WFTY

WFTY-DT (channel 67) is a television station licensed to Smithtown, New York, United States, serving Long Island and owned by TelevisaUnivision. Its main channel broadcasts the True Crime Network; it also rebroadcasts the main channels of its New York City–area Univision and UniMás stations, WXTV-DT (channel 41) and WFUT-DT (channel 68), from its transmitter in Middle Island, New York.

Channel 67 was originally assigned to Patchogue, New York, where television producer Theodore Granik obtained the construction permit for a new TV station in September 1968. Granik envisioned a group of ultra high frequency (UHF) stations carrying public affairs programming, but he died in 1970 with channel 67 unbuilt. The permit was acquired by the Suburban Broadcasting Corporation, which believed it could fill a void in providing news, sports, and entertainment programming from and for Long Island. On this basis, WSNL-TV began broadcasting on November 18, 1973. As much as 70 percent of its lineup consisted of live, local programming, ranging from local news and sports to children's and cooking shows and a Long Island–set soap opera. The station struggled to build a viewer and advertiser base owing to reception difficulties—lampooned so frequently by ''Newsday'' writer Marvin Kitman that he was sued—and economic troubles. It left the air on June 20, 1975, and filed for bankruptcy the next year.

In 1978, CanWest Capital Corporation, a Canadian company whose U.S. subsidiary Universal Subscription Television was in the subscription television (STV) business, paid off all of Suburban's debts in exchange for the rights to broadcast STV programming on channel 67. CanWest then entered into a joint venture with Wometco Enterprises, majority owner of channel 68 and operator of the Wometco Home Theater (WHT) STV service that served the New York City area and northern New Jersey. Beginning in June 1980, WSNL-TV began providing WHT on Long Island. Wometco terminated the joint venture in 1981 and became the sole owner of channel 67. At its peak, WHT served more than 111,000 subscribers and was the fourth-largest STV system in the nation.

The death of Wometco majority owner Mitchell Wolfson in 1983 triggered a leveraged buyout by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR). As subscriptions declined due to rising cable penetration, Wometco sold off the WHT business but kept channels 68 and 67, which began broadcasting a music video service known as U68 on June 1, 1985. U68 was a locally programmed competitor to MTV with a more eclectic mix of music. The stations were put on the market in December 1985 because KKR executed a second leveraged buyout, this time of Storer Communications, and chose to retain Storer's cable systems in northern New Jersey and Connecticut over WWHT and WSNL-TV. The two stations were sold to the Home Shopping Network (HSN) as part of its foray into broadcasting; renamed WHSE and WHSI, they broadcast home shopping programming for the next 15 years. While an attempt by company owner Barry Diller to convert the stations to general-entertainment independents was slated as late as 2000, Diller ultimately sold WHSE and WHSI and other USA Broadcasting stations to Univision in 2001. Many of these stations formed the backbone of Telefutura (now UniMás), which launched in January 2002, at which time WHSE and WHSI became WFUT and WFTY.

WSNL-TV

Prehistory

On August 22, 1964, Theodore Granik applied for a construction permit for channel 75 in Patchogue, New York, with the channel assignment soon changed to 67 after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) overhauled television allocations nationally. Granik, who had produced the long-running ''The American Forum of the Air'' on radio and television, envisioned the Patchogue channel as one of seven stations nationwide specializing in public affairs programming. Long Island Video also filed for channel 67; Medallion Pictures acquired the company and became the applicant, but it agreed to withdraw in exchange for the costs it had incurred in seeking channel 67, granting Granik the permit in September 1968.

Granik never built channel 67. He died on September 21, 1970. His death scuttled plans for channel 67 and channel 50 in Washington, D.C.; the estate left no money to start the Washington station, which declared bankruptcy. On March 19, 1971, Granik Broadcasting Corporation filed to sell the permit to the Suburban Broadcasting Corporation. Suburban was a consortium of New York–area investors, including some from Long Island as well as Percy Sutton, the president of Manhattan Borough.

