WKPD

Last updated
WKPD
Satellite of WKLE, Lexington, Kentucky
Kentucky Educational Television logo.svg
Channels
Branding KET
Programming
Network Kentucky Educational Television
Affiliations
Ownership
OwnerKentucky Authority for Educational Television
History
First air date
May 31, 1971
(52 years ago) (1971-05-31)
Former call signs
WDXR-TV (1971–1978)
Former channel number(s)
  • Analog:
  • 29 (UHF, 1971–2009)
  • Digital:
  • 41 (UHF, 2002–2019)
Independent (1971–1975)
Call sign meaning
Kentucky Paducah
Technical information [1]
Licensing authority
 FCC
Facility ID 65758
ERP 90 kW
HAAT 159 m (522 ft)
Transmitter coordinates 37°5′40″N88°40′20″W / 37.09444°N 88.67222°W / 37.09444; -88.67222
Links
Public license information
Website www.ket.org

WKPD (channel 29) is a PBS member television station licensed to Paducah, Kentucky, United States. Owned by the Kentucky Authority for Educational Television, the station is operated as part of the statewide Kentucky Educational Television (KET) network. WKPD's transmitter is located on Coleman Road off of KY 305 on the west side of Paducah, near the McCracken County Soccer Complex. [2]

Contents

History

WDXR-TV

On May 27, 1966, E. Weaks McKinney-Smith and George T. Bailey, doing business as Channel 29, filed with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a construction permit to build a new commercial television on channel 29 at Paducah, which was granted by the FCC on January 30, 1967. [3] The station took the call letters WDXR-TV; Smith and Bailey were the owners of Paducah radio station WDXR. [4]

In 1968, Smith and Bailey bought land at the corner of Kentucky Avenue and 4th Street in downtown Paducah for a new building to house WDXR radio and television. [5] Construction on the facility began in the summer of 1969; [6] while the building was finished early the next year, it was not until December 1970 that the station announced a planned launch date for April 1, 1971, and programming focused on the Paducah area. [7]

Channel 29 began telecasting May 31, 1971, as an independent station. [8] Programming offerings initially included two daily newscasts. [9] It also aired syndicated programming and local sports telecasts, [10] as well as a local church service. [11]

Tragedy struck WDXR radio and television on February 21, 1974, when Weaks McKinney-Smith died in a New York City hospital at the age of 49, nearly a month after suffering a heart attack on a business trip to try to affiliate the station with ABC, [8] [12] which was already seen in parts of the market from Harrisburg, Illinois-licensed WSIL-TV. With Weaks's death and Bailey selling his shares later that year, the station became 100 percent owned by Lady Sarah McKinney-Smith. [3]

On October 22, 1975, at 12 midnight Central time, [13] WDXR-TV suspended operations after going bankrupt. A week later, the station issued a two-sentence statement confirming that it had asked the FCC to remain silent. [14] No reason was given, [15] but a representative of the church, when he visited the station to ask about the suspension, saw men from RCA carting away equipment. [11]

As a KET transmitter

That same year, Kentucky Educational Television commissioned a study that reported the establishment of new transmitters to serve Paducah and Owensboro a high priority. Parts of the Jackson Purchase area received a signal from WKMU, the network's transmitter that is licensed to Murray, but without specially designed antenna setups, as local schools had, the public could not receive a consistent clear signal. KET filed for the channel directly, only to discover that the WDXR-TV license was still active. [16]

Lady Sarah sold the WDXR-TV building, though without any television production equipment (which had been removed), to J. Spencer Solomon, owner of a production firm in Benton, in September 1976. [17] A lengthy courtship for facilities and the worse nature of the signal gap in the Owensboro area threatened to cost Paducah its shot at having a KET transmitter. [18] However, in January 1977, a deal was reached to donate the WDXR-TV license to KET. [19]

The FCC approved the license transfer on January 30, 1978. [3] KET, however, opted not to use the former tower of WDXR-TV near Melber and instead pressed forward with plans to build at a site owned by the McCracken County government. The new tower, located on Coleman Road, would also provide facilities to the state early warning system [19] and would cost $1 a year instead of $26,000 to buy the WDXR-TV tower site. [20] Construction on WKPD, as the transmitter was renamed, was delayed by a backlog of state projects; [21] the station returned to the air September 9, 1979, as the 14th KET transmitter. [22]

Coverage area

Although WKPD covers most of the same areas of the Purchase region as WKMU except for Fulton County, WKPD's signal can also be received in areas of the region where WKMU cannot. Examples include parts of Ballard County, as well as areas of southernmost Illinois and parts of Mississippi County in southeast Missouri. WKPD's signal coverage extends from Charleston, Missouri, to Cairo, Illinois. The WKPD signal is received as far east as Eddyville, as far south as Mayfield near WKMU's tower, and as far north as northern Johnson and Pope counties in Illinois. [23]

