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WSTM-TV
WSTM-TV (channel 3) is a television station in Syracuse, New York, United States, affiliated with NBC and The CW. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, which provides certain services to CBS affiliate WTVH (channel 5) through a local marketing agreement with Granite Broadcasting. The two stations share studios on James Street/NY 290 in the Near Northeast section of Syracuse; WSTM-TV's transmitter is located in the town of Onondaga, New York.
The station began operations on February 15, 1950, on VHF channel 5 with the call sign WSYR-TV, moving to VHF channel 3 in 1953. It was owned by Advance Publications (the Newhouse family's company) along with the Syracuse Post-Standard, Syracuse Herald-Journal, and WSYR radio (AM 570 and FM 94.5, now WYYY). It was Syracuse's second television station, signing on a year and three months after WHEN-TV (now WTVH). It originally had facilities at the Kemper Building in Downtown Syracuse. In 1958, WSYR-AM-FM-TV moved to new studios on James Street.
Unlike most NBC affiliates in two station markets, WSYR-TV did not take a secondary ABC or DuMont affiliation. WSYR-TV doubled as the NBC affiliate for Binghamton until WINR-TV (now WICZ-TV) signed-on in 1957. The station also operated a satellite station in Elmira until 1980; that station, first known as WSYE-TV and now WETM-TV, is now owned by Nexstar Broadcasting Group and fed via centralcasting facilities of a Syracuse cross-town rival, which ironically now holds the WSYR-TV call letters. It remains affiliated with NBC.
The Newhouse family largely exited broadcasting in 1980. The WSYR cluster had been grandfathered after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) banned common ownership of newspaper and broadcasting outlets, but lost this protection when Advance dismantled its broadcasting division. Channel 3 was sold to the Times Mirror Company, who—so as to comply with an FCC rule in effect at the time that prohibited TV and radio stations in the same market, but with different owners from sharing the same callsigns—changed the television station's calls to WSTM-TV (for "Syracuse Times Mirror") on March 28 and kept the James Street studios.
In 1986, Times Mirror sold WSTM-TV to SJL Broadcast Management, a broadcast holding company controlled by George Lilly. SJL then sold WSTM-TV to Federal Broadcasting in 1992. That company was bought out by Raycom Media in 1997. The WSYR-TV calls returned to Syracuse in 2005 after Clear Channel Communications purchased WIXT-TV (formerly WNYS-TV) as part of the Ackerley Group acquisition three years earlier. The company changed WIXT-TV's calls to match WSYR radio, which it had owned for several years.
On March 5, 1996, WSTM-TV General Manager Charles Bivins died after collapsing at the Syracuse Track and Racquet Club. He was 48 and had previously suffered a mild heart attack two years earlier. Bivins was also a visiting professor at Syracuse University's S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications teaching television programming. In 2003, Raycom Media purchased Syracuse's low-powered UPN affiliate WAWA-LP from Venture Technologies Group for an undisclosed amount of money. The station had its call letters changed to WSTQ-LP (derived from WSTM-TV) and given the on-air branding of "UPN 6, The Q". Raycom used "6" to reflect its cable slot as a result of the station becoming offered on the basic lineup of Time Warner Cable (now Charter Spectrum) on July 1.
Before the purchase, Time Warner Cable had refused to carry WAWA-LP. The same "must-carry" rules that kept the station off the cable system eventually got WSTQ-LP on. The must-carry rules give full-powered stations the option of "retransmission consent" or requiring compensation from cable systems as a condition of carrying a station's signal. In this case, full-powered WSTM-TV can require cable systems like Time Warner Cable to offer WSTQ-LP on their systems as a condition of carrying WSTM-TV.
On March 27, 2006, Raycom Media announced the sale of WSTM-TV and WSTQ-LP to Barrington Broadcasting. The sale was finalized that August. On March 2, 2009, as a result of low ratings and slow advertising sales, it was announced that WTVH would enter into a local marketing agreement with WSTM-TV. Initially, WTVH continued to operate out of its own James Street studios a block away but was eventually merged into WSTM-TV's facilities. WTVH was also integrated into WSTM-TV's website. On September 6, 2009, WTVH's transmitter was damaged after a power failure. While Granite Broadcasting worked to fix the signal, WSTM-TV's third digital subchannel carried that station. On September 12, WTVH's signal was restored.
