WMAZ-TV

WMAZ-TV, virtual and VHF digital channel 13, is a dual CBS/CW+-affiliated television station licensed to Macon, Georgia, United States. The station is owned by Tegna Inc. WMAZ-TV's studios are located on Gray Highway on the northeast side of Macon, and its transmitter is located on GA 87/US 23/129 ALT (Golden Isles Highway) along the Twiggs–Bibb county line.

WMAZ-TV
Macon, Georgia
United States
ChannelsDigital: 13 (VHF)
Virtual: 13 (PSIP)
Branding13WMAZ (general)
13WMAZ News (newscasts)
SloganStraight from the Heart
Programming
Affiliations13.1: CBS
13.2: CW+
13.3: True Crime Network
Ownership
OwnerTegna Inc.
(Pacific and Southern, LLC)
History
First air date
September 27, 1953 (1953-09-27)
Former channel number(s)
Analog:
13 (VHF, 1953–2009)
Digital:
4 (VHF, 2003–2009)
  • All secondary
  • DuMont (1953–1955)
  • NBC (1953–1968)
  • ABC (1953–1982)
Call sign meaning
Watch Mercer Attain Zenith
Technical information
Licensing authority
FCC
Facility ID46991
ERP52.6 kW
HAAT238 m (781 ft)
Transmitter coordinates32°45′10″N 83°33′32″W
Links
Public license information
Profile
LMS
Websitewww.13wmaz.com

History

The station first signed on the air on September 27, 1953.[1] It was the second TV station in Macon. WNEX-TV (channel 47) began operation on August 25, 1953, co-owned with WNEX (1400 AM). But in the 1950s, few people had TVs that received UHF channels and WNEX-TV ended operations in 1955.

WMAZ-TV was originally owned by the Southeastern Broadcasting Company, and took its calls from co-owned WMAZ radio (940 AM, now WMAC, and 99.1 FM, now WLXF at 105.5). WMAZ-TV is the fourth-oldest television station in the state of Georgia and the oldest outside of Atlanta, beating WDAK-TV (now WTVM) in Columbus to the air by only one day. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) awarded Southeastern Broadcasting a license to operate a television station on its second try; it had previously made an unsuccessful bid for the VHF channel 7 allocation one year earlier in 1952. The new station was one of the most powerful VHF stations in the country, providing at least secondary signal coverage from the southern Atlanta suburbs to the western suburbs of Savannah.

The station has been a primary CBS affiliate from its launch, owing to WMAZ-AM's longtime affiliation with the CBS Radio Network. In addition, WMAZ-TV also carried secondary affiliations with ABC, NBC and the DuMont Television Network. It lost DuMont in 1955, one year before the network ceased operations. Southeastern Broadcasting sold WMAZ-AM-FM-TV to Southern Broadcasting Corporation in 1963, earning a healthy return on its 1929 lease and 1935 purchase of WMAZ-AM. Southern Broadcasting merged with the Greenville, South Carolina-based News-Piedmont Company to form Multimedia, Inc. in 1967.

After the failure of WNEX-TV, WMAZ was the only commercial television station in the Macon market until September 1968, when WCWB-TV (channel 41, now WMGT-TV) signed on and took the NBC affiliation. WMAZ-TV continued to carry select ABC programs (notably the soap opera General Hospital in the afternoons and Saturday NCAA football coverage in the fall) until WGXA (channel 24, now a Fox affiliate) started operations in April 1982.

In 1974, WMAZ-AM-FM-TV moved to a new studio facility on Gray Highway in Macon. WMAZ-TV remains the only VHF station allocated to the Macon market, due partly to the fact that Macon is sandwiched between the much larger Atlanta market to the north, Columbus to the west, Albany to the south, and the Augusta and Savannah markets to the east. Partly because of this, the station has dominated the ratings in Central Georgia for most of its history.