Cable and satellite carriage

Since 2003, the main channel of WKPD is available on DirecTV and Dish Network satellite television in the entirety of the Paducah–Cape Girardeau market, including both customers who live on the Illinois or Missouri sides of the market, and the Paducah market's two other principal cities of Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and Harrisburg, Illinois. [24] All cable television providers in the Kentucky segment of the media market provide at least the main channel of the network. WSIU-TV is mostly carried on cable in the Illinois and Missouri segments of the market.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:

Subchannels of WKPD [25]
Channel Res. Aspect Short nameProgramming
29.1 720p 16:9 KETMain KET programming / PBS
29.2KET2 KET2
29.3 480i 4:3 KET KYKentucky Channel
29.4KETKIDS PBS Kids

Analog-to-digital conversion

WKPD-TV shut down its analog signal over UHF channel 29 in compliance with the 2009 digital television transition. Although the mandatory deadline was June 12, 2009, after the DTV Delay Act pushed back the deadline from February 17, the analog signal was shut down on April 16. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 41. Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former UHF analog channel 29. [26] [27]

WKPD moved its digital signal to UHF channel 23 as part of the network's participation in the 2016–17 FCC Spectrum incentive auction.

Programming

See also

Related Research Articles

Iowa PBS, formerly Iowa Public Television (IPTV), is a network of Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) member stations in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is operated by the Iowa Public Broadcasting Board, an agency of the state education department which holds the licenses for all the PBS member stations in the state. Iowa PBS' headquarters are located at 6450 Corporate Drive in Johnston, Iowa, a suburb of Des Moines.

KBSI is a television station licensed to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, United States, serving as the Fox affiliate for Southeastern Missouri, the Purchase area of Western Kentucky, Southern Illinois, and Northwest Tennessee. It is owned by the Community News Media subsidiary of Standard Media alongside Paducah, Kentucky–licensed MyNetworkTV affiliate WDKA. Both stations share studios on Enterprise Street in Cape Girardeau, while KBSI's transmitter is located in unincorporated Cape Girardeau County north of the city.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WDKA</span> MyNetworkTV affiliate in Paducah, Kentucky

WDKA is a television station licensed to Paducah, Kentucky, United States, serving as the MyNetworkTV affiliate for Western Kentucky's Purchase region, Southern Illinois and Southeastern Missouri, and Northwest Tennessee. It is owned by the Community News Media subsidiary of Standard Media alongside Cape Girardeau, Missouri–licensed Fox affiliate KBSI. Both stations share studios on Enterprise Street in Cape Girardeau, while WDKA's transmitter is located in Vienna, Illinois.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WGEM-TV</span> NBC/CW/Fox affiliate in Quincy, Illinois

WGEM-TV is a television station licensed to Quincy, Illinois, United States, serving the Quincy, Illinois–Hannibal, Missouri–Keokuk, Iowa market as an affiliate of NBC, The CW Plus, and Fox. Owned by Gray Television, it is sister to the company's sole radio property, sports station WGEM-FM (105.1). Both stations share studios in the New Tremont Apartments on Hampshire Street in downtown Quincy. WGEM-TV's transmitter is located east of the city on Cannonball Road near I-172.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kentucky Educational Television</span> PBS member network serving Kentucky

Kentucky Educational Television (KET) is a state network of PBS member television stations serving the U.S. Commonwealth of Kentucky. It is operated by the Kentucky Authority for Educational Television, an agency of the Kentucky state government, which provides more than half of its annual funding. KET is the dominant public broadcaster in the commonwealth, with transmitters covering the vast majority of the state as well as parts of adjacent states; the only other PBS member in Kentucky is WKYU-TV in Bowling Green. KET is the largest PBS state network in the United States; the broadcast signals of its sixteen stations cover almost all of the state, as well as parts of Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. The network's offices, network center and primary studio facilities are located at the O. Leonard Press Telecommunications Center on Cooper Drive in Lexington; KET also has production centers in Louisville and at the Kentucky State Capitol Annex in Frankfort.

