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KSWO-TV (channel 7) is a
television station A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the earth's s ...
licensed to
Lawton, Oklahoma Lawton is a city in and the county seat of Comanche County, Oklahoma, Comanche County, in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. Located in western Oklahoma, approximately southwest of Oklahoma City, it is the principal city of the Lawton metropolitan ar ...
, United States, serving the western Texoma area as an affiliate of
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and
Telemundo Telemundo (; formerly NetSpan) is an American Spanish-language terrestrial television network owned by NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is a wholly owned subsidiary of Comcast. It provides content ...
. It is owned by
Gray Media Gray Media, Inc., doing business as Gray Television, is an American publicly traded television broadcasting company based in Atlanta. Founded in 1946 by James Harrison Gray as Gray Communications Systems, the company owns or operates 180 statio ...
, which maintains a
shared services Shared services is the provision of a service by one part of an organization or group where that service had previously been found in more than one part of the organization or group. Thus the funding and resourcing of the service is shared and the ...
agreement (SSA) with
American Spirit Media American Spirit Media, LLC is a broadcasting company based in Charlotte, North Carolina. Founded by Thomas B. Henson in 2003 as Ottumwa Media Holdings, it owns television stations in several cities in the Southeastern United States. History In 2 ...
, owner of
Wichita Falls, Texas Wichita Falls ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Wichita County, Texas, United States. It is the principal city of the Wichita Falls metropolitan area, Wichita Falls metropolitan statistical area, which encompasses all of Archer County, Tex ...
–licensed
CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...
affiliate
KAUZ-TV KAUZ-TV (channel 6) is a television station licensed to Wichita Falls, Texas, United States, serving as the CBS affiliate for the western Texoma area. It is owned by American Spirit Media, which maintains a shared services agreement (SSA) wit ...
(channel 6), for the provision of certain services. KSWO-TV's studios are located on 60th Street in southeastern Lawton, and its transmitter is located near East 1940 and North 2390 Roads in rural southwestern
Tillman County, Oklahoma Tillman County is a county located in the southwestern part of Oklahoma, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 6,968. The county seat is Frederick. History The Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867 established a reservation in ...
(near
Grandfield Grandfield is a city in Tillman County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 919 as of the 2020 United States census. It is located about 30 driving miles southeast of the county seat of Frederick, and is situated at the intersection of ...
).


