is the
CW -affiliated
Television Station for
Baltimore, Maryland . Licensed to the city, the station broadcasts an analog signal on
UHF channel 54 from a transmitter located near Gilson Park in
Catonsville . WNUV broadcasts a digital signal on UHF channel 40 from a transmitter located in the Woodberry section of Baltimore. The station is owned by
Cunningham Broadcasting but is operated by
Sinclair Broadcast Group through a
Local Marketing Agreement with Sinclair's flagship station
FOX affiliate
WBFF . However, due to Cunningham's financial structure, Sinclair effectively owns WNUV as well (see below). WNUV and WBFF share studios located on West 41st Street in the Woodberry section of the city. WNUV is known on-air as '''''"The CW Baltimore"'''''.
In addition to CW primetime, WNUV's '', ''
What I Like About You '', ''
Reba '', ''
My Wife And Kids '', ''
The Bernie Mac Show '', and ''
Girlfriends ''.
In addition to
Baltimore Orioles games, WNUV also airs
ACC basketball and football games through its affiliation with
Lincoln Financial (formerly Jefferson Pilot) Sports. Coverage of ACC football games, as is the case with Orioles games, is split with
WJZ-TV .
WNUV began broadcasting on
July 1 ,
1982 as an affiliate of
SuperTV , a subscription television service. The SuperTV programming aired at night, so during the daytime WNUV aired programming from the
Financial News Network (now part of
CNBC ) and
Televangelist s. At that time, the station was owned by NUVision, Inc. where the station's
Call Letters came from.
In the Fall of 1984, WNUV dropped Financial News and added cartoons from 7 to 9 AM and 2:30 to 5 PM weekdays, sitcoms Noon to 2:30 PM and 5 to 7 PM weekdays, and a movie shown mid-mornings. It retained Subscription TV at night. In the Spring of 1986, the station began to air a conventional independent general entertainment schedule full time and dropped SuperTV. It adopted the on-air name "Baltimore 54". At that time, WNUV had morning and afternoon children's programming similar to WBFF's
Captain Chesapeake , hosted from a mock space ship by a
Star Trek -like crew of characters known as the "54 Space Corps".
In 1989, WNUV was bought by Abry Communications. Under its ownership, the station remained a full-time
Independent Station and picked up the broadcast rights to some
Baltimore Orioles games. The station showed Orioles games through 2006.
In 1994, Abry merged with
Sinclair Broadcast Group . However, Sinclair already owned WBFF and could not keep both stations. Accordingly, WNUV was purchased by Glencairn Ltd., headed by former Sinclair executive Edwin Edwards. The Smith Family, owners and founders of Sinclair (which started when WBFF signed on in 1971) owned 97 percent of Glencairn's stock, so Sinclair effectively owned both stations. Sinclair further circumvented the rules by signing a local marketing agreement with Glencairn, under which WNUV's operations were merged with those of WBFF. In effect, Sinclair had emasculated WBFF's major rival.
WNUV was Glencairn's first station and similar deals resulted in Glencairn owning 11 stations all operated by Sinclair under LMAs. The
FCC eventually fined Sinclair $40,000 in 2001 for illegally controlling Glencairn.
When
UPN started broadcasting in January of 1995, WNUV became its Baltimore affiliate. However, in December of 1997, Sinclair decided not to renew the UPN affiliation and the station became Baltimore's
WB affiliate (
WMJF-LP had been the previous WB affiliate) in January of 1998. UPN moved to WHSW (now
WUTB ).
WNUV launched a 6:30 PM 's 10 PM newscast. In January of 2005, Sinclair decided to move WNUV's 6:30 PM newscast to 5:30 PM on WBFF. The station now airs no newscasts.
Sinclair tried to buy WNUV outright in 2002 as part of a merger with Glencairn but the FCC turned down the request because Baltimore was one of six markets where Sinclair could not legally have a duopoly. The Baltimore market despite its relatively large size (it is the 24th-largest market) has only seven full-power stations (or six, if the two
Maryland Public Television stations licensed in the market are treated as one) which are too few to legally permit a duopoly. Glencairn was renamed Cunningham Broadcasting but is still effectively owned by Sinclair since most of its stock is held by trusts owned by the Smith Family. There is nearly uncontestable evidence that Glencairn / Cunningham has served as a
Corporate Shell used by Sinclair to circumvent FCC ownership rules.
On
January 24 ,
2006 , the WB and UPN networks announced that they would cease broadcasting and merge to create a new network. The new network would be called , the letters representing the first initial of its corporate parents
CBS (the parent company of UPN) and the
Warner Bros. unit of
Time Warner .
On
February 22 , 2006,
News Corporation announced that they would start up another new broadcast television network called . The new network, which would be sister to FOX, would be operated by FOX Television Stations and its syndication division
Twentieth Television .
MyNetworkTV was created in order to give UPN and WB stations, not mentioned as becoming CW affiliates, another option besides becoming independent. It was also created to compete against The CW. The area's UPN affiliate WTUB, owned by
FOX Television Stations , was announced as becoming Baltimore's MyNetworkTV affiliate.
Sinclair later affiliated most of its WB and UPN stations with MyNetworkTV leaving some doubt as to WNUV's status after the new networks were scheduled to launch. However, on
May 2 , 2006, Sinclair affiliated most of its other UPN and WB affiliates, including WNUV, with The CW. The station's branding switched in September to "The CW Baltimore".
MyNetworkTV began broadcasting on WUTB on September, 2006. The CW began broadcasting on WNUV on
September 18 , 2006.
In January of 2007,
DirecTV began carrying WNUV nationally on channel 385 as the distant CW affiliate.