WPXS is a religious television station licensed to Mount Vernon, Illinois, United States, but primarily serving the St. Louis market. The station is owned and operated by the Daystar Television Network. WPXS' transmitter is located on Five Forks Road near New Athens, Illinois.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">KFVS-TV</span> CBS affiliate in Cape Girardeau, Missouri

KFVS-TV is a television station licensed to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, United States, serving Southeastern Missouri, the Purchase area of Western Kentucky, Southern Illinois, and Northwest Tennessee as an affiliate of CBS and The CW. The station is owned by Gray Television alongside Paducah, Kentucky–licensed Telemundo affiliate WQWQ-LD. The two stations share studios in the Hirsch Tower on Broadway Avenue in Downtown Cape Girardeau; KFVS-TV's transmitter is located northwest of Egypt Mills, in unincorporated Cape Girardeau County.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WSIL-TV</span> ABC affiliate in Harrisburg, Illinois

WSIL-TV is a television station licensed to Harrisburg, Illinois, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate for Southern Illinois, Southeast Missouri, the Purchase area of Western Kentucky, and Northwest Tennessee. Owned by Allen Media Broadcasting, the station maintains studios on Country Aire Drive in Carterville and a transmitter near Creal Springs, Illinois. It is rebroadcast on KPOB-TV in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, covering the Missouri Bootheel and northeastern Arkansas, and translator K10KM-D in Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

WSIU-TV is a PBS member television station in Carbondale, Illinois, United States. It is owned by Southern Illinois University alongside NPR member WSIU. The two stations share studios on the university's campus in Carbondale; WSIU-TV's transmitter is located along US 51 near Tamaroa, Illinois.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WPSD-TV</span> NBC affiliate in Paducah, Kentucky

WPSD-TV is a television station licensed to Paducah, Kentucky, United States, serving as the NBC affiliate for Western Kentucky's Jackson Purchase region, Southern Illinois, the Missouri Bootheel, and northwest Tennessee. Owned by locally based Paxton Media Group, the station maintains studios on Television Lane in Paducah, and its transmitter is located at Monkey's Eyebrow, Kentucky.

Arkansas PBS is a state network of PBS member television stations serving the U.S. state of Arkansas. It is operated by the Arkansas Educational Television Commission, a statutory non-cabinet agency of the Arkansas government operated through the Arkansas Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, which holds the licenses for all of the public television stations based in the state. The commission is managed by an independent board of university and education officials, and gubernatorial appointees representing each of Arkansas's four congressional districts. Along with offering television programs supplied by PBS and various independent distributors, the network produces public affairs, cultural and documentary programming as well as sports events sanctioned by the Arkansas Activities Association (AAA).

WKOI-TV is a television station licensed to Richmond, Indiana, United States, broadcasting the Ion Television network to the Dayton, Ohio, area. The station is owned and operated by the Ion Media subsidiary of the E. W. Scripps Company. Transmission facilities are provided by unrelated NBC affiliate WDTN, which shares its digital channel with WKOI-TV through a channel sharing agreement, along with WDTN's sister station, Springfield, Ohio–licensed CW affiliate WBDT ; the transmitter is located on Frytown Road in southwest Dayton. For the purposes of its FCC correspondence, WKOI's official 'studio' facility is located at Scripps Center in downtown Cincinnati.

KOZK is a PBS member television station licensed to Springfield, Missouri, United States, owned by Missouri State University. The station's studios are located on the Missouri State University campus on National Avenue in southern Springfield, and its transmitter is located on Highway FF north of Fordland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WQWQ-LD</span> Low-power Telemundo affiliate in Paducah, Kentucky

WQWQ-LD is a low-power television station broadcasting from Cape Girardeau, Missouri, United States, as an affiliate of the Spanish-language network Telemundo. It is owned by Gray Television alongside KFVS-TV, a dual affiliate of CBS and The CW. The two stations share studios in the Hirsch Tower on Broadway Avenue in downtown Cape Girardeau; WQWQ-LD's transmitter is located northwest of Egypt Mills, in unincorporated Cape Girardeau County. Though WQWQ-LD is licensed to serve Paducah, Kentucky, its signal does not cover that city.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WATM-TV</span> ABC affiliate in Altoona, Pennsylvania

WATM-TV is a television station licensed to Altoona, Pennsylvania, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate for the Johnstown–Altoona–State College market. It is owned by Palm Television, L.P., which maintains a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Cunningham Broadcasting, owner of Johnstown-licensed Fox affiliate WWCP-TV, for the provision of certain services. Both stations, in turn, are operated under a time brokerage agreement (TBA) by Sinclair Broadcast Group, owner of Johnstown-licensed dual NBC/CW+ affiliate WJAC-TV.

WTCT is a religious television station licensed to Marion, Illinois, United States, serving the Paducah–Cape Girardeau–Harrisburg television market as the flagship station of the locally based Tri-State Christian Television (TCT) network. WTCT's transmitter is located near Goreville, Illinois. The national feed of TCT via WTCT is available on DirecTV channel 377.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">WKPC-TV</span> PBS member station in Louisville, Kentucky

WKPC-TV is a Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) member television station licensed to Louisville, Kentucky, United States. Owned by the Kentucky Authority for Educational Television, the station is operated as part of the statewide Kentucky Educational Television (KET) network. WKPC-TV's transmitter is located at the Kentuckiana Tower Farm at Floyds Knobs, in Floyd County, Indiana. WKPC and WKMJ are the only KET-owned stations whose transmitters are outside Kentucky's borders.

