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WITI
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| WITI | |
|---|---|
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| Milwaukee, Wisconsin | |
| Branding | WITI, FOX6 Milwaukee |
| Slogan | The Most Powerful Name in Local News (news); Just You Watch the Best (general) |
| Channels | Analog: 6 (VHF) Digital: 33 (UHF) |
| Affiliations | Fox |
| Owner | Fox Television Stations |
| Founded | May 21, 1956 |
| Call letters meaning | Independent Television Inc. (original owner) |
| Former affiliations | Independent (1956-1959) CBS (1959-1961), (1977-1994) ABC (1961-1977) |
| Website | MyFoxMilwaukee.com |
WITI is a Fox network owned-and-operated television station (O&O) located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Its signal covers most of southeastern Wisconsin including the cities of Racine, Kenosha, Sheboygan and Waukesha. Its transmitter is located in Shorewood, Wisconsin. The station is the only major network O&O in the Milwaukee market.
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WITI's call letters stand for "Independent Television, Inc.," the corporation that originally owned the FCC license granted on June 11, 1955. The station began broadcasting on May 21, 1956.
From 1956 to 1959 WITI used the DuMont Vitascan color system. The station returned to monochrome cameras when it moved to the building on North 27th Street.[1]
On August 8, 1958, Storer Broadcasting bought WITI in hopes of affiliating the station with the CBS network, which at the time had a UHF O&O in Milwaukee (WXIX channel 19; now WVTV channel 18). WITI became a CBS affiliate on April 1, 1959. At that time, WITI moved from its original facility in Mequon to the former WCAN-TV/WXIX studios on N. 27th Street (later used from 1980 until 1994 by WCGV channel 24).
In 1961, WITI would undergo an affiliation switch. CBS, then carried by WITI, desired to affiliate with WISN-TV, since the station's radio stations were already affiliated with the network. As a result, WITI and WISN swapped affiliations, and WITI became an ABC affiliate on April 2, 1961.
The switch was reversed in 1977. WITI's owner at the time, Storer Broadcasting, had a bitter relationship with ABC, stemming from the network's departure from Storer's San Diego UHF station, KCST, a station the network was forced to affiliate with after KCST fought successfully to have ABC affiliation stripped from Tijuana, Mexico-based XETV. At the same time, Storer had a strong relationship with CBS in other markets where they owned stations. Hence, they dropped ABC from WITI to take the CBS affiliation back from WISN. Without hesitation, WISN aligned with ABC, then the top network in the country. The switch occurred on March 27, 1977. In 1978, the station would move to new studios at the northwest corner of N. Green Bay and Brown Deer Roads.
George N. Gillett Jr. bought the station from Storer Broadcasting in 1987. After a series of mergers and bankruptcies, New World Communications became owners of the station in 1993, despite rumors of CBS buying the station (along with WITI's sisters that carried CBS).
In the beginning of December 1994, WITI dropped CBS (which moved to WDJT (Channel 58)) and instead affiliated with Fox. The reasoning went beyond the switching of all New World stations to Fox, because the station had carried Green Bay Packers games since 1977 from CBS, which up to 1994 had the NFC contract for NFL games; by switching affiliations, except for a period of three months in 1994 (when WCGV was still the Fox affiliate), WITI was able to remain the 'home station' of the Packers since Fox held the NFC contract.
From February 1995 on, the station would be known as "Six is News" throughout the day in order to highlight the station's newly-expanded news schedule. Conversely during Fox prime time hours, the station was promoted as "Fox is Six" to try to build an audience for the growing network on the stronger Milwaukee station. (A similar move took place with WJW in Cleveland, which branded itself "ei8ht is News" and "Fox is ei8ht," playing off of an old 1969 station logo.)
In 1996, Fox's Television Stations Group bought WITI and the remaining New World stations outright, and after the approval of the sale in January 1997, the station was rebranded as "FOX SIX" for all programming and station promotions, with the channel number still fully spelled out. Channel 6 officially became "Fox 6" in April 1998 with the introduction of their current news set.
Regional sports network FSN Wisconsin has been based out of WITI's studios since 2004. Currently no programming except for the Sunday late night Packers program Fox 6 Blitz is shared between the two stations, and both have separate on-air staff.
In 2006, WITI celebrated its 50th anniversary with an hour-long special.[1]
After the station installed a new graphics and control switcher on the morning of September 29, 2007 [2], the station finally switched to the current red/white/blue color scheme of Fox O&O's, along with news graphics. However only the coloring of the logo changed, and it did not take on the vertical stacking look of other other Fox station logos; this is most likely because the current horizontal logo form is heavily integrated into the news set, and the news set design is still considered fresh enough not to need a change. The set is already one of the largest in the FTSG used for newscasts.