History


Early history

On May 22, 1952, Oklahoma Quality Broadcasting Co.—a locally based company founded by M&D Finance Co. owner Ransom H. Drewry, who co-founded the licensee with a group of shareholders that included J. R. Montgomery (then-president of Lawton's City National Bank), T. R. Warkentin, Robert P. Scott (both of whom were minority partners in locally based S.W. Stationery) and G. G. Downing—submitted an application to the
Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...
(FCC) for a
construction permit Planning permission or building permit refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. House building permits, for example, are subject to bu ...
to build and
license A license (American English) or licence (Commonwealth English) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another part ...
to operate a broadcast television station in the Wichita Falls–Lawton market that would transmit on VHF channel 7. When the FCC awarded the license and permit for channel 7 to the Drewry-led group on December 23, 1952, ( Guide to reading History Cards) the group requested and received approval to assign KSWO-TV as the call letters for his television station; the calls were taken from the Lawton radio station that Drewry founded in 1941, KSWO (1380 AM, now
KKRX KXCA (1380 AM) is a radio station broadcasting an urban adult contemporary format. Licensed to Lawton, Oklahoma, United States, the station serves the Lawton area. The station is currently owned by Mollman Media, Inc. On February 23, 2024, KK ...
). KSWO-TV first signed on the air on March 8, 1953; it was the second television station to sign on in the Wichita Falls–Lawton market, launching one week after
CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...
affiliate KWFT-TV (channel 6, later KSYD-TV and now
KAUZ-TV KAUZ-TV (channel 6) is a television station licensed to Wichita Falls, Texas, United States, serving as the CBS affiliate for the western Texoma area. It is owned by American Spirit Media, which maintains a shared services agreement (SSA) wit ...
)—located across the Oklahoma–Texas state line in Wichita Falls—made its debut on March 1. (Wichita Falls
NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...
affiliate
KFDX-TV KFDX-TV (channel 3) is a television station licensed to Wichita Falls, Texas, United States, serving as the NBC affiliate for the western Texoma area. Its third digital subchannel serves as an owned-and-operated station of The CW (via The CW P ...
hannel 3would sign on one month later, on April 12.) Channel 7 has been an ABC television affiliate since its debut, inheriting those rights through KSWO radio's longtime relationship with the progenitor ABC Radio Network; however, the station also maintained a secondary affiliation with the
DuMont Television Network The DuMont Television Network (also the DuMont Network, DuMont Television, DuMont/Du Mont, or (incorrectly) Dumont ) was one of America's pioneer commercial television networks, rivaling NBC and CBS for the distinction of being first overall in ...
. The station originally maintained transmitter facilities located at its studios, located east of Lawton; construction on the studio facility was delayed 60 days due to inclement winter weather conditions that affected southwestern Oklahoma during the winter of that year, such so that the studio doors were covered with canvas until adequate doors were installed in the building. The transmitter was a relatively low-power unit that propagated a signal that reached over a limited radius spanning to
Altus Altus or ALTUS may refer to: Music *Alto, a musical term meaning second highest musical or vocal type * Altus (voice type), a vocal type also known as countertenor Places * Altus, Arkansas, US ** Altus AVA, a wine-growing region near Altus, Ark ...
to the west, Wichita Falls to the south, Anadarko to the north, and Ringling to the east. By the late 1950s, other nearby ABC affiliates (such as
KTEN } KTEN (channel 10) is a television station licensed to Ada, Oklahoma, United States, serving the Sherman, Texas–Ada, Oklahoma media market, market as an affiliate of NBC, The CW Plus, and American Broadcasting Company, ABC. The station is own ...
in
Ada Ada may refer to: Arts and entertainment * '' Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle'', a novel by Vladimir Nabokov Film and television * Ada, a character in 1991 movie '' Armour of God II: Operation Condor'' * '' Ada... A Way of Life'', a 2008 Bollywo ...
and
KOCO-TV KOCO-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, affiliated with ABC and owned by Hearst Television. Its studios and transmitter are located on East Britton Road ( Historic Route 66)—between North Kelley ...
, which had recently relocated to
Oklahoma City Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Oklahoma, most populous city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat ...
from Enid) began encroaching the northern and eastern fringes on KSWO's viewing area; however, wide gaps in channel 7's signal coverage existed to the south and west of Wichita Falls—the only primary ABC stations in
north North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...
and
west Texas West Texas is a loosely defined region in the U.S. state of Texas, generally encompassing the desert climate, arid and semiarid climate, semiarid lands west of a line drawn between the cities of Wichita Falls, Texas, Wichita Falls, Abilene, Texa ...
at the time were
Dallas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...
affiliate
WFAA-TV WFAA (channel 8) is a television station licensed to Dallas, Texas, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate for the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. It is owned by Tegna Inc. alongside Decatur-licensed independent station KFAA-TV (channel ...
, and Amarillo affiliate
KVII-TV KVII-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Amarillo, Texas, United States, affiliated with ABC and The CW Plus. Owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, the station maintains studios at One Broadcast Center between South Pierce and South Buchan ...
(
Lubbock Lubbock ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the county seat of Lubbock County. With a population of 272,086 in 2024, Lubbock is the 10th-most populous city in Texas and the 84th-most populous in the United States. The city is in the ...
and Abilene, respectively, did not get their own primary ABC affiliates until
KAMC KAMC (channel 28) is a television station in Lubbock, Texas, United States, affiliated with American Broadcasting Company, ABC. It is owned by Mission Broadcasting, which maintains a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Nexstar Media Group, ow ...
affiliated with the network in 1969, followed by the switch of
KTXS-TV KTXS-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Sweetwater, Texas, United States, serving the Abilene area as an affiliate of ABC and The CW Plus. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group alongside KTES-LD (channel 40), broadcasting t ...
