WDPX-TV

Channel 58 first signed on January 16, 1984 as 12,000-watt W58AO, a low-power station owned by Cape Cod Broadcasting and originally licensed to Vineyard Haven, Massachusetts, with studio facilities in Hyannis.

After temporarily going dark for one week a year-and-a-half later, channel 58 would relaunch on July 19, 1985 as full-power independent station WCVX, now transmitting at a powerful 1.2 million watts, on a par with that of Boston-area independents WSBK-TV and WLVI-TV. Its lineup featured a mixture of vintage reruns, old movies, several half-hour feeds of CNN Headline News, a few first-run syndicated shows and some locally produced programming, including a twice-nightly newscast.[2] However, it suffered early on due to lack of cable coverage, as the Supreme Court had struck down the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)'s must-carry rule on the very day WCVX launched, thus knocking it out of the 60% of homes in the Cape Cod region relying on cable television.[3] Despite this early hurdle, however, area cable systems gradually began adding WCVX to their lineups, and by August 1987, it was carried by every provider on Cape Cod.[4]

In spite of achieving the necessary cable carriage, WCVX was still ailing financially, and by late 1987, Cape Cod Broadcasting president Don Moore was forced to turn the station over to Sentry Federal Savings Bank, which chose Dan Carney to take over daily operations the following January. While viewership increased under Carney's tenure, WCVX continued to lose money, and after laying off nearly 85% of staffers just two years later, Sentry attempted to find a new owner for the struggling station.[5] At one point, Sentry entered into negotiations with the owners of WNAC-TV in Providence, Rhode Island about possibly acquiring WCVX as a satellite station, but the deal collapsed after it was decided by WNAC management that any resulting boost would be minimal at best, as well as Cape Cod's aforementioned widespread cable penetration (which had increased to nearly 100% by late 1990, when the talks took place) already providing sufficient availability of both the Boston and Providence stations.[6] Unable to find another willing buyer, Sentry decided to shut down WCVX, and the station went dark in the early hours of July 2, 1991, following an airing of the 1955 film Kentucky Rifle.[7]

Three years after its demise, in 1994, the station was purchased by Boston University and relaunched as WZBU, a satellite of Boston's WABU, channel 68 (along with WNBU in Concord, New Hampshire).

In 1999, Paxson Communications (the forerunner to Ion Media Networks) bought WABU, WZBU and WNBU, immediately turning them into part-time affiliates of Pax TV (now Ion Television), while retaining some syndicated programs; the stations' call letters were also respectively changed to WBPX, WDPX and WPXG later that year. Eventually, the syndicated programs were dropped, turning WBPX and its satellites into full-time Pax owned-and-operated stations by 2000.

During the FCC's incentive auction, it was announced that the over-the-air spectrum of WDPX-TV had been sold for $43,467,644; the station indicated that it would enter into a post-auction channel sharing agreement.[8] WDPX-TV now channel-shares with former parent station WBPX-TV; as the WBPX-TV signal does not reach Vineyard Haven, WDPX has changed its city of license to Woburn.[9]

• Channel 58 virtual TV stations in the United States
• Channel 22 digital TV stations in the United States
• List of television stations in Massachusetts

• Official website
• BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on WDPX-TV