, channel 29, is an
Owned-and-operated station of the
News Corporation -owned
Fox Broadcasting Company , based in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania . From studios in downtown Philadelphia and transmitter located in the
Roxborough section of the city, the station's signal covers the
Delaware Valley area (Pennsylvania,
New Jersey and
Delaware ).
The station signed on the air on
May 16 ,
1965 as
Independent Station out of nearby
Jenkintown , owned by brothers '''W'''illiam, '''I'''rwin, and '''B'''enjamin '''F'''ox. The Fox family had already been operating WIBF-FM (103.9 MHz., now
WPPZ ) for several years. The new UHF television station was located in the basement of the family's Benson East apartment building on Old York Road in Jenkintown. WIBF-TV was the first of three UHF independents in the Philadelphia market to sign-on during 1965, with
WPHL-TV (channel 17) and WKBS-TV (channel 48, now
WGTW-TV ) arriving in September.
In
1969 ,
Cincinnati -based
Taft Broadcasting purchased the station and call letters were changed to . In order to keep channel 29, Taft was forced to sell
WNEP-TV (channel 16) in
Scranton, Pennsylvania , due to
FCC regulations at the time prohibiting a company from owning two television stations with overlapping coverage areas. Under Taft's ownership, WTAF-TV became a local powerhouse. By the start of the 1980s, WTAF had passed WKBS-TV as Philadelphia's leading independent station. When WKBS left the air in
1983 , the station placed advertisements in ''
TV Guide '' and local papers reminding Philadelphia viewers that channel 29 was still around and that channel 48's former audience was welcome to sample WTAF-TV. But interestingly, the station passed on picking up any of channel 48's shows, most of which went to WPHL-TV.
WTAF-TV was also a strong sports station, having secured broadcast rights to the
Philadelphia Phillies , the
NHL 's
Philadelphia Flyers and the
NBA 's
Philadelphia 76ers at various points. In the 1980s, the station also aired network shows that
NBC 's then-affiliate
KYW-TV and
ABC station
WPVI-TV preempted in favor of local programming. In the spring of
1986 , channel 29 added a 10 PM newscast, the second attempt in the market, and the most successful. In the fall of that same year, WTAF-TV became a charter affiliate of the fledgling Fox network.
As part of a group deal, all of Taft's independent and Fox-affiliated stations, including WTAF, were sold to the
Norfolk, Virginia -based
TVX Broadcast Group in
February 1988 . The new owners changed the station's call letters to the current . The Taft purchase created a large debt load for TVX, and as a result the company sold a number of its smaller stations.
Paramount Pictures purchased a minority stake in TVX in
1989 . A year later, after calling itself ''TV-29'' for many years, the station changed its on-air branding to ''Fox 29''.
In
1991 , Paramount acquired the remainder of TVX which it did not own, and the company's name was changed to , with WTXF as its largest-market station.
Viacom gained control of the stations as part of its purchase of Paramount Pictures in
1993 . In
1994 Viacom announced plans to create a new network service, the
United Paramount Network , which it would co-own with
Chris-Craft Industries . The initial affiliation plans called for WTXF dropping Fox and becoming the Philadelphia outlet for the new network, which would launch in
January 1995 . Though Fox received no official notification from Viacom that the affiliation would be cancelled, Fox made a preliminary deal to buy rival station WGBS-TV (channel 57, now
WPSG ). Signs of the planned switch began showing up at the start of the 1994-95 season, when WTXF began calling itself simply "29."
The planned move coincided with the biggest affiliation shuffle in Philadelphia television history. In the spring of 1994,
CBS and
Westinghouse Broadcasting , owners of KYW-TV, had entered into a long-term affiliation agreement, which resulted in KYW-TV dropping NBC in favor of CBS. CBS would then sell its longtime owned-and-operated station,
WCAU-TV . Several months earlier, Fox entered into a multi-station, multi-year partnership with
New World Communications . New World and NBC emerged as the leading bidders for WCAU, with New World intending to switch WCAU to Fox if it emerged victorious. Fox later cancelled its preliminary deal to purchase WGBS and joined the bidding for WCAU, which was eventually sold to NBC. During this time, Viacom/Paramount changed its Philadelphia plans and decided to sell WTXF to Fox. Almost simultaneously, Viacom bought WGBS and made it the market's UPN station.
As a Fox owned-and-operated station, WTXF immediately added more first run talk and reality shows to the schedule. In
1996 , morning cartoons were dropped in favor of a weekday morning newscast, . Throughout the mid-to-late 1990s, WTXF was available nationally on satellite as the east coast Fox feed, most notably on
PrimeStar .
The station ID changed to ''Fox Philadelphia'' in ,
2005 .
WTXF shares resources with
New York City sister stations
WNYW and
WWOR-TV when the New York stations are reporting on stories that take place in southern New Jersey. WTXF reporters appear on the newscasts to cover the stories. It is expected that, in the very near future, WTXF will expand its news operations to include early-evening newscasts, enabling channel 29 to go head-to-head with the three other network-owned stations.
- ''Good Day Philadelphia'' - Monday-Friday 5:00-9:00 AM
- ''Fox 29 Ten O'Clock News'' - every night 10:00-11:00 PM
