WDBB (channel 17) 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
Bessemer, Alabama
Bessemer is a city in Jefferson County, Alabama, Jefferson County, Alabama, United States and a southwestern suburb of Birmingham, Alabama, Birmingham. The population was 26,019 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is within the Bi ...
, United States, serving
Tuscaloosa and west Alabama as a
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 ...
of
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...
-based
CW affiliate
WTTO (channel 21, licensed to
Homewood). It is owned by
Cunningham Broadcasting
Cunningham Broadcasting Corporation is an owner of broadcast television stations in the United States. The company owns fifteen stations–eight affiliated with Fox, three affiliated with The CW, two affiliated with ABC, and two affiliated with ...
, a partner company of the
Sinclair Broadcast Group
Sinclair, Inc., doing business as Sinclair Broadcast Group, is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. Headquartered in the Baltimore suburb o ...
, which owns WTTO,
MyNetworkTV
MyNetworkTV (stylized as mynetworkTV; unofficially abbreviated MNT or MNTV) is an American commercial broadcast television syndication service and former television network owned by Fox Corporation, operated by its Fox Television Stations ...
affiliate
WABM
WABM (channel 68) is a television station in Birmingham, Alabama, United States, affiliated with MyNetworkTV. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group alongside Homewood, Alabama, Homewood-licensed The CW, CW affiliate WTTO (channel 21) and low- ...
(channel 68), and regional
ABC affiliate WBMA-LD (channel 58, branded as
ABC 33/40), which WDBB also rebroadcasts. Sinclair supplies all of WDBB's programming under a programming services agreement, a form of
local marketing agreement
In North American broadcasting, a local marketing agreement (LMA), or local management agreement, is a contract in which one corporation, company agrees to operate a radio station, radio or television station owned by another party. In essence, it ...
. However, Sinclair effectively owns WDBB, as the majority of Cunningham's stock is owned by the family of deceased group founder Julian Smith. The transmitter is located near
Windham Springs, east of
State Route 69.
WDBB was started a local
independent station
An independent station is a broadcast station, usually a television station, not affiliated with a larger broadcast television network, network. As such, it only broadcasts broadcast syndication, syndicated programs it has purchased; brokered pr ...
by Dubose Broadcasting in 1984; it soon expanded to cover Birmingham. In 1986, the station launched
WNAL-TV (channel 44) in
Gadsden, which together with WDBB provided regional coverage. WDBB-WNAL served as the
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, LLC (commonly known as Fox; stylized in all caps) is an Television in the United States, American commercial broadcasting, commercial broadcast television broadcaster, television network serving as the flagship proper ...
affiliate for the Tuscaloosa, Birmingham, and
Anniston–Gadsden markets from the network's launch in 1986 until 1990, when the affiliation went to WTTO; WDBB began simulcasting that station the next year due to financial difficulties. WDBB and WTTO lost Fox in 1996 due to a major regional shuffle of network affiliations, affiliating with
The WB
The WB Television Network (shortened to The WB, stylized as "THE WB", and nicknamed the "Frog Network" and/or "The Frog" for its former mascot Michigan J. Frog) was an American television network that ran from 1995 to 2006. It launched on ter ...
in 1997 and with The CW in 2006.
History
On March 23, 1983, Channel 17 of Tuscaloosa, Inc., filed an application with 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) to build a new commercial TV station in the city. Shareholders in the applicant were headlined by David R. Dubose, who was then the news director at
WUAL-FM
WUAL-FM (91.5 FM) is a non-commercial, listener-supported radio station in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. It is owned by the University of Alabama and is the flagship station of Alabama Public Radio. It signed on the air on .
WUAL-FM is a Class C1 ...
at the
University of Alabama
The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, the Capstone, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, United States. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of ...
.
WDBB began broadcasting on October 8, 1984, from studios on Jug Factory Road. It served as Tuscaloosa's second commercial station and first independent. It would not, however, remain focused on Tuscaloosa for long. Even though Birmingham was just barely large enough at the time to support two independent stations, WDBB felt there was room for another station in the market, particularly because Birmingham had only two TV newsrooms at the time. In 1985, it spent $3.5 million to upgrade its transmission facility, building a tower midway between Tuscaloosa and Birmingham.
Activated in early 1986 alongside a translator in the immediate Birmingham area, W62BG, the improved signal earned WDBB a place on most cable systems in
Jefferson County.
In addition, it became the production home for the coaches shows of
Alabama Crimson Tide
The Alabama Crimson Tide refers to the college athletics in the United States, intercollegiate athletic varsity teams that represent the University of Alabama, located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Tuscaloosa. The Crimson Tide teams compete in the Na ...
athletics, and in 1986, it obtained exclusive market rights for them in Birmingham, displacing
WBRC (channel 6) as their local broadcaster.
