WXPX-TV

Construction

In 1987, a group filed to build a station on the unused channel 66 allocation at Bradenton, Florida, just before the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) froze most licensing activity in top-30 markets to study digital television channel needs.[1] Eleven applicants filed,[2] and seven remained in the running when FCC administrative law judge Richard Sippel selected Bradenton Broadcast Television Co. Ltd., run by Anita F. Rogers, in an initial decision handed down in April 1989.[3]

Channel 66 received its permit as WTGB in 1992. Rogers was introduced to Lowell Paxson, who had left the Home Shopping Network to found Christian Network, Inc. This firm funded channel 66, which would air programming from the Paxson-owned The Worship Network.[4] Christian Network formed part of a strategy by Paxson to have commercial and Christian stations in each of Orlando, Tampa, and Miami.[5] When channel 66 began broadcasting as WFCT on August 1, 1994, it aired infomercials for 12 hours a day, two hours of Worship programming in prime time, and overnight sacred music.[6] When Paxson Communications Corporation launched its Infomall TV infomercial network the next year, WFCT was one of its first stations.[7]

Pax, i, and Ion

Paxson Communications Corporation exercised its options to directly acquire Christian Network–owned WFCT and WCTD in Miami in August 1997.[8] On August 31, 1998, under new WXPX-TV call letters, the station became a launch outlet for the new Pax TV network.[9] In 2000, WXPX signed a joint sales agreement with Tampa NBC affiliate WFLA-TV (channel 8) that included WFLA selling WXPX advertising and WXPX sharing WFLA newscasts.[10] Initially, WFLA produced live 7 and 10 p.m. newscasts for WXPX, which was the only station in the network to rebroadcast NBC Nightly News and one of three to offer live news. The 7 p.m. news was scrapped and changed to a rebroadcast in October 2001,[11] while the 10 p.m. followed in early 2002 after Pax opted not to keep paying to produce it.[12] Beginning in 2003, WXPX was the television home of Tampa Bay Devil Rays baseball, airing 65 to 67 games a season between 2003 and 2008.[13][14] Two cable-only regional sports networks, Fox Sports Florida and Sun Sports, split rights beginning in 2009.[15]

After canceling all of its joint sales agreements[16] and changing its name to i: Independent Television in 2005,[17] the network became known as Ion Television in 2007,[18] following the 2006 name change of Paxson Communications Corporation to Ion Media Networks.[19] The E. W. Scripps Company, owner in Tampa Bay of ABC affiliate WFTS-TV (channel 28), acquired Ion Media in 2020.[20][21]

The Spot

On May 14, 2025, it was announced that WXPX would become an independent station, branded as "The Spot, Tampa Bay 66", on July 1. The new format will be anchored by Scripps Sports's acquisition of regional rights to the Tampa Bay Lightning hockey team, whose games will air on WXPX.[22]

Analog-to-digital conversion

WXPX-TV began broadcasting a digital signal on channel 42 on January 1, 2003.[24] It shut down its analog signal on June 12, 2009, as part of the digital television transition.[25] WXPX-TV relocated its signal from channel 42 to channel 29 on January 17, 2020, as a result of the 2016 United States wireless spectrum auction.[26]