to ABC from CBS in 1979). KSWO disaffiliated from DuMont upon its shut down in 1956, amid various issues that arose from its relations with
Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...
that hamstrung it from expansion; the station became a full-time ABC affiliate on November 10 of that year. On December 15, 1957, a fire caused extensive damage to the 60th Street studio facility after gasoline being used to clean a weather map caught fire. In August 1959, the FCC gave permission for Drewry to construct a tower near
Grandfield, Oklahoma Grandfield is a city in Tillman County, Oklahoma, Tillman County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 919 as of the 2020 United States census. It is located about 30 driving miles southeast of the county seat of Frederick, Oklahoma, Fred ...
, which would operate at 316,000
watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), quantify the rate of Work ...
s of power (the maximum power allowable for stations broadcasting on VHF channels 7–13), thereby providing a more powerful signal that could extend KSWO-TV's reach to many portions of far southwestern Oklahoma and northwestern Texas where reception of the station had been marginal at best. Wichitex Radio and Television and Sydney Grayson—the respective owners of NBC affiliate KFDX-TV and CBS affiliate KSYD-TV in Wichita Falls—opposed the application, resulting in Drewry having to convince the FCC that the
construction permit Planning permission or building permit refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. House building permits, for example, are subject to bu ...
merited approval. The new site was located about halfway between Wichita Falls and Lawton (from a Lawton perspective, it was in the same direction as the Wichita Falls stations). The transmitter facility was activated on February 28, 1960, extending channel 7's signal to encompass a much larger area of northwestern Texas and southwestern Oklahoma—bringing stronger reception of ABC network programming to additional areas of the two states for the first time. A second tower would be built at Grandfield for
KJTL KJTL (channel 18) is a television station licensed to Wichita Falls, Texas, United States, serving as the Fox affiliate for the western Texoma area. It is owned by locally based Mission Broadcasting as its flagship station; Mission maintains ...
(channel 18) when it signed on in 1985. Over the years, Ransom Drewry and his family gradually expanded their broadcasting group by acquiring other stations in the northern half of Texas:
KFDA-TV KFDA-TV (channel 10) is a television station in Amarillo, Texas, United States, affiliated with CBS. It is owned by Gray Media alongside Borger-licensed Telemundo affiliate KEYU (channel 31). The two stations share studios on Broadway Drive ( ...
in Amarillo (acquired in 1976 through Amarillo Telecasters, a partnership between R. H. Drewry and Ray Herndon, majority owner of
KMID-TV KMID (channel 2) is a television station licensed to Midland, Texas, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate for the Permian Basin area. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which provides certain services to Odessa-licensed Fox affiliat ...
in Midland);
KXXV-TV KXXV (channel 25) is a television station in Waco, Texas, United States, serving Central Texas as an affiliate of ABC. Owned by the E. W. Scripps Company, the station maintains studios on South New Road in Waco, and its transmitter is located n ...
in
Waco Waco ( ) is a city in and the county seat of McLennan County, Texas, United States. It is situated along the Brazos River and I-35, halfway between Dallas and Austin. The city had a U.S. census estimated 2024 population of 146,608, making i ...
(acquired in 1994);
KWES-TV KWES-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Odessa, Texas, United States, serving the Permian Basin (North America), Permian Basin area as an affiliate of NBC. The station is owned by Tegna Inc. and maintains studios on West County ...
in Midland and Big Spring
satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...
KWAB-TV (both acquired in 1991); K60EE (now
KTLE-LD KTLE-LD (channel 20) is a low-power television station licensed to Odessa, Texas, United States, serving the Permian Basin area as an affiliate of the Spanish-language network Telemundo. It is owned by Gray Media alongside CBS affiliate KOSA-TV ...
) in
Odessa ODESSA is an American codename (from the German language, German: ''Organisation der ehemaligen SS-Angehörigen'', meaning: Organization of Former SS Members) coined in 1946 to cover Ratlines (World War II aftermath), Nazi underground escape-pl ...
(acquired in 2001);
KSCM-LP KSCM-LP (channel 18) was a low-power television station in Bryan, Texas, United States, which was affiliated with the Spanish-language network Telemundo. Owned by Raycom Media, the station was a simulcast of the second digital subchannel of Waco ...
in Bryan (acquired in 2006); and KEYU in Amarillo (acquired in 2009). In December 1997, Drewry sold KSWO radio, as well as KRHD (1350 AM, now
KFTP KFTP (1350 AM) is a radio station licensed to Duncan, Oklahoma, United States. The station is currently owned by Mollman Media, Inc. History The station was assigned the call sign KRHD from 1947 thru 1998 and was named after its original owner ...
) and KRHD-FM (102.3, now KKEN) in Duncan, to Anadarko-based Monroe-Stephens Broadcasting (majority owned by media executive Stanton M. Nelson) for $425,000; the sale of the radio stations allowed the company to focus its business interests around KSWO-TV and its sister television stations in Texas. On July 1, 2008, Drewry announced its intention to sell its eleven television stations (as well as radio station KTXC in
Lamesa, Texas Lamesa ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Dawson County, Texas, United States. Its population was 8,674 at the 2020 census, down from 9,952 at the 2000 census. Located south of Lubbock on the Llano Estacado, Lamesa was founded in 1903. M ...
) to Dallas-based London Broadcasting Company—a company founded by Terry E. London, former CEO of
Gaylord Entertainment Ryman Hospitality Properties, Inc. is a hotel, resort, entertainment, and media company named for one of its assets: the Ryman Auditorium, a National Historic Landmark in Nashville, Tennessee. The company's legal lineage can be traced back to it ...
, the previous year to acquire broadcast properties in small- to mid-sized markets within Texas—for $115 million. While the deal received approval by the FCC, London Broadcasting filed a notice of non-consummation to the FCC in January 2009 after company management decided to terminate the deal due to market uncertainties resulting from the
Great Recession The Great Recession was a period of market decline in economies around the world that occurred from late 2007 to mid-2009.
.