May 1, 1986, brought the launch of WNAL-TV, which—while independently owned—rebroadcast WDBB's programming to eastern Alabama.
Due to low ratings and the return of
WBMG to the local news game, WDBB opted to cease local news in September 1986.
However, the stations were about to get a lift; in October 1986, WDBB-WNAL became central Alabama's first Fox affiliate.
It continued to air Fox programming until September 1, 1990, when Fox moved to WTTO.
In the late 1980s, WDBB had several disputes over its rating status in the Birmingham
area of dominant influence (ADI) as measured by
Arbitron
Nielsen Audio (formerly Arbitron) is a consumer research company in the United States that collects listener data on radio broadcasting audiences. It was founded as the American Research Bureau by Jim Seiler in 1949 and became national by mergin ...
, then one of two companies that produced television ratings. It had asked Arbitron in 1985 to be listed in the Birmingham ratings instead of Tuscaloosa, then a separate and far smaller ADI. The next year, Arbitron agreed as long as viewership was combined with WNAL; however, after less than a year, Arbitron rescinded this arrangement after being pressured by competing stations in Birmingham and having
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
WVTM-TV cancel its contract. In 1989, a federal jury awarded WDBB and WNAL $5.5 million in damages, finding Arbitron guilty of fraud and breach of contract. In 1990, the station also filed to change its city of license to Bessemer, a suburb of Birmingham, in order to be placed within the Birmingham ADI; the FCC turned the request down. WDBB would ultimately win reassignment in 1996 after contesting the FCC's decision, with the review finding Bessemer was independent enough of Birmingham to be allotted the station.
Due to financial difficulties, WDBB and WNAL began simulcasting WTTO on January 30, 1991. In return, WTTO added several of WDBB's stronger syndicated programs to its schedule.
In addition to programming contracts, WTTO also purchased WDBB's Birmingham business offices and W62BG, and WDBB moved operations back to the Jug Factory Road site.
The structure of WTTO's relationship with WDBB and WNAL changed to one of an affiliation. Dubose also announced the addition of local programming, including news, to the station.
In 1994, Dubose sold the station to WDBB-TV Inc., a subsidiary of H&P Communications of Las Vegas, for $2.5 million. At that time, channel 17 expanded to add noon and 5 p.m. newscasts.
However, turmoil was roiling the Birmingham market. Earlier that year, WBRC was sold to
New World Communications, which not only owned WVTM but had signed a deal to convert 12 stations into Fox affiliates, including WBRC. Due to ownership overlap, WBRC was sold directly to Fox in 1995. That would leave WTTO, WDBB, and WNAL out of an affiliation—and ABC without a carrier in Birmingham. All three stations began discussing affiliation with ABC; in fact, WDBB was already a year into negotiations by 1995.
Amidst this uncertain backdrop, Sinclair moved to take programming control of WDBB in November 1995 with the signing of the programming services agreement.
[ This report notes a purchase but is technically incorrect.] However, ABC bypassed Sinclair's stations and instead opted to partner with
Allbritton Communications
Allbritton Communications Company was an American media company based in Arlington, Virginia. It was the leading subsidiary of Perpetual Corporation, a private holding company owned by the family of company founder and former Riggs Bank presiden ...
to use WCFT in Tuscaloosa and WJSU in Anniston to start a new regional ABC affiliate.
Sinclair moved to end the WDBB newscasts that December, putting 25 to 30 news staff and another 10 to 15 production employees out of work.
On September 1, 1996, WBRC became the new Fox affiliate for Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, and Anniston. WNAL-TV broke off to become the CBS affiliate for the Anniston–Gadsden area, and the other two stations continued as independents until affiliating with
The WB
The WB Television Network (shortened to The WB, stylized as "THE WB", and nicknamed the "Frog Network" and/or "The Frog" for its former mascot Michigan J. Frog) was an American television network that ran from 1995 to 2006. It launched on ter ...
in 1997.
WTTO and WDBB became affiliates of
The CW
The CW Network, LLC (commonly referred to as The CW or simply CW) is an American commercial broadcast television network which is controlled by Nexstar Media Group through a 75% ownership interest. The network's name is derived from the firs ...
in 2006 when The WB and
UPN merged. The license was transferred from H&P to Cunningham in 2010.
Subchannels
In 2014, Sinclair purchased Allbritton Communications. However, it could not continue to own WCFT or WJSU without divestitures. Those stations were divested to
Howard Stirk Holdings; in the case of the Tuscaloosa station, now
WSES, ABC 33/40 moved to the WDBB multiplex.
References
External links
*
{{SBGI
1984 establishments in Alabama
Bessemer, Alabama
The CW affiliates
Sinclair Broadcast Group
Television channels and stations established in 1984
DBB
Tuscaloosa, Alabama