WCGV-TV

WCGV-TV, virtual channel 24 (digital channel 25), is a MyNetworkTV-affiliated television station located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. The station is owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, as part of a duopoly with CW affiliate WVTV (channel 18). The two stations share studio facilities located on Calumet Road in the Park Place office park near the 41/45 Interchange on Milwaukee's northwest side, and its transmitter is located on North Humboldt Boulevard in Milwaukee's Estabrook Park neighborhood, co-located with WVTV on the Milwaukee Public Television broadcast tower.

History

As an independent station

The station first signed on the air on March 24, 1980, under the ownership of B&F Broadcasting from the former North 27th Street facilities of WITI (channel 6), which had moved to a new facility in Brown Deer two years earlier in 1978. At the time, it operated as an independent station and ran religious programs, older movies, cartoons and drama series during the day, along with select CBS and NBC programs that WITI (channel 6) and WTMJ-TV (channel 4) declined to air (such as the 1983 Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour and CBS Late Night). It also produced a two-hour local afternoon talk program called Tempo 24, which aired from 1980 to 1981. At night, the station ran programming from subscription television service SelecTV, which required a decoder box and a monthly subscription to view; SelecTV ran mostly first-run feature films, although Friday evenings outside of FCC-designated safe harbor hours consisted of adult programming from The Playboy Channel.