JSA with KAUZ-TV

On July 31, 2009, Drewry entered into a joint sales and shared services agreement with
Hoak Media Hoak Media Corporation was a broadcast media company based in Dallas, Texas. Hoak once owned eighteen television stations (including satellites), all in medium and small-markets, mostly in the Great Plains states and Colorado. Hoak Media was e ...
, under which it assumed some operational responsibilities for longtime rival KAUZ-TV. The agreement, which took effect on August 3, allowed KSWO-TV to provide advertising and promotional services for KAUZ, while Hoak would retain responsibilities over channel 6's programming (including news operations),
master control Master control is the technical hub of a broadcast operation common among most over-the-air television stations and television networks. It is distinct from a production control room (PCR) in television studios where the activities such as swit ...
and production services. The two stations did not consolidate all operations, owing to the distance between Wichita Falls and Lawton and the tailoring of each station's news service to those areas, though KAUZ-TV dismissed its general manager, news director, and sales manager, as well as a news photographer, to be replaced by staff from KSWO. In January 2012, KSWO became the second television station in the Wichita Falls–Lawton market and the eighth station in Oklahoma to begin carrying syndicated programming in
high definition High definition or HD may refer to: Visual technologies *Blu-ray Disc, the universal optical High Definition disc format *HD Photo, former name for the JPEG XR image file format *HDV, format for recording high-definition video onto magnetic tap ...
. The switch was part of a series of upgrades to KSWO and KAUZ's shared master control facility at the former's Lawton studio.


