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WWDP AI simulator
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WWDP
WWDP (channel 46) is a television station licensed to Norwell, Massachusetts, United States, serving the Boston area as an affiliate of the digital multicast network Roar. It is owned by WRNN-TV Associates alongside Foxborough-licensed WMFP (channel 62). Through a channel sharing agreement, the two stations transmit using WWDP's spectrum from a tower off Pleasant Street in West Bridgewater. WWDP's studios are located on Bert Drive, also in West Bridgewater.
Channel 46 had a precarious existence from its sign-on in 1986 until a decade later, including more than seven years off the air between 1989 and 1996. It was the first Boston-area home for Pax before Pax bought the stronger channel 68. Since, it has largely been leased out or used to air home shopping programming.
The station first signed on the air on December 6, 1986, as WRYT, operating as an independent station from a bare-bones facility in Hanover. Owned by Robert Howe, a cable system owner from Alton, Illinois, WRYT operated from a tiny 300-foot (91 m) tower originally designed for use as a translator. It broadcast at only 6,000 watts—the minimum transmitter power for a full-power station. All of the equipment—two tape decks, a mixer, a primitive character generator, a satellite receiver and an Emergency Broadcast System unit—was located in an old video store bathroom. Most of the programs were multicultural, from the International Satellite Network.
The station changed its call sign to WHRC on February 4, 1988, exchanging with another of Howe's broadcast properties, a radio station in Edwardsville, Illinois. Two months later, it began broadcasting from a considerably improved broadcast facility in Brockton. Its 952,000-watt effective radiated power gave it fairly decent coverage of the southern fringe of Greater Boston, and it had also managed to get carriage on cable throughout the market. However, the antenna was somewhat heavier than normal, and the owners feared that the tower could not handle the weight of ice buildup should winter weather hit the area. As a result, the station was forced to go off the air in November while a new site was found.
In January 1989, WHRC returned to the air from a transmitter in Foxborough, with considerably reduced power (at 501,000 watts). However, the site was not wired for three-phase power, as is usually the case with television transmitters. WHRC was forced to make do with diesel power, which was totally inadequate for a television transmitter. Two of the transmitter's three diesel generators had failed by the spring of 1989, leaving WHRC unable to broadcast in color for half of the time. The station had never been on solid financial ground, and the technical problems only hampered matters further.
By June, the owner, a California resident, was going through a divorce, which complicated his efforts to keep the station going. He stopped paying syndication distributors, the diesel fuel supplier and other creditors, and the employees' paychecks started to bounce. The station was put on the market, but there were no credible buyers. Finally, in September, the diesel fuel supplier refused to deliver any more fuel to power the transmitter facility. As a result, the station abruptly went off the air at 1:13 p.m. on September 19, 1989, when the last remaining diesel generator ran out of fuel. At the time, many of the employees had not been paid for eight weeks.
Attempts to use channel 46 were periodically made in the next several years, but the tower situation loomed over any and all potential users. In 1990, Steve Mindich, owner of the weekly Boston Phoenix newspaper, reached a deal to buy WHRC through his Rogue Television Corporation. Mindich planned to rename the station WPHX and also held a tentative deal to buy the silent WNHT in Concord, New Hampshire; the stations were to be affiliates of the planned Star Television Network, airing classic TV shows.
Mindich's deal, however, came undone because he could not secure a tower, a necessity if the station were to improve its facilities. In late 1991, another deal was struck to sell the station to Two if by Sea Broadcasting Corporation, headed by Michael Parker of Easton, Pennsylvania, who owned WTVE in Reading.
WWDP
WWDP (channel 46) is a television station licensed to Norwell, Massachusetts, United States, serving the Boston area as an affiliate of the digital multicast network Roar. It is owned by WRNN-TV Associates alongside Foxborough-licensed WMFP (channel 62). Through a channel sharing agreement, the two stations transmit using WWDP's spectrum from a tower off Pleasant Street in West Bridgewater. WWDP's studios are located on Bert Drive, also in West Bridgewater.
Channel 46 had a precarious existence from its sign-on in 1986 until a decade later, including more than seven years off the air between 1989 and 1996. It was the first Boston-area home for Pax before Pax bought the stronger channel 68. Since, it has largely been leased out or used to air home shopping programming.
The station first signed on the air on December 6, 1986, as WRYT, operating as an independent station from a bare-bones facility in Hanover. Owned by Robert Howe, a cable system owner from Alton, Illinois, WRYT operated from a tiny 300-foot (91 m) tower originally designed for use as a translator. It broadcast at only 6,000 watts—the minimum transmitter power for a full-power station. All of the equipment—two tape decks, a mixer, a primitive character generator, a satellite receiver and an Emergency Broadcast System unit—was located in an old video store bathroom. Most of the programs were multicultural, from the International Satellite Network.
The station changed its call sign to WHRC on February 4, 1988, exchanging with another of Howe's broadcast properties, a radio station in Edwardsville, Illinois. Two months later, it began broadcasting from a considerably improved broadcast facility in Brockton. Its 952,000-watt effective radiated power gave it fairly decent coverage of the southern fringe of Greater Boston, and it had also managed to get carriage on cable throughout the market. However, the antenna was somewhat heavier than normal, and the owners feared that the tower could not handle the weight of ice buildup should winter weather hit the area. As a result, the station was forced to go off the air in November while a new site was found.
In January 1989, WHRC returned to the air from a transmitter in Foxborough, with considerably reduced power (at 501,000 watts). However, the site was not wired for three-phase power, as is usually the case with television transmitters. WHRC was forced to make do with diesel power, which was totally inadequate for a television transmitter. Two of the transmitter's three diesel generators had failed by the spring of 1989, leaving WHRC unable to broadcast in color for half of the time. The station had never been on solid financial ground, and the technical problems only hampered matters further.
By June, the owner, a California resident, was going through a divorce, which complicated his efforts to keep the station going. He stopped paying syndication distributors, the diesel fuel supplier and other creditors, and the employees' paychecks started to bounce. The station was put on the market, but there were no credible buyers. Finally, in September, the diesel fuel supplier refused to deliver any more fuel to power the transmitter facility. As a result, the station abruptly went off the air at 1:13 p.m. on September 19, 1989, when the last remaining diesel generator ran out of fuel. At the time, many of the employees had not been paid for eight weeks.
Attempts to use channel 46 were periodically made in the next several years, but the tower situation loomed over any and all potential users. In 1990, Steve Mindich, owner of the weekly Boston Phoenix newspaper, reached a deal to buy WHRC through his Rogue Television Corporation. Mindich planned to rename the station WPHX and also held a tentative deal to buy the silent WNHT in Concord, New Hampshire; the stations were to be affiliates of the planned Star Television Network, airing classic TV shows.
Mindich's deal, however, came undone because he could not secure a tower, a necessity if the station were to improve its facilities. In late 1991, another deal was struck to sell the station to Two if by Sea Broadcasting Corporation, headed by Michael Parker of Easton, Pennsylvania, who owned WTVE in Reading.