More emphasis on the station's website has been inserted into newscasts since the beginning of the 2007-08 season, including online chats during newscasts and sports programming, and two webcams in the studio turned on 24/7 to give viewers a behind the scenes look into the station's newscasts.
On June 13, 2007, Fox's parent company, News Corporation, planned to sell the station, along with eight other owned and operated stations.[3]
WITI, being a Fox O&O, airs a great deal of programming from Twentieth Television, including sitcoms (such as Malcolm in the Middle), court shows (like Divorce Court and Christina's Court) and reality programming (like COPS). WITI double-runs Judge Judy and Judge Joe Brown in the afternoons, and Seinfeld before Fox prime time and in late night. The station airs many of Twentieth's series under test runs before they go into national syndication for non-Fox stations, including Texas Justice, A Current Affair, Good Day Live, Geraldo at Large, and currently Fox's mid-morning The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet. The station also airs TMZ on TV weeknights after the late airing of Seinfeld, with a next-day repeat after the noon news, and American Idol Rewind, Alias, and Stargate SG-1 on weekends.
WITI had also aired episodes of M*A*S*H since the 1977 CBS/ABC affiliation switch, first within its CBS series run and then on into syndication WISN-TV channel 12 originally aired syndicated M*A*S*H reruns at 5 pm and 10:30 pm and then later at 11 PM along with other varied time periods when M*A*S*H originally sold in syndicated. WITI gained syndication rights to the show in the 1990s after a long and successful run on WISN. At the time when WITI was a ABC affiliate, in the early 1970s they pre-empted The Dick Cavett Show in favor of old movies, it was shown instead on WVTV-TV when it was a independent station at the time, also they pre-empted All My Children in favor of the noon news. As of September 10, 2007 however, the show is no longer on the schedule, although the rights remain with WITI in case of a syndication failure in the 2007-08 season [4].
As was the case with many of the stations acquired from New World, WITI has never aired Fox's children's block in either the Fox Kids or the current 4Kids TV iterations. The block stayed with WCGV for ten years after WITI took the Fox affiliation and in September 2004 moved to independent station WMLW-CA channel 41.
The station celebrated 50 years on the air in 2006, with promotions showing the station's history throughout the year which started airing on New Year's Day, along with a 50th anniversary special during the May sweeps period. They also aired the December 21 NFL Network Packer/Viking game locally [5]. In 2007 the NFL Network game will be carried on WISN-TV instead.
Since Channel 6 became a Fox O&O, the station has put more emphasis on its local newscasts, and currently runs at least forty hours of news a week. The station's newscasts usually place a strong third behind WTMJ and WISN (both of whom fight it out for first place), though the morning newscast (Fox 6 Wakeup News) is very competitive with the national network shows, and occasionally comes in first in the ratings because of the program's local focus. The station is also one of the few Fox O&O stations to have a newscast at 10pm in the Central and Mountain time zones, with KSAZ in Phoenix, KMSP in Minneapolis/St. Paul, WDAF in Kansas City, WBRC in Birmingham and KDFW in Dallas-Ft. Worth, WFLD in Chicago, and KTVI in St. Louis. WTVT in Tampa and WTTG in Washington, D.C. is experimenting with a newscast in the Eastern Time Zone equivalent timeslot of 11pm. As of December 2007 the noon newscast on weekdays will move to 11am, with the Saturday morning broadcast being expanded to two hours beginning at 7am, and the Sunday broadcast also moving to 7am but remaining an hour long. In addition, Gus Gnorski's DIY program on Saturday mornings, Ask Gus will be discontinued.
WITI also takes advantage of the fact that the audio for Channel 6 can be heard on an FM radio on 87.7 FM, mentioning often during their morning newscasts, station promotions and breaking news events that you can 'Listen to Fox 6 in your car'.
