wowt

Digital: 22 (UHF)

Subchannels 6.1 NBC

6.2 62O (Ind./Universal Sports) Affiliations National Broadcasting Company Owner Gray Television, Inc.

(Gray Television Licensee, Inc.) First air date August 29, 1949 Call letters’ meaning Woodmen Of The World (original owner of WOW radio) + Television Former callsigns WOW-TV (1949-1975) Former channel number(s) Analog:

6 (1949-2009) Former affiliations Primary:

NBC(1949-1956)

CBS (1956-1986)

Secondary:

ABC (1949-1953, 1954-1957)

DuMont (1949-1952)

DT2:

UPN (2005-2006) Transmitter Power 1000 kW Height 398 m Facility ID 65528 Transmitter Coordinates 41°18'39?N 96°1'37.5?W? / ?41.31083°N 96.027083°W? / 41.31083; -96.027083 Website www.wowt.com

WOWT-TV, identified as "Channel 6" but broadcasting on digital channel 22, is the NBC affiliate in Omaha, Nebraska. WOWT also serves the state capital, Lincoln, 52 miles (84 km) away, with broadcast and cable coverage. As Lincoln is located in a different market area, satellite viewers in Lincoln receive NBC from KHAS-TV in Hastings, though WOWT has long been regarded as the primary local NBC affiliate in Lincoln. Contents [hide] 1 History 2 62O 3 Digital television 4 Programming 5 Newscasts 6 Notable Past Personalities 7 News/Station Presentation 7.1 Newscast Titles 7.2 Station Slogans 8 External links 9 References //

History

Channel 6 signed on the air on August 29, 1949 as WOW-TV, the first television station in Nebraska and one of the oldest in the Upper Midwest. It also claims to be the first television station in four other Midwestern states (Kansas, North Dakota, South Dakota and Iowa. Johnny Carson's first television job was at the station where he had a daily show called the The Squirrel's Nest where he told jokes.

The station was operated by Radio Station WOW, Inc. alongside WOW radio (AM 590, now KXSP, and 92.3 FM, now KEZO)[1] The owners operated under a United States Supreme Court ruling which had forced the Woodmen of the World, who had founded WOW-AM in 1923, to divest itself of the radio stations because they threatened the Woodmen's tax-exempt status.

The station was originally an NBC affiliate, but carried a secondary affiliation with ABC until 1953, when KOLN-TV signed on from Lincoln as an ABC affiliate. However, in 1954, Lincoln was broken off from the Omaha market, and WOW-TV resumed sharing ABC programming with KMTV until 1957, when KETV signed on as an ABC affiliate.

Meredith Corporation bought WOW-AM-FM-TV in 1958. The station claims it was bought by former Secretary of the Navy Francis Matthews in 1954, but this is false; Matthews died two years earlier.

In 1956, after the radio stations dropped their longtime affiliation with NBC in favor of CBS, WOW-TV switched affiliations with KMTV and became Omaha's CBS television affiliate. When Meredith sold channel 6 to Chronicle Publishing Company of San Francisco in 1975, it changed its call