Prior to launch
On July 9, 1953, Tri-City Broadcasting Company, owner of WNOP (740 AM) in Newport, filed with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a construction permit to build a television station on channel 74, which had been assigned to Newport.[1] After Gordon Broadcasting, owner of Cincinnati radio station WSAI, dropped its application for the channel, Tri-City became unopposed,[2] and a construction permit for WNOP-TV was granted on December 24, 1953. Jim Lang, the former Campbell County sheriff that controlled Tri-City, envisioned the studios being adjoined by an amusement complex, complete with glass-enclosed restaurant, indoor ice rink, and outdoor swimming pool.[3]
With Lang noting the tribulations of other UHF television stations around the country, however, Tri-City opted not to build its station right away. In April 1956, Lang told a reporter for The Cincinnati Enquirer that it would only be a "matter of time" until channel 74 went on air.[4] Some conversation around the construction permit emerged in late 1962, when Lang sold WNOP radio and the WNOP-TV construction permit to television actor Dean Miller in a deal that ultimately fell through;[5] Tri-City had presented to the FCC a proposal to add a lower-power channel 3 station to Cincinnati (between channel 2 in Dayton and channel 3 in Louisville), which Miller also supported, though chances of approval were slim.[6]
In early 1965, channel 74 was no closer to going on the air than it had been a decade prior, but a change in ownership would lead to the foundation being laid to start a new commercial television station in Greater Cincinnati. That March, Tri-City sold the WNOP-TV permit to Daniel H. Overmyer, who was seeking to build a chain of major-market UHF television stations, for $100,000.[7] Two changes were nearly immediate after the purchase closed. On September 14, 1965, the call letters were changed to WSCO-TV; Overmyer's stations all bore the initials of family members, with the new designation representing his wife, Shirley Clark Overmyer.[8] The FCC was in the process of overhauling the UHF table of allocations at the time, which—together with a rulemaking petition from Overmyer[9]—resulted in the lower channel of 19 being substituted for 74 in 1966. Overmyer selected the Bald Knob tower site,[10] negotiated to lease a studio facility on Eighth Street in the Queensgate neighborhood,[11] and announced that the new station would be affiliated with the new Overmyer Network once it started.[12]
A launch date of February 1, 1967, was initially slated,[14] but the station did not start on that date. Instead, in April, Overmyer reached a deal to sell 80 percent of his television station group to the American Viscose Corporation (AVC).[15]
Startup and early years
The FCC approved the purchase of the Overmyer stations by AVC (which organized its television holdings under the name U.S. Communications Corporation) in December 1967.[16] The following May, the call letters changed one more time to WXIX-TV, representing the Roman numeral for 19;[17] station manager Doug McLarty also cited possible confusion with WCPO-TV in changing the call sign.[18] From the Overmyer-built transmitter facilities and a studio site within an office suite at 801 West Eighth Street in Cincinnati, WXIX-TV debuted on the afternoon of August 1, 1968.[19] The site from which channel 19 went on air was not the one Overmyer had selected; channel 19 was then sued by that property's owners.[20]
Cincinnati's first commercial independent station featured a schedule consisting primarily of movies, sports, and syndicated programs, though it also produced a local daytime children's program hosted by puppeteer
Channel 19 was demonstrating success and attracting viewership, which made it an outlier in the U.S. Communications portfolio. In March 1971, the company suspended operations at its stations in Atlanta and San Francisco,[25] and channel 19 had cut back its broadcast day in the second half of 1970. WXIX-TV came close to joining them in silence. On August 5, 1971, The Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. Communications had asked the FCC for permission to take channel 19 and WPGH-TV in Pittsburgh off the air.[26] The two stations, however, got a reprieve because they had instead attracted potential buyers.[27] It was initially announced that a Washington, D.C., communications law firm, Welch and Morgan, would buy the station,[28] but AVC insisted on the buyers endorsing the $2 million in debt associated with channel 19, which caused them to balk at the deal.
Malrite ownership and the arrival of Fox
In 1982, Metromedia entered into an agreement to buy WFLD-TV in Chicago. This $136 million deal—the most expensive purchase of an independent station and far and away the highest sale price of any UHF outlet—required it to divest of one of its two UHF stations, WXIX or KRIV in Houston, under the ownership limits of the day that allowed one company to own as many as five VHF and two additional UHF television stations. It chose to sell the Cincinnati outlet, which was in the smallest market of any in which the firm owned TV properties,[36] and it also sold WTCN-TV in Minneapolis to finance the purchase.[37] The buyer was Cleveland-based Malrite Communications Group.[38] The $45 million sale was approved by the FCC in December 1983.[39]
From the Malrite purchase until his death from esophageal cancer in 1992, Bill T. Jenkins was channel 19's general manager; he also served on the first Fox affiliate association board and advised the creation of Fox Kids, and within Malrite, he was named executive vice president of its television station division, securing Fox affiliations for multiple Malrite stations.[46] He was replaced by Stu Powell, WFLD's general manager; Stu then hired Greg Caputo, who had overseen the launch of a local newsroom at WFLD in 1987, to do the same in Cincinnati.[47]
Launching local news made the Woodlawn site, 15 mi from Cincinnati on Interstate 75, a hindrance for news crews. As a result, in 1993, WXIX-TV purchased the former Harriet Beecher Stowe School building in the Queensgate neighborhood, spending $2 million at a sheriff's sale to acquire the former black junior high school which had since been converted into offices. The station converted a third of the structure for its own use, including using the former gymnasium as its primary studio.[48] The station moved into what was renamed "19 Broadcast Plaza" in December 1995; at the same time, it dropped its "19XIX" moniker used for a decade and became known as "Fox 19".[49]
Sale to Gray Television
On June 25, 2018, Atlanta-based Gray Television announced that it had reached an agreement with Raycom to merge their respective broadcasting assets (consisting of Raycom's 63 existing owned-and/or-operated television stations, including WXIX-TV, and Gray's 93 television stations) under Gray's corporate umbrella in a cash-and-stock merger transaction valued at $3.6 billion.[52][53] The sale was approved on December 20 of that year[54] and was completed on January 2, 2019.[55]