Raycom Media ownership

On August 10, 2015,
Montgomery, Alabama Montgomery is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Alabama. Named for Continental Army major general Richard Montgomery, it stands beside the Alabama River on the Gulf Coastal Plain. The population was 2 ...
–based
Raycom Media Raycom Media, Inc. was an American television broadcasting company based in Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery, Alabama. Raycom owned and/or provided services for 65 television stations and two radio stations across 44 markets in 20 states. Raycom ...
announced that it would purchase Drewry's eight television stations for $160 million—a handsome return on company patriarch Ransom Drewry's investment in KSWO radio 74 years earlier. As part of the deal,
American Spirit Media American Spirit Media, LLC is a broadcasting company based in Charlotte, North Carolina. Founded by Thomas B. Henson in 2003 as Ottumwa Media Holdings, it owns television stations in several cities in the Southeastern United States. History In 2 ...
would purchase the license of and other assets belonging to KAUZ-TV from Hoak Media. While KSWO and KAUZ would remain jointly operated, the existing joint sales agreement between KSWO and KAUZ would be terminated upon the sale's closure due to an FCC rule implemented that year, which prohibited such agreements by counting the sale of 15% or more of advertising time by one station to a competing junior partner station in the JSA as a
duopoly A duopoly (from Greek , ; and , ) is a type of oligopoly where two firms have dominant or exclusive control over a market, and most (if not all) of the competition within that market occurs directly between them. Duopoly is the most commonly ...
that would not be permitted in the Wichita Falls–Lawton market under the agency's ownership rules. The sale was completed on December 1. Upon the JSA's termination, Raycom entered into a shared services agreement with KAUZ, under which KSWO would handle news production, administrative and production operations and provide equipment and building space for that station; despite this, KAUZ remains based out of Wichita Falls and continues to largely operate independently of channel 7.


Sale to Gray Television

On June 25, 2018,
Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...
-based
Gray Television Gray Media, Inc., doing business as Gray Television, is an American publicly traded television broadcasting company based in Atlanta. Founded in 1946 by James Harrison Gray as Gray Communications Systems, the company owns or operates 180 statio ...
announced it had reached a $3.6 billion agreement with Raycom to merge their respective broadcasting assets (consisting of Raycom's 63 existing owned-and/or-operated television stations, including KSWO and the JSA/SSA with KAUZ-TV, and Gray's 93 television stations) under Gray's corporate umbrella. The sale was approved on December 20 and was completed on January 2, 2019.


News operation

, KSWO-TV presently broadcasts hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with hours each weekday and two hours each on Saturdays and Sundays). In regards to the number of hours devoted to news programming, it is the highest local newscast output among the Wichita Falls–Lawton market's broadcast television stations, tied with NBC affiliate KFDX-TV and beating KSWO's CBS-affiliated sister station KAUZ-TV's weekly news total by a half-hour. Because of KSWO's status as the only major-network affiliate licensed to a city on the Oklahoma side of the Wichita Falls–Lawton market, the station's newscasts tend to focus more on Lawton and surrounding areas of southwestern Oklahoma, with a secondary focus on stories occurring in northwest Texas. Among the three local television news operations in the area, KSWO maintains a ratings stronghold on the Oklahoma side of the Wichita Falls–Lawton market, while KAUZ and KFDX primarily compete for the audience on the Texas side.


