Early years
In March 1951, during a self-imposed freeze on new television applications, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposed a table of city-by-city channel assignments that included, for the first time, ultra high frequency (UHF) broadcasting. Three channels were proposed to Peoria: Very high frequency (VHF) channel 8 and UHF channels 37 (reserved for educational use) and 43.[2] Radio station WMBD, citing that a city the size of Peoria required an additional assignment, petitioned the FCC to add channel 12 there; While this plan was denied, the FCC concluded that an additional channel at Peoria was warranted, and UHF channel 19 was added instead.[3]
After the FCC lifted its multi-year freeze in 1952,[4] two parties applied to the FCC for channel 19 in Peoria: the Hilltop Broadcasting Company, the new owner of WWXL (1590 AM), and WPEO.[5] While the hearing was on, WWXL, which Hilltop had acquired out of bankruptcy, began broadcasting under the new call sign WTVH.[6]
WTVH-TV began broadcasting on October 18, 1953, as Peoria's second television station. It aired programs from CBS, ABC, and the DuMont Television Network. The studio and transmitter were located on Stewart Street in Creve Coeur.[7] A year later, the Peoria Journal-Star newspaper company, then publisher of the morning Star and afternoon Journal, acquired a controlling interest in Hilltop and the WTVH stations.[8] The AM station was shut down before the end of the year to focus efforts on channel 19.[9] Even though CBS programs had been on the schedule from the start, WTVH was not a primary CBS affiliate until September 1954.[10] Veteran Illinois broadcaster Doug Quick theorized that uncertainty about the availability of a VHF channel in the Peoria area, channel 8, or whether CBS's Peoria radio affiliate, WMBD, would obtain a permit for a Peoria TV station were reasons for CBS's late commitment.[11]
In technical terms, WTVH-TV broadcast with less power than WEEK-TV (channel 43) when it launched, with an effective radiated power (ERP) of 25,000 watts. The Pantagraph reported that reception of channel 19 was poor in the Bloomington–Normal area when it launched.[12] The ERP was increased to 214,000 watts in November 1954 with the installation of a new transmitter.[13] In 1955, the station purchased a new, 1000 ft tower to replace the existing 240 ft mast at Creve Coeur.[14]
DuMont ceased its existence as a network in 1955;[15] when Peoria's third station, WMBD-TV (channel 31), began broadcasting on January 1, 1958, it became the CBS affiliate.[16][17] The change resulted in a curtailed broadcast day, as at the time ABC provided less programming than CBS. In 1959, Hilltop sold WTVH to the Metropolitan Broadcasting Corporation for $610,000.[18][19] Metropolitan Broadcasting renamed itself Metromedia in 1961.[20]
In 1965, Metromedia, looking to make room in its portfolio for purchases in larger markets, sold WTVH to the Twelve Ninety Radio Corporation, headed by the Small family and owner of Peoria radio station WIRL (1290 AM).[21] The new ownership changed the call sign to WIRL-TV on September 13.[22] The acquisition of channel 19 was WIRL's second effort to expand into television. In June 1956, the FCC granted WIRL a construction permit for VHF channel 8, but it stayed the grant pending a proceeding on whether channel 8 would remain in Peoria.[23] The channel allocation was moved to the Quad Cities area in an action reaffirmed by the FCC in 1962.[24] The station held a permit for channel 25, which was deleted in 1963,[25] enabling WEEK-TV to move from channel 43 to 25 the next year.[26][27]
Forward Communications Corporation of Wausau, Wisconsin, acquired the station in a sale completed in April 1971[28] and changed the call sign to WRAU-TV the following May 1. The news departments of WIRL radio and the newly renamed channel 19 were separated at this time.[29] To make room for a number of employees that had been working in a downtown Peoria office and the news staff, which had previously worked out of the WIRL radio studios, the Creve Coeur studio was expanded.[30] A new, higher-power transmitter was purchased to improve the signal. Under Forward, WRAU-TV's newscasts generally rated second behind WEEK-TV. This changed beginning in December 1982, when workers from the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) struck the station for 219 days—longer than the concurrent strike against Caterpillar Inc. by the United Auto Workers. Local unions organized a boycott of WRAU-TV advertisers, the station was barred from news conferences in the Caterpillar strike, and news ratings fell to a much more distant second, with non-union technicians producing three newscasts a day.[31][32]
Forward Communications was sold in late 1984 to Wesray Capital Corporation, which retained the Forward name for its media holdings.[34] The sale coincided with an overhaul of channel 19's image. Longtime newscaster Clark Smith was fired after 14 years in 1984. The station adopted its present call sign of WHOI on March 17, 1985, as part of a promotional campaign billing the station as "the new heart of Illinois".[35][36]
Wesray sold the Forward stations to Adams Communications in 1988,[37] but the deal left Adams highly leveraged and ill-prepared to confront declines in the value of broadcast properties, prompting it to default on $283 million of debt in 1991.[38] Brissette Broadcasting was formed the next year when Paul Brissette, who had been the vice president of Adams Communications's television stations division, bought out the business for $257 million.[39] Brissette's management period saw a number of issues in the news department. Ratings fell in 1992, when the station lost the rights to telecast the popular game show Jeopardy! to WMBD and a new news show, Eyewitness Agenda, proved a ratings failure.[40][41] Recognized news personalities defected to other local stations, including weathercaster Lee Ranson, who had been with channel 19 for 22 years and was described by Mark Gibson of The Pantagraph as "the one constant" at the station through its various changes in ownership and management.[42]
In 1996, as part of a $270 million merger, Brissette was folded into Benedek Broadcasting after the company was unable to expand by adding stations.[47] Two years later, WHOI brought The WB network to the Peoria–Bloomington market by launching WBPE, the local cable-only outlet of The WB 100+ Station Group.[48] Financial problems later developed at Benedek; the early 2000s recession reduced ad sales and caused the company to miss interest payments on a set of bonds it issued in 1996, prompting a filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.[49] While most of Benedek's stations were sold to Gray Television, some—including WHOI—went to Chelsey Broadcasting, an affiliate of the Chelsey Capital hedge fund, after Gray determined that not all the stations fit the company's focus at the time on larger markets and CBS affiliates.[50] On August 1, 2003, WHOI began broadcasting a digital signal on channel 40.[51]
Barrington Broadcasting of Hoffman Estates, Illinois, purchased WHOI and KHQA-TV in Hannibal, Missouri, from Chelsey in 2004. The acquisition was among the first for the company, which had already been managing Chelsey's stations for a year and whose founder, Jim Yager, was the former president of Benedek.[52][53] When The WB merged with UPN to form The CW in 2006, WBPE obtained the affiliation and changed its name to Peoria's CW,[54] being broadcast as a digital subchannel of WHOI.[55] WHOI was the last major Peoria television station to broadcast an analog signal; most stations in the market switched on the original February 17, 2009, digital television transition date, except for WHOI,[56] which completed its switchover on the June 12 final date.
Despite occasional credible efforts, WHOI remained mostly in third place in news ratings in the 1990s and 2000s. By 1999, the market's news race looked like a two-station fight between perennial leader WEEK and a revitalized WMBD; each of their evening newscasts attracted audience shares of 20 percent or more, while WHOI's best-performing newscast mustered a 12-percent share.[58] Though channel 19 improved its ratings steadily in the early- and mid-2000s, the 2006 defection of anchor Paul Ferrante to WMBD caused ratings to slide, particularly among women aged 25–54.[59]
