WQTV-LP


WQTV-LP, UHF analog channel 24, is a low-powered television station licensed to Murray, Kentucky, United States. The station's transmitter is located on Midway Road, along US 641, in unincorporated Calloway County, Kentucky.
WQWQ-LP in Paducah, Kentucky operates as a translator of WQTV-LP; this station's transmitter is located in Farley, Kentucky along the Clarks River. Together, the two stations serve as the CW affiliate for Western Kentucky's Jackson Purchase, Southeastern Missouri, and Southern Illinois. Programming from the MeTV service used to be offered on these stations on a secondary basis, from September 12, 2011 to January 1, 2020, when MeTV programming was moved to a newly-created fourth digital subchannel of Cape Girardeau, Missouri-licensed CBS affiliate KFVS-TV.
Owned by Gray Television, WQTV and WQWQ are sister stations to KFVS-TV and the three stations share studios in the Hirsch Tower on Broadway Avenue in downtown Cape Girardeau. For identification purposes, it is the WQWQ call sign that is used in the logo even though WQTV has more broadcasting power and was the first of the two stations to sign-on.
WQTV and WQWQ do not transmit digital signals of their own, and due to their low-powered status, their signals only cover the immediate areas surrounding Murray and Paducah. Therefore, KFVS-DT2 serves as that purpose which greatly extends their off-air reach. This signal can be seen in 720p high definition on virtual and VHF channel 12.2 from a transmitter northwest of Egypt Mills, in unincorporated Cape Girardeau County. Between September 12, 2011 and January 1, 2020 when MeTV had taken up most of the broadcast day on WQTV/WQWQ, there were only second airings of some syndicated programming from KFVS seen on these stations. Now that the full schedule, uninterrupted, of MeTV has been added to KFVS-DT4, WQTV/WQWQ/KFVS-DT2 can now be operated like a traditional CW-affiliated station, outside of network programming time slots.

History

WQTV-LP launched on January 1, 1988 as W46BE and was known on-air as "TV 46". It was designed to be a sister outlet for radio station WNBS-AM 1340 and had studios in downtown Murray's Court Square. During its infancy, the channel was affiliated at various times with the All News Channel, FamilyNet, and Channel America. After its corporate bankruptcy, the license was sold to Jackson Purchase Broadcasting, owners of WSJP-AM 1130 and WBLN-FM 103.7. The call letters were changed to the current WQTV-LP on August 14, 1995, and it became a WB affiliate, replacing the superstation feed of WGN as the network's affiliate in Southern Illinois. The station was then sold to Murray State University which continued to operate it as a for-profit enterprise.
Eventually, the channel assignment was changed from 46 to 24 and MSU sold the station to current owner Raycom Media in 2004. In 2000, WQTV switched affiliations with WDKA and became a UPN affiliate. During this period, the station was known on-air as "UPN The Beat". On January 24, 2006, The WB and UPN announced that they would end broadcasting and merge. The newly combined network would be called The CW. The letters would represent the first initial of its corporate parents: CBS and the Warner Bros. unit of Time Warner. On February 22, News Corporation announced that it would start up another new network called MyNetworkTV. This new service, which would be a sister network 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. WDKA joined MyNetworkTV on September 5, while on September 18, WQTV became part of The CW. The channel re-branded as "Heartland's CW" and began to be offered on a second digital subchannel of KFVS. This was done to extend its broadcasting radius. It is unknown if WQTV and/or WQWQ will add digital signals of their own. By law, the two were not obligated to make the switch on June 12, 2009 due to their low-powered status.
WQTV and WQWQ-LP will be obligated to convert to digital by July 13, 2021 as part of the Digital TV transition for low-powered TV stations. In early 2015, a construction permit was issued for both WQTV and WQWQ to convert to digital. They will become translators of KFVS, offering all five of the subchannels of KFVS once that transition is complete.

MeTV

On September 12, 2011, WQWQ added MeTV through a secondary affiliation agreement. The channel would provide parts of a simulcast of MeTV programming during different times of the day while the rest of the day would be The CW's prime time lineup along with syndicated, news and original programming. This would be the case until in December 2019 when KFVS announced they would be updating their technology and move MeTV to its own newly created subchannel on 12.4, ending seven years of secondary operations on WQWQ. On January 1, 2020 around 3 a.m., MeTV switched off their secondary operations after an episode of Barnaby Jones leading to infomercials. As of June 2020, WQWQ is a full CW affiliate while MeTV is available on KFVS-DT4.

Digital television

Newscasts

At one point in time, KFVS produced a nightly prime time newscast on WQTV/WQWQ. Known as Heartland News at 9, the show could be seen for a half-hour and was targeted specifically at a Southeastern Missouri audience. It competed with another broadcast in the time slot on Fox affiliate KBSI which also aired every night for thirty minutes. However, that program was produced by NBC affiliate WPSD-TV so it featured more of a regionalized summary of headlines since it originated from the NBC outlet's facility in Kentucky.
The WQTV/WQWQ newscast was dropped after the July 29, 2007 edition. WQTV/WQWQ currently replay three weekday newscasts from KFVS including the 6 a.m. hour of The Breakfast Show, Heartland News at Noon, and Heartland News at 10. The Sunday edition of The Breakfast Show is also repeated on those stations.