News department history

KSWO pioneered new developments in weather forecasting for its viewing area throughout its history, particularly in regard to its coverage of severe weather events affecting its nearly 30-county viewing area encompassing southwestern Oklahoma and western north Texas. Channel 7 was the first television station in the area to have its own on-site weather radar (which was originally displayed in black and white as the station had not yet acquired color broadcasting equipment nor did colorizing techniques for radar displays exist at the time) in the late 1950s or early 1960s, had introduced the market's first color radar in 1976 (branded as "Accu-scan 7"), and introduced the area's first Doppler weather radar in 1984 (more than ten years ahead of the installations of such a system by arch-rivals KFDX and KAUZ). KSWO-TV has several longtime veterans who have been with the station for 20 years or longer. Jan Stratton—who also served as the station's news director until July 2006—served as evening anchor continuously for 33 years from 1981 until her retirement in January 2014. Co-anchor and former news director, David Bradley, who was with the station from 1986 until 2017 (when he accepted an anchor job at fellow ABC affiliate KVII-TV in Amarillo, Texas), originated at channel 7 with a thirteen-year tenure as sports director/weeknight sports anchor before he moved to the news side as KSWO's primary weeknight anchor in 1999. Tom Charles, a familiar face to Channel 7 viewers since the early 1960s, officially retired from KSWO-TV after 45 years of service on December 31, 2010; Charles served as chief weathercaster/meteorologist from 1964 to 1996 and then as anchor of the 5:30 a.m. newscast and co-anchor of ''Good Morning Texoma'' from 2000 to 2010 following a four-year stint as chief meteorologist at CBS affiliate KAUZ-TV. Larry Patton, who has been employed by the station since 1967, has served as general manager of KSWO-TV since 1977; Patton was inducted into the Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame in March 2015. KSWO broadcast Dr.
James "Red" Duke James Henry "Red" Duke, Jr. (November 16, 1928 – August 25, 2015) was a trauma surgeon and professor at McGovern Medical School, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center, where he worke ...
's syndicated medical reports to viewers in Texoma throughout much of the 1980s and 1990s. The station launched a local morning newscast in 1989, when it launched the traditional news program ''Good Morning Texoma''. Originally airing for 30 minutes from 6:30 to 7 a.m., the program would expand to one hour in September 1992, then to hours in September 1999, and finally to two hours in September 2009. ''Good Morning Texoma'' would eventually expand to weekends in January 1993, making KSWO the first television station in the Wichita Falls-Lawton market to launch a weekend morning newscast, with the debut of one-hour-long Saturday and Sunday editions at 8 a.m. (the 8 a.m. edition of the weekend broadcasts would later be reduced to a half-hour in January 2010, at which time it was joined by an additional half-hour weekend edition at 6:30 a.m.). In 1996, the station discontinued its longtime ''Action 7 News'' moniker for its newscasts and rebranded its news programming under the ''7 News'' banner. In late May of that year, KSWO broadcast its early morning newscast, ''Good Morning Texoma'', with limited backup electricity; the newscast was conducted virtually in the dark due to electrical outages that had affected the Lawton area after a complex of severe thunderstorms rolled through southern Oklahoma the previous night with areas of damaging
straight-line winds In meteorology, a downburst is a strong downward and outward gushing wind system that emanates from a point source above and blows radially, that is, in straight lines in all directions from the area of impact at surface level. It originate ...
. The only power available to the studio came from a
portable generator Portable may refer to: General * Portable building, a manufactured structure that is built off site and moved in upon completion of site and utility work * Portable classroom, a temporary building installed on the grounds of a school to provide a ...
located in one of the station's live trucks, which also served as a makeshift studio-transmitter link to relay the signal to the transmitter dish at the Grandfield site. The broadcast was done with one camera, one tape deck and one microphone (which was passed between the anchors). In 1999, the station introduced a combined newsroom/studio set that is heavily downscaled version of the "Newsplex" set used at the time by WHDH in Boston and WSVN in Miami, both of which also integrate their anchor desk within their newsrooms. (In January 2018, the "Newsplex" was repainted and remodeled to include updated
duratrans Duratrans were invented by Eastman Kodak Co. in the late 1970s and trademarked in 1982, to ascribe to their newly developed large-format backlit color transparency film, Kodak shortened the material name Endura Transparency to its current name. T ...
and widescreen monitors; KSWO's newscasts were temporarily moved to a separate area on the newsroom's second level until the remodeling was completed.) For the May 2009 ratings period, according to
Nielsen Media Research Nielsen Media Research (NMR) is an American firm that measures media audiences, including television, radio, theatre, films (via the AMC Theatres MAP program), and newspapers. Headquartered in New York City, it is best known for the Nielsen rat ...
, KSWO's newscasts ranked in first place on weekdays in the morning, 6 and 10 p.m. timeslots. However, the station has experienced a slight decline in its ratings ever since Drewry management consolidated certain news department assets belonging to Wichita Falls-based KAUZ with channel 7's news operation in the fall of 2009, and transferred longtime station manager, Mike Taylor, to KAUZ to serve as that station's general manager. Ironically, Nexstar Broadcasting Group-owned KFDX, which maintains the only other news operation in the Lawton–Wichita Falls market, has shown improvement with its ratings rather than an increase either for KAUZ or KSWO. In June 2011, KSWO began broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition, becoming the first station in the Wichita Falls-Lawton market to make the upgrade; the 9 p.m. newscast on KSWO-DT3 was included in the upgrade. For most of the JSA/SSA's existence, KSWO and KAUZ retained fully separate local news programs, due to the stations' distance from one another and their focus on different portions of the Wichita Falls–Lawton market. The two stations began simulcasting local news for the first time on January 6, 2018, when KSWO and KAUZ consolidated production of their respective half-hour weekend 8 a.m. newscasts into a single program, under the unified title ''Texoma Weekend Morning News'', that is simulcast on both stations and utilizes KSWO's existing weekend morning news staff (KSWO maintains a separate 6:30 a.m. newscast on Saturday and Sunday mornings, which carries the same title).


