WAFF (TV)

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WAFF
Huntsville/Decatur
Branding	WAFF 48
Slogan	The Heart of The Valley
Channels	48 analog, 49 digital
Affiliations	NBC (1954-68; 1977-present)
Owner	Raycom Media
Founded	1954 on channel 23 (moved to channel 48 in 1968)
Call letters meaning	W American Families' Finest (old slogan of former owner AFLAC)
Former callsigns	WMSL-TV (1954-74); WYUR-TV (1974-78)
Former affiliations	ABC (1968-77)
Website	www.waff.com

WAFF is the NBC television affiliate for Huntsville, Alabama. Broadcasting on channel 48, the station serves the northern fifth of Alabama and three counties in southern Middle Tennessee.

[edit] History

It went on the air in Decatur on July 4, 1954 as WMSL-TV, channel 23. It was owned by Frank Whisenant, a Decatur businessman who also owned WMSL-AM. From inception until 1968, WMSL was affiliated with NBC. Until the early 1960s, Decatur was the largest town in the viewing area and centrally located, thus making it a perfect location for the region's first television station. However, when Huntsville became the region's largest city due to the exponential growth of U.S. Army and NASA installations, Whisenant decided to move WMSL-TV there. However, because the station's original channel assignment, channel 23, was too close in frequency to a nearby translator of Alabama Public Television, WHIQ-TV, on channel 25, the FCC ordered WMSL-TV to move to channel 48. The move to Huntsville, which allowed the station to broadcast local programs in color for the first time, took place in January 1969; Whisenant closed the Decatur WMSL-TV studios shortly thereafter and vacated channel 23 (which enjoyed a short-lived revival in the 1990s as a low-powered station). In the meantime, Whisenant sold WMSL radio to another Decatur businessman; it is now known as WWTM-AM.

Some months before, WMSL-TV lost the NBC affiliation to rival WAAY-TV, which had a greater audience and thus was more attractive to the network. Still, the new channel 48, which got the ABC affiliation by default, made persistent efforts to serve its greatly expanded viewing area. Perhaps most notable (and surely most beloved) of its local programs was the weekday children's show hosted by station general manager Benny Carle, a Birmingham native who honed his talents for many years on WBRC-TV there. The show was typical for its day, featuring about 10 to 15 school-aged children in the studio with the host, who conducted party games, told stories, and engaged in clownish behavior; cartoons were shown during the one-hour (later 30-minute) late-afternoon (later mid-morning) program. He began the show in the mid-1960s, while the station was still in Decatur, and continued it until 1975, when ABC's "Good Morning America" displaced its morning time slot. Carle now owns radio and low-power TV stations WBCF in Florence, Alabama, which he established after leaving channel 48.

In 1974, Whisenant sold the station to a Vermont-based company, which renamed the station WYUR-TV. Despite more aggressive attempts to promote its newscast, WYUR-TV's ratings were far behind WAAY and WHNT. Then, in 1978, AFLAC, then known by its full name of American Family Life Assurance Company, bought the station, re-christening it WAFF-TV. Some months earlier, ABC decided to return to WAAY-TV, as that network had become the nation's most popular, in prime time programming especially. This left channel 48 with the then-less-desirable NBC affiliation. AFLAC did not immediately turn the corner with WAFF-TV; the station kept fine-tuning its newscasts and acquiring some nationally popular syndicated programs, but nothing seemed to work. Around 1980 or 1981 a new television station and tower were constructed on the south end of Monte Sano Mountain. The tower was around 1,476 feet high and was constructed in an effort to provide better reception to viewers across North Alabama and South Tennessee. The weather forecaster at the time, Glenn Bracken, held a coloring contest for schools across the viewing area whereby children could depict their scenes of the new "tall tower" and incorportate WAFF's marketing message "New Tall Tower Means More Picture Power" and have their drawing and name presented during the nightly weather forecast (which was usually done outside).

Then, on the evening of March 24, 1982, the station's building, mounted on the side of Monte Sano Mountain overlooking Huntsville proper, caught fire and burned to the ground. Local firefighters could not control the blaze due to low water pressure in the area; this would later prompt competitor WHNT-TV to relocate to downtown Huntsville. It was only a few days, however, before WAFF-TV began broadcasting again through the auspices of local cable companies, who provided NBC programming feeds from WSMV-TV in Nashville and WVTM-TV in Birmingham, both of which were available in their own rights on many northern Alabama cable systems prior to 1990. Eventually, WAFF-TV would rebuild at a new location, occupying a former jewelry store on North Memorial Parkway, some miles away from Monte Sano; microwave links connected the studios to the transmitter and tower, which were not damaged by the fire. The fire would also prompt a repair to the water pressure situation and the building of a new fire station atop Monte Sano, which sits directly across from WAAY's studios. WAFF, after this, began airing television commercials showing various scenes of their news personalities interacting with persons in their viewing area, along with their news helicopter, Sky48, to a song entitled "We're Your Kind of People."

The disaster may have proved to be a blessing in disguise, as AFLAC began investing money in developing talent and production facilities, enabling WAFF-TV to start making a serious ratings impact for the first time. Not only did the station benefit from the renewed popularity of NBC in the mid-1980s, but its acquisitions of highly popular syndicated shows like "Oprah". "Jeopardy!", and "Wheel of Fortune," made it a hit with viewers in the Tennessee Valley region. Since that time, the station has experienced continued success.

As with the other two major-network Huntsville TV stations, weather forecasting became a very high priority for WAFF-TV in the 1990s, especially after the city experienced a devastating tornado in November 1989. The station constructed a doppler radar and began to use highly sophisticated meteorological equipment.

AFLAC sold WAFF-TV, along with its other broadcasting properties, to Raycom Media of Montgomery, Ala. in the late 1990s.

Notable news personalities over the years have included Hans Sitarz, Paul Buxton, Robert Lane, Greg McCambell, Tom Kennemer, Missy Ming, Bob Baron, Kelly Cooper, Roy Ackland, Tony Troiano, Jay Prater, Mark Thornhill, Kimberly Essex, Lee Marshall, Liz Hurley, Glenn Bracken, Brad Travis, Will Kennedy, Varion Walton and Kristin Tallent.

[edit] Other Logos

Logo for WAFF 48 News.

[edit] External links

• WAFF-TV
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WAFF