WMAZ-TV logo prior to April 2018

The station's longtime slogan, "Straight from the Heart," dates back to 1983, when WMAZ-TV debuted an image campaign based on Bryan Adams' song of the same name, tying into Macon's location near the geographical center of the state (which is southeast of Macon in Twiggs County). Its NBC-affiliated sister station in Knoxville, Tennessee, WBIR-TV, also uses the slogan and image campaign.

On July 24, 1995, the Gannett Company announced its acquisition of Multimedia for $1.7 billion. When the FCC approved the merger in November 1995, it announced that WMAZ-TV, along with KOCO-TV in Oklahoma City and WLWT in Cincinnati, would have to be divested to comply with cross-ownership regulations. Gannett was granted a waiver to operate KOCO-TV and Multimedia Cablevision until December 1996, after which it would be required to sell either of the two properties. Shortly after the deal was consummated, the FCC increased the size of the ownership cap to allow companies to own stations that cover 35% of all U.S. households; as a result, Gannett ultimately retained control of WMAZ-TV, which became a sister station to Georgia's third-oldest television station, WXIA-TV in Atlanta.[2][3][4][5][6] WLWT and KOCO-TV were traded to Argyle II in January 1997; the merger between Argyle II and Hearst Television would be finalized seven months later.[7]

On June 29, 2015, the Gannett Company split in two, with one side specializing in print media and the other side specializing in broadcast and digital media. WMAZ-TV was retained by the latter company, renamed Tegna.[8]

WMAZ-DT2

WMAZ-DT2, branded on-air as Central Georgia's CW, is the CW-affiliated second digital subchannel of WMAZ-TV, broadcasting in 720p high definition on virtual and VHF digital channel 13.2. All programming on WMAZ-DT2 is received through The CW's programming feed for smaller media markets, The CW Plus, which provides a set schedule of syndicated programming acquired by The CW for broadcast during time periods outside of the network's regular programming hours; however, Tegna Inc. handles local advertising and promotional services for the subchannel.

History

The subchannel's history traces back to the September 21, 1998 launch of "WBMN", a cable-only affiliate of The WB Television Network that was originally managed and promoted by Cox Communications alongside the launch of The WB 100+ Station Group, a similar service to The CW Plus that was created to expand national coverage of The WB via primarily local origination channels managed by cable providers in markets ranked above #100 by Nielsen Media Research. Since it was a cable-exclusive outlet and therefore not licensed by the FCC, the channel used the "WBMN" callsign in a fictional manner.

Prior to the launch of the cable channel, residents in the Macon market were only able to receive WB network programming on cable via the network's Atlanta affiliate WATL or via Chicago-based superstation WGN on both cable and satellite.

On January 24, 2006, the Warner Bros. unit of Time Warner and CBS Corporation announced that the two companies would shut down The WB and UPN and combine the networks' respective programming to create a new "fifth" network called The CW.[9][10] The CW Plus was created by the network as a replacement for The WB 100+ Station Group to allow the existing cable outlets as well as low-power analog stations and digital subchannels of major network affiliates in smaller markets that joined The WB 100+ in the years following its launch to maintain a network affiliation; "WBMN" affiliated with The CW Plus on September 18, 2006 upon the launch of the CW network.

On October 3, 2013, the Gannett Company announced that WMAZ-TV will carry The CW on a new second digital subchannel, retaining the "Central Georgia's CW" branding used by "WBMN".[11] On October 11, 2013, WMAZ-TV began transmitting a test pattern on digital subchannel 13.2. The subchannel officially debuted at midnight on October 14, 2013, with Gannett assuming promotional and advertising control of "WBMN" from Cox Communications with the subsequent sign-on of WMAZ-TV digital subchannel 13.2.[12] It remained available on Cox cable channel 3. The subchannel broadcasts in the 720p resolution format for high definition programming, rather than The CW's native 1080i format (a full 1080i feed of the channel is available to Cox subscribers).

Digital channels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:

Channel Video Aspect PSIP short name Programming[13]
13.11080i16:9WMAZ-TVMain WMAZ-TV programming / CBS
13.2720pWMAZTV2Central Georgia's CW
13.3480i4:3CrimeTrue Crime Network

Programming

As of November 2020, syndicated programs broadcast on WMAZ-DT1 include Live with Kelly and Ryan, Dr. Phil, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, The Andy Griffith Show, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!.

