WISE-TV launched on Nov 21, 1953 is a CW station operating in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Quincy Media is the owner of the channel that shares duopoly with WPTA available on Ch 21. The two sisters have studios and transmitters located on Butler Road in Northwest Fort Wayne. It originally worked as NBC affiliate from its beginnings since 2016.
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Sisters: WPTA
Website: www.yourcwtv.com/partners/fortwayne/
History
The channel first signed on air on Nov 21, 1953 as WKJG-TV and was the maiden television station in Fort Wayne; it was linked with NBC. William Kunkel was the original owner of the channel who also happened to own The Journal Gazette newspaper as well as WKJG 1380 AM and 97.3 FM radios. The radio stations were put on market and were eventually released on Sep 30, 1971 with their calls changing from WKJG to WMEE and WKJG 97.3 FM to WMEF-FM.
The FM channel now uses the call letters WMEE today while the AM sibling switched a number of calls to eventually become WONO. However, the channel returned back to its original WKJG call sign on Nov 3, 2003 and retains it to the date. For a small time WKJG was held by Tony Hulman, a Terre Haute-based industrialist. Upon the death of Hulman, the service was taken over by Joseph R. Cloutier which owned 51% stake in the company (Corporation for General Trade) which was sold off in 2003.
WKJG parent Corporation for General Trade was released for USD 20mn to New Vision Television and on May 26, 2013, the channel changed its calls to WISE-TV as it marked its 50th anniversary. A new transmitter tower was shortly introduced after the event to carry a stronger signal. Granite Broadcasting after paying USD 44.2mn became the new owner of the service but released the ABC affiliate WPTA to Malara Broadcast Group. However, it established an LMA to operate WPTA as well as other Malara assets including KDLH. Granite raised from the bankruptcy in 2007 and was taken over by Silver Point Capital.
Quincy Newspaper agreed to acquire WPTA on Feb 11, 2014; the deal also included the acquisition of Granite’s Broadcasting channels which included WWISE. Initially the license of WISE was bought by SagamoreHIll Broadcasting, however, WPTA would operate the channel through a SSA. Quincy bought the channel (WISE) outright in Nov 2014 with WPTA maintained by Malara as its owners. After the approval of Federal Communications Commission, SagamoreHill once again got its hand on Aug 1, 2016.
The cat and mouse game continued and yet on May 21, 2018, Quincy Media jumped into to buy the station for USD 952,884.
Audiences can watch WISE online for latest Fort Wayne and Indiana news, weather and sports updates and more. Follow the channel on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Here is the website: https://www.yourcwtv.com/