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WSTM-TV
WSTM-TV (channel 3) is a television station in Syracuse, New York, United States, affiliated with NBC and The CW. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, which provides certain services to CBS affiliate WTVH (channel 5) through a local marketing agreement with Granite Broadcasting. The two stations share studios on James Street/NY 290 in the Near Northeast section of Syracuse; WSTM-TV's transmitter is located in the town of Onondaga, New York.
The station began operations on February 15, 1950, on VHF channel 5 with the call sign WSYR-TV, moving to VHF channel 3 in 1953. It was owned by Advance Publications (the Newhouse family's company) along with the Syracuse Post-Standard, Syracuse Herald-Journal, and WSYR radio (AM 570 and FM 94.5, now WYYY). It was Syracuse's second television station, signing on a year and three months after WHEN-TV (now WTVH). It originally had facilities at the Kemper Building in Downtown Syracuse. In 1958, WSYR-AM-FM-TV moved to new studios on James Street.
Unlike most NBC affiliates in two station markets, WSYR-TV did not take a secondary ABC or DuMont affiliation. WSYR-TV doubled as the NBC affiliate for Binghamton until WINR-TV (now WICZ-TV) signed-on in 1957. The station also operated a satellite station in Elmira until 1980; that station, first known as WSYE-TV and now WETM-TV, is now owned by Nexstar Broadcasting Group and fed via centralcasting facilities of a Syracuse cross-town rival, which ironically now holds the WSYR-TV call letters. It remains affiliated with NBC.
The Newhouse family largely exited broadcasting in 1980. The WSYR cluster had been grandfathered after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) banned common ownership of newspaper and broadcasting outlets, but lost this protection when Advance dismantled its broadcasting division. Channel 3 was sold to the Times Mirror Company, who—so as to comply with an FCC rule in effect at the time that prohibited TV and radio stations in the same market, but with different owners from sharing the same callsigns—changed the television station's calls to WSTM-TV (for "Syracuse Times Mirror") on March 28 and kept the James Street studios.
In 1986, Times Mirror sold WSTM-TV to SJL Broadcast Management, a broadcast holding company controlled by George Lilly. SJL then sold WSTM-TV to Federal Broadcasting in 1992. That company was bought out by Raycom Media in 1997. The WSYR-TV calls returned to Syracuse in 2005 after Clear Channel Communications purchased WIXT-TV (formerly WNYS-TV) as part of the Ackerley Group acquisition three years earlier. The company changed WIXT-TV's calls to match WSYR radio, which it had owned for several years.
On March 5, 1996, WSTM-TV General Manager Charles Bivins died after collapsing at the Syracuse Track and Racquet Club. He was 48 and had previously suffered a mild heart attack two years earlier. Bivins was also a visiting professor at Syracuse University's S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications teaching television programming. In 2003, Raycom Media purchased Syracuse's low-powered UPN affiliate WAWA-LP from Venture Technologies Group for an undisclosed amount of money. The station had its call letters changed to WSTQ-LP (derived from WSTM-TV) and given the on-air branding of "UPN 6, The Q". Raycom used "6" to reflect its cable slot as a result of the station becoming offered on the basic lineup of Time Warner Cable (now Charter Spectrum) on July 1.
Before the purchase, Time Warner Cable had refused to carry WAWA-LP. The same "must-carry" rules that kept the station off the cable system eventually got WSTQ-LP on. The must-carry rules give full-powered stations the option of "retransmission consent" or requiring compensation from cable systems as a condition of carrying a station's signal. In this case, full-powered WSTM-TV can require cable systems like Time Warner Cable to offer WSTQ-LP on their systems as a condition of carrying WSTM-TV.
On March 27, 2006, Raycom Media announced the sale of WSTM-TV and WSTQ-LP to Barrington Broadcasting. The sale was finalized that August. On March 2, 2009, as a result of low ratings and slow advertising sales, it was announced that WTVH would enter into a local marketing agreement with WSTM-TV. Initially, WTVH continued to operate out of its own James Street studios a block away but was eventually merged into WSTM-TV's facilities. WTVH was also integrated into WSTM-TV's website. On September 6, 2009, WTVH's transmitter was damaged after a power failure. While Granite Broadcasting worked to fix the signal, WSTM-TV's third digital subchannel carried that station. On September 12, WTVH's signal was restored.