Syndicated programs broadcast on WMAZ-DT2 include Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Judge Jerry, The Steve Wilkos Show, Maury, The Goldbergs, Black-ish and Schitt's Creek.

News operation

WMAZ-TV presently broadcasts 26½ hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with four hours each weekday and three hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in addition, the station produces five hours of newscasts each week (with one hour each weekday) for WMAZ-DT2. Unlike most CBS affiliates in the Eastern Time Zone, WMAZ does not broadcast a local newscast in the 5:30 p.m. half-hour on weeknights, opting to air syndicated reruns of The Andy Griffith Show during that timeslot. It has been the far-and-away market leader in Macon for as long as records have been kept, partly due to essentially having the market to itself for its first 15 years on the air.

On November 4, 2011, WMAZ moved production of its newscasts to the set used by its legal advice program Law Call, with the normal red and black newsroom/control room backdrop. Three days later, on November 7, the station (via the Facebook page of then-morning anchor Stephanie Susskind) announced during its 5:00 p.m. newscast that it would be upgrading its news production to HD in the coming weeks. Ten days later, on November 17, 2011, WMAZ-TV became the second television station (after Warner Robins-based WRWR-LD (channel 38), which had debuted its newscasts on September 17, 2010 in the format) and the first full power station in the Macon market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. With the launch of WMAZ-DT2 on October 14, 2013, the station began producing a half-hour weekday morning newscast (airing at 7:00 a.m.) and a half-hour primetime newscast at 10:00 p.m. for the sub-channel.

On April 18, 2018, WMAZ dropped the Eyewitness name from the newscast's title that it had used since the early 1980s to coincide with the switch to the new Tegna standardized music and graphics package. The newscasts are now identified as 13 WMAZ News.

Notable current on-air staff
  • Frank Malloy - anchor

Notable former on-air staff

References
  1. Telecasting Yearbook 1954-1955 page 100
  2. "THE MEDIA BUSINESS; Expanding in TV, Gannett Agrees to Buy Multimedia". The New York Times. The New York Times Company. July 25, 1995.
  3. "Gannett, Multimedia announce merger agreement" (Press release). Gannett Company. December 4, 1995. Archived from the original on January 7, 2013.
  4. Jim Stafford (December 2, 1995). "Sale Due For KOCO In Merger". The Daily Oklahoman. Oklahoma Publishing Company. Retrieved October 18, 2017.
  5. "Gannett Deal Yields Ownership Conflict". The Journal Record. The Journal Record Publishing Company. July 26, 1995 – via Questia Online Library.
  6. Chris McConnell (April 7, 1997). "Gannett/Multimedia gets FCC green light" (PDF). Broadcasting & Cable. Cahners Business Information. p. 18. Retrieved October 18, 2017 – via American Radio History.
  7. "Gannett Announces Agreement with Argyle Television Inc" (Press release). Gannett Company. November 20, 1996. Retrieved October 18, 2017 – via Tegna, Inc.
  8. "Separation of Gannett into two public companies completed | TEGNA". Tegna. Retrieved 2015-06-29.
  9. 'Gilmore Girls' meet 'Smackdown'; CW Network to combine WB, UPN in CBS-Warner venture beginning in September, CNNMoney.com, January 24, 2006.
  10. UPN and WB to Combine, Forming New TV Network, The New York Times, January 24, 2006.
  11. "13WMAZ Will Broadcast The CW Network on Digital Channel 13.2". WMAZ-TV. October 3, 2013. Retrieved May 5, 2014.
  12. "Central Georgia's CW is On the Air on WMAZ 13.2". WMAZ-TV. October 3, 2013. Retrieved May 5, 2014.
  13. RabbitEars TV Query for WMAZ
  14. "Phil Keating Bio". Fox News. Retrieved 9 March 2013.
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