955 when WQUA-TV (now WXIQ) launched. When WTFR-TV went dark in 1956, WQHG shared ABC programming with WQUA-TV until WRIX signed on in 1963. During the late 1950s, WQHG was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network. In 1954, WQHG received national attention for its coverage of Hurricane Carol.

On January 1, 1961, WQHG and WQUA-TV swapped networks: channel 5 became an NBC affiliate. Their secondary affiliations with ABC continued during this swap.

For many years in the 1970s, WQHG broadcast men's basketball games of Providence College and the University of Rhode Island, with Chris Clark calling play-by-play. In the early 1970s, when PC was one of the top teams in the country (and the top college basketball team in New England), their home games at the newly opened Providence Civic Center were often sellouts, despite the fact that WQHG televised many of these home games live.

In 1979, the station's studios were moved to their current location in an industrial area on the outskirts of Quahog. Adhering to the design of the studios of most of its sister television stations at the time, WQHG's current studio building is a modern interpretation of an Antebellum mansion.

After Storer Broadcasting was bought out by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts in 1985, the station underwent a series of ownership changes. KKR sold the stations to Gillett Communications in 1987; shortly thereafter, SCI Television was spun off from Gillett to acquire the stations after the latter company filed for bankruptcy. After Gillett defaulted on some of its financing agreements in the early 1990s, its ownership was restructured and the company was renamed SCI Television. Eventually, SCI ran into fiscal issues, and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 1993. New World Communications purchased WQHG and the other SCI stations in 1993.

### As a Fox station

On December 18, 1993, Fox outbid CBS for the rights to the NFL's National Football Conference television package. Fox then signed a long-term station affiliation and program development deal with New World Communications on May 23, 1994, which resulted in Fox affiliating with most of the company's "Big Three" network affiliates, effective that fall.

WQHG affiliated with Fox on December 10, 1994; NBC, which was unable to come to deals with WXIQ (which was sold to CBS in response) and automatically WRIX, affiliated with the market's original Fox affiliate, WURI (channel 24). After WXIQ's sale was completed, that station (which had been an ABC affiliate since 1977) swapped affiliations with WRIX effective September 10, 1995, WRIX reunited with ABC while WXIQ became a CBS owned-and-operated station. The four stations produced a special, "New Season, New Stations" to remind Quahog viewers of what stations were airing the Big Four's fall lineup, the first full fall season since the two affiliation swaps during the previous year.

Fox Television Stations bought most New World stations, including WQHG, in July 1996; the purchase was finalized on January 22, 1997, making WQHG the second network-owned station in the market (CBS owned WXIQ for parts of 1995 and 1996 before selling it to Clear Channel Communications).

In its earliest days, WQHG's logo included a Rhode Island Red rooster, the state bird of Rhode Island. Prior to WQHG's purchase by Fox, it had included various versions of a different stylized "5" accompanied by the WQHG call letters. This had been in effect for the previous twenty years. The stylized "5" was initially retained after the purchase, but with the Fox logo attached to the left-hand side and the call letters removed. This was dropped in 1997 in favor of a "Fox 5" logo.

## National Slogans

* All the Best on TV-5 (1976-1978; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* TV-5 See Us (1978-1979; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* TV-5, Proud As A Peacock! (1979-1981; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* TV-5, Our Pride is Showing (1981-1982; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* TV-5, Just Watch Us Now (1982-1983; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* TV-5 There, Be There (1983-1984; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* TV-5, Let's All Be There (1984-1986; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* Come Home to TV-5 (1986-1987; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* Come on Home to TV-5 (1987-1988; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* Come Home to the Best, Only on TV-5 (1988-1990; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* WQHG. The Place To Be (1990-1992; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* It's Here on TV-5 (1992-1993; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* Got Everybody Watching WQHG (1993-1994; localized version of NBC ad campaign)
* It's TV-5! (1994; localized version of NBC ad campaign, and last slogan before switching to Fox in 1994)
* TV-5 and FOX (1994-1995; localized version of Fox ad campaign (FOX is Kickin' It))
* TV-5's Cool Like Us (1995-1996; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* Non-Stop FOX 5 (1996-1997; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* Just One FOX 5 (1997-1999; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* If It's Really Special, It's On FOX 5 (1999-2002; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* FOX 5 Now (2002-2006; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* First on FOX 5 (2006-2007; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* FOX 5 On, FOX 5 Off (2007-2008; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* So Quahog, So FOX 5 (2008-2014; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* We are FOX 5 (2014-present; localized version of Fox ad campaign)
* We are 70 Years, We are FOX 5 (2018-present; localized version of Fox ad campaign)

## Current On-Air Staff

### Anchors

* Tom Tucker
* Diane Simmons

### Weather

* Ollie Williams
* Greg the Weather Mine

### Reporters

* Trisha Takanawa
* Maria Jimenez