- Mark Concannon (Weekdays on Wake-Up)
- Katrina Cravy (Monday-Thursday at 6:00, 9:00; Sunday at 5:00, 9:00, 10:00)
- Chris Goodman (Saturdays at 6:00, 9:00, 10:00)
- Chrystina Head (Saturdays at 6:00, 9:00, 10:00)
- Brad Hicks (Monday-Thursday at 6:00, 9:00; Friday at 5:00, 6:00, 9:00, 10:00)
- Tami Hughes (Weekends on Wake-Up)
- Nicole Koglin (Weekdays on Wake-Up)
- Kim Murphy (Weekdays on Wake-Up)
- Ted Perry (Monday-Thursday at 5:00, 10:00; Sunday at 5:00, 9:00, 10:00)
- Beverly Taylor (Monday-Thursday at 5:00, 10:00; Friday at 5:00, 6:00, 9:00, 10:00)
- Joanne Williams (Weekdays at Noon)
- Justin Williams (Weekends on Wake-Up)
- Mike Bartley (forced out in 2000, now at WQED Pittsburgh as host of OnQ)
- Joyce Garbaciak (stepped down in 2005, now a features reporter/anchor at WISN (Channel 12))
- Vince Gibbens (died in 1995)
- Carl Zimmermann (1959-1986, retired)
- Stu Armstrong (1956-1959)
- Jill Geisler (1973-1998 as reporter, anchor, and news director, now a leadership director at the Poynter Institute)
- Vince Condella (Chief Meteorologist, Weekday Evenings)
- Bart Adrian (Weekend Evenings)
- Rob Haswell (Weekdays on Wake-Up and Noon)
- Tom Skilling (Currently chief meteorologist for Chicago's WGN-TV, CLTV, and the Chicago Tribune)
- Scott Steele (Known for having his dog Spunky with him when he did the weather in the morning on Wake-Up; Spunky passed away on September 22, 2007 [2]. Currently weekend/fill-in meteorologist for WTMJ-TV )
- Eric Braate (Currently at Houston's KPRC-TV)
- Jen Lada
- Tom Pipines
- Tim Van Vooren
- Cynthia Kaump
- Bob Moore (Also fills in for Meteorologists)
- Cathy Orosz
- Renee Banot
- Katrina Cravy (Contact 6)
- Julie Feldman (Health Center)
- Gus Gnorski (The Gus Tour weekdays on Wake-Up [Visits various places in the Greater Milwaukee Area or Upcoming Fairs], station announcer, host of Saturday morning DIY show Ask Gus)
- Bryan Polcyn (Investigative Reporter)
- Jennifer Reyes (Helicopter Reporter)
- Jeremy Ross
- Myra Sanchick
- Wendy Strong (Business Journal)
- Vivika Vergara
- Doug Luzader (Washington DC Correspondent)
 The "TV6" logo design dates to the early '70s, when WITI was an ABC affiliate; when the station switched affiliation to CBS, the CBS "Eye" logo was placed inside the "6" loop. The image campaign 'A Friend You Can Count On' was used from 1989-1995. |
 The first Fox era logo for WITI, used from February 1995-January 1997. For Fox programming, an alternate version with the colors transposed would be used, with the text changed to FOX is SIX. |
 Second Fox era logo, used from January 1997-April 1998 after FTSG took full control of the station. |
 Third Fox logo, used from April 1998-January 2003, which debuted after the introduction of the station's current news set. |
 Former station logo, used from January 2003 to September 29, 2007. |
Current version of WITI's logo, launched on September 29, 2007. The logo is a horizontal version of the current Fox O&O color scheme, and during newscasts the logo bug rotates between this logo and the MyFoxMilwaukee logo. |
 Alternate boxless version of the current logo, used in promo ads and news teasers for the station, along with the station's logo bug. |
 The HDTV version of WITI's logo bug, shown during Fox primetime programming on WITI-DT, appearing in the bottom right corner. |
- ^ Golembiewski, Dick (2007) "A Brief History of Milwaukee Television (the Analog Years)"
- ^ http://www.todaystmj4.com/news/local/10002426.html
- www.myfoxmilwaukee.com. - Personality names and positions
- Official WITI Website
- History of Milwaukee television
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WITI
- WITI Celebrates 50 Years
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| Local television stations |
WTMJ 4 (NBC, WX+ on DT2) - WITI 6 (FOX) - WMKE-CA 7 (A1) - WMVS 10 (PBS) - WISN 12 (ABC) - W16BS 16 (Silent) - WVTV 18 (The CW) - WCGV 24 (MNTV) - WVCY 30 (FN) - |
| Cable-only out-of-market stations | |
| Local cable television channels | |
| See also |
Broadcast television stations in Madison, Green Bay, Chicago and Grand Rapids, MI |
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WITI 6 (Milwaukee) - WLUK 11 (Green Bay) - WLAX 25/WEUX 48 (La Crosse/Eau Claire) - WMSN 47 (Madison) - WFXS 55 (Wittenburg/Wausau) |
| See also: ABC, CW, CBS, MNTV, NBC, PBS and Other stations in Wisconsin |