WKMJ-TV is a PBS member television station in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. It is the flagship station for KET2, the second television service of Kentucky Educational Television (KET), which is owned by the Kentucky Authority for Educational Television.

W26EW-D, virtual and UHF digital channel 26, is a low-powered HSN-affiliated television station licensed to Huntington, West Virginia, United States. The signal covers all of Huntington, and also can reach parts of Ashland, Kentucky and Ironton, Ohio.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">KDKZ-LD</span> Television station in Missouri, United States

KDKZ-LD, virtual and UHF digital channel 18, is a low-power AMGTV-affiliated television station licensed to Farmington, Missouri, United States and serving the northwestern parts of the Cape Girardeau, Missouri/Paducah, Kentucky market, and the southernmost part of the St. Louis market.

References

  1. ↑ "Facility Technical Data for WKPD". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
  2. ↑ "RabbitEars.Info".
  3. 1 2 3 FCC History Cards for WKPD
  4. ↑ "TV Permit Sought By Paducahans". Paducah Sun-Democrat. May 31, 1966. pp. 1, 2 . Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  5. ↑ "High Bid Accepted For Downtown Land". Paducah Sun-Democrat. June 12, 1968. p. 9. Retrieved February 16, 2021– via Newspapers.com.
  6. ↑ "Work Starts For Downtown Building". Paducah Sun-Democrat. July 27, 1969. p. 6-C. Retrieved February 16, 2021– via Newspapers.com.
  7. ↑ "WDXR-TV To Open Programming April 1". Paducah Sun-Democrat. December 15, 1970. pp. 1, 2 . Retrieved February 16, 2021– via Newspapers.com.
  8. 1 2 Nash, Francis M. (1995). Towers Over Kentucky: A History of Radio and TV in the Bluegrass State. HOST Communications. p. 311. ISBN   9781879688933.
  9. ↑ "WDXR-TV Is Scheduled To Begin Operating Monday". Paducah Sun-Democrat. May 30, 1971. p. 1-C. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  10. ↑ "Amazing Facts About Telecast". The Messenger. October 18, 1973. p. 1, 10.
  11. 1 2 "Television station in Paducah, Ky., is going off air". The Courier-Journal. October 28, 1975. p. A11. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  12. ↑ "Weaks McKinney-Smith, TV Executive, Dies". Paducah Sun-Democrat. February 21, 1974. p. 1. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  13. ↑ "WDXR, Channel 29, ceases operations". The Southeastern Missourian . Cape Girardeau, Missouri. October 31, 1975. p. 19 – via Google Books.
  14. ↑ "WDXR-TV Suspends Operations". Paducah Sun-Democrat. October 27, 1975. p. 1. Retrieved February 16, 2021– via Newspapers.com.
  15. ↑ "Channel 29 Quits In Unexplained Move". Kentucky New Era . Hopkinsville, Kentucky. October 28, 1975. p. 28 – via Google Books.
  16. ↑ Matlock, Bill (February 1, 1976). "KET plans run into trouble". Paducah Sun-Democrat. p. 1-C. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  17. ↑ "Benton-based corporation purchases WDXR Building". Paducah Sun-Democrat. September 3, 1976. pp. 1-A, 2-A . Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  18. ↑ Matlock, Bill (December 26, 1976). "Technical points could cost city KET transmitter". pp. 1-A, 14-A . Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  19. 1 2 "License held by WDXR-TV donated to KET". Paducah Sun-Democrat. January 7, 1977. p. 1. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  20. ↑ Bartleman, Bill (April 22, 1977). "County-owned property picked for transmitter". Paducah Sun-Democrat. p. Highlights 5. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  21. ↑ "TV transmitter project is delayed". Paducah Sun. October 2, 1978. p. 9-A. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  22. ↑ Matlock, Bill (September 9, 1979). "KET will flip switch on WKPD here today". Paducah Sun. p. 1-C. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  23. ↑ Maps of the coverage areas of all Full-power stations in Paducah, KY and Cape Girardeau, MO. Federal Communications Commission (2009).
  24. ↑ Moyers, Scott (April 23, 2003). "TV plans for local channels in lineup". The Southeastern Missourian. p. 1A, 2A.
  25. ↑ "Digital TV Market Listing for WKPD". RabbitEars .
  26. ↑ "Calls come after KET, WKYT digital TV transition". Lexington Herald-Leader . April 17, 2009. Retrieved January 17, 2017.
  27. ↑ "The Digital Transition: The Malcolm (Mac) Wall Years". KET. Kentucky Educational Television. Retrieved 2017-01-13.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.