On-air staff


Notable former on-air staff

*
Don Armes Don Armes (born July 31, 1961) is a United States Republican politician from U.S. state of Oklahoma. Armes served in the Oklahoma House of Representatives, representing state House District 63. He was first elected to the seat in 2002. Early l ...
– agricultural reporter (1999–2002; now 63rd House District Rep. in the
Oklahoma House of Representatives The Oklahoma House of Representatives is the lower house of the legislature of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. Its members introduce and vote on bills and resolutions, provide legislative oversight for state agencies, and help to craft the state's ...
) * Kevin Ogle – reporter (now at
KFOR-TV KFOR-TV (channel 4) is a television station in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside KAUT-TV (channel 43), an owned-and-operated station of The CW. The two stations share stu ...
in
Oklahoma City Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Oklahoma, most populous city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat ...
) * Randy Scott – sports anchor/reporter (2004–2005; now at
ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...
)


Technical information


Subchannels

The station's signal is
multiplexed In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource— ...
: In 2006, KSWO-TV launched a Telemundo subchannel. The third subchannel previously aired a loop of weather forecasts,
Live Well Network Localish (formerly Live Well Network) is a digital multicast television network owned by ABC Owned Television Stations, a division of Disney. Localish's 24/7 channel streams on Hulu + Live and on linear TV. Its flagship shows including ''More ...
, and
This TV This TV (also known as This TV Network and alternately stylized as thisTV) was an American free-to-air television network owned by Allen Media Broadcast Networks, LLC, part of the Allen Media Group division of Entertainment Studios. Originally ...
; a 9 p.m. newscast aired on it from 2011 to 2014 and 2015 to 2016.


Analog-to-digital conversion

KSWO-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 7, on February 17, 2009, the original target date on which full-power television stations in the United States were to transition from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station cited the need to place its digital antenna where the analog transmitter was located for its decision to go forward with the transition on the originally scheduled date, despite a
Congressional A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ad ...
vote the previous month that pushed back the analog-to-digital cutoff for full-power stations to June 12. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition VHF channel 11, using
virtual channel In most telecommunications organizations, a virtual channel is a method of remapping the ''program number'' as used in H.222 Program Association Tables and Program Mapping Tables to a channel number that can be entered as digits on a receiver's ...
7.


Translators

In addition to the main Grandfield transmitter, a community-owned translator in
Quanah, Texas Quanah () is a city in and the county seat of Hardeman County, Texas, Hardeman County, Texas, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census the population was 2,279, down from 2,641 at the 2010 United States census, 2010 census. ...
, rebroadcasts KSWO-TV, as does a UHF fill-in translator in Lawton which was activated in January 2022. Gray also owns construction permits for further UHF fill-in translators to serve the Altus and Wichita Falls areas. *
Altus, OK Altus () is a city in and the county seat of Jackson County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 18,729 at the 2020 census. Altus is home to Altus Air Force Base, the United States Air Force training base for C-17, KC-46 and KC-135 ...
: 21 *
Jolly Happiness is a complex and multifaceted emotion that encompasses a range of positive feelings, from contentment to intense joy. It is often associated with positive life experiences, such as achieving goals, spending time with loved ones, ...
/Wichita Falls, TX: *
Lawton, OK Lawton is a city in and the county seat of Comanche County, in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. Located in western Oklahoma, approximately southwest of Oklahoma City, it is the principal city of the Lawton, Oklahoma, metropolitan statistical area. ...
: * Quanah, TX:


References


External links

* {{Gray TV 1953 establishments in Oklahoma American Broadcasting Company affiliates Dabl affiliates Gray Media MeTV affiliates Telemundo affiliates Television channels and stations established in 1953 SWO-TV True Crime Network affiliates