WJZ-TV

WJZ-TV, channel 13, is a CBS owned-and-operated television station located in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. The station is owned by the CBS Television Stations subsidiary of CBS Corporation. WJZ-TV's studios and offices are located on Television Hill in the Woodberry section of Baltimore, adjacent to the transmission tower it shares with four other Baltimore television stations.

History

Early history

Baltimore's third television station started on November 2, 1948 as WAAM. The station's original owner was Radio-Television of Baltimore, Inc., which was operated by a pair of Baltimore businessmen, brothers Ben and Herman Cohen. Channel 13 was originally an ABC affiliate, the network's fifth outlet to be located on the East Coast. Until 1956, it carried an additional primary affiliation with the DuMont Television Network. On the station's first day of operations, WAAM broadcast the 1948 presidential election returns and various entertainment shows, remaining on the air for 23 consecutive hours. Channel 13 has been housed in the same studio, located on what is now known as Television Hill, since its inception; the building was the first in Baltimore specifically designed for television production and broadcasting. As a DuMont affiliate, WAAM originated many Baltimore Colts games for the network's National Football League coverage.

Baltimore

Baltimore (/ˈbɔːltᵻˌmɔːr/, locally: [ˈbɔɫ.mɔɻ]) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maryland, and the 26th-most populous city in the country. It is the largest independent city in the United States. Baltimore has more public monuments than any other city per capita in the country and is home to some of the earliest National Register historic districts in the nation, including Fell's Point (1969), Federal Hill (1970) and Mount Vernon Place (1971). More than 65,000 properties, or roughly one in three buildings in the city, are listed on the National Register, more than any other city in the nation.

Founded in 1729, Baltimore is the second largest seaport in the Mid-Atlantic. Baltimore's Inner Harbor was once the second leading port of entry for immigrants to the United States and a major manufacturing center. After a decline in major manufacturing, industrialization and rail transportation, Baltimore shifted to a service-oriented economy, with the Johns Hopkins Hospital (founded 1889), and Johns Hopkins University (founded 1876), now the city's top two employers.

CBS

CBS (an initialism of the network's former name, the Columbia Broadcasting System) is an American commercial broadcast television network that is the flagship properties of CBS Corporation. The company is headquartered at the CBS Building in New York City with major production facilities and operations in New York City (at the CBS Broadcast Center) and Los Angeles (at CBS Television City and the CBS Studio Center).

CBS is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network", in reference to the company's iconic logo, in use since 1951. It has also been called the "Tiffany Network", alluding to the perceived high quality of CBS programming during the tenure of its founder William S. Paley. It can also refer to some of CBS's first demonstrations of color television, which were held in a former Tiffany & Co. building in New York City in 1950.

The network has its origins in United Independent Broadcasters Inc., a collection of 16 radio stations that was purchased by Paley in 1928 and renamed the Columbia Broadcasting System. Under Paley's guidance, CBS would first become one of the largest radio networks in the United States, and eventually one of the Big Three American broadcast television networks. In 1974, CBS dropped its former full name and became known simply as CBS, Inc. The Westinghouse Electric Corporation acquired the network in 1995, renamed its corporate entity to the current CBS Broadcasting, Inc. in 1997, and eventually adopted the name of the company it had acquired to become CBS Corporation. In 2000, CBS came under the control of Viacom, which was formed as a spin-off of CBS in 1971. In late 2005, Viacom split itself into two separate companies, and re-established CBS Corporation – through the spin-off of its broadcast television, radio and select cable television and non-broadcasting assets – with the CBS television network at its core. CBS Corporation is controlled by Sumner Redstone through National Amusements, which also controls the current Viacom.