After closing on the purchase of the permit from Granik's estate, Suburban unveiled its plans for channel 67, which was given the call sign WSNL-TV (for Suffolk County and Nassau County counties on Long Island). Suburban's principals believed Long Island was underserved by television, being part of the New York television market. In 1969, an educational station, WLIW, began broadcasting from Garden City, but there was no commercial outlet. Company president David H. Polinger noted the presence of two daily newspapers and 20 radio stations on Long Island but no locally focused TV station. Polinger brought Long Island broadcast experience, having built radio stations in Lake Success and Babylon.

Channel 67 planned a schedule heavy on live programs, with as much as 70 percent of the schedule being live, ranging from news and high school sports to a live soap opera. Films and syndicated programming rounded out the lineup. Construction of studios near the corner of the Long Island Expressway and Veterans Highway in Central Islip, near Hauppauge, began in April 1973. The building featured two studios to handle the station's large local program output.

Live and local for Long Island

WSNL-TV began broadcasting to Long Island on November 18, 1973. It represented a $4 million investment by Suburban Broadcasting. Programming included ''The Fairchilds'', a soap opera featuring a family that moved from California to Oyster Bay; the amateur variety show ''Toast of Long Island''; a late-night variety show, ''Long Island Tonight''; ''Chef Nicola'', a live cooking show; ''Black Metamorphosis'', a public affairs program; exercise program ''Trim and Slim''; children's programs ''Captain Ahab'' and ''Ahab and Friends''; and sports coverage and two daily editions of ''67 Action News''. Syndicated programs included ''The Phil Donahue Show''.

The principal operating challenge for WSNL-TV was that it was an ultra high frequency (UHF) station. The quality of the station's local programming and many viewers' trouble tuning it in became regular fodder for Marvin Kitman, the television critic and satirist for Long Island's daily ''Newsday''. Over the course of 1974, Kitman published several columns making light of channel 67's poor signal—hobbled by installation difficulties—and production values. In April, Kitman wrote,

Kitman ran a survey asking for readers' comments on WSNL-TV's reception and programming in February 1974. Based on the survey, Kitman published "ratings" for the station's various local programs. He also published alleged reader comments as to the station's receivability. A man from Far Rockaway told Kitman, "Yes, I saw Channel 67. In ''TV Guide''." In response, Suburban Broadcasting filed a $15 million lawsuit in New York Supreme Court against Kitman and ''Newsday'' in November 1974, claiming a "willful and malicious effort to mortally injure" WSNL-TV's chances as a "viable advertising medium".

Suburban's lawsuit against Kitman coincided with a retrenchment. Channel 67 had been in talks for a loan from Franklin National Bank, but the bank became insolvent and was closed in October 1974. The station's first election night coverage was almost affected by strike action among 12 unionized news employees. In October, WSNL laid off Oren Palenik, host of a women's program, and other hosts and increased its reliance on syndicated shows and films. The news programming was reduced to hourly news updates in January 1975, part of a reduction in local programming from 40 hours a week to just eight or nine hours and accompanying a layoff of one-fifth of the station's staff. In addition to filing suit against Kitman, Suburban sued equipment manufacturer RCA and tower fabricator Stainless Inc. for improper initial installation of the antenna. The company also sought new investors. In one last miscue, the station gave up its rights to telecast New York Cosmos soccer just two weeks before Pelé signed with the team.

The reduction in local programming and personnel failed to turn the station's finances around. The station left the air on June 20, 1975, while signing a deal with a company to use the Central Islip studios for commercial and film production. The suspension was described as temporary, lasting just three months. One broadcaster operating other UHF stations told ''The New York Times'' that Suburban failed to take its "VHF thinking" and translate it to the different economics of running a UHF television station. The station lost an average of $255,931 for each of the 20 months it was in business.

Suburban Broadcasting Corporation filed for bankruptcy in February 1976, listing assets of $3.9 million and liabilities of $4.8 million. Creditors were told that the station was about to become profitable when two of its three largest advertisers went out of business.

Subscription TV broadcasting

On August 24, 1978, Suburban Broadcasting found a Canadian white knight to pay its $5 million in debts. CanWest Capital Corporation provided the financing in a deal that saw CanWest's U.S. subscription television (STV) subsidiary, Universal Subscription Television, enter into a franchise agreement to provide pay broadcasting over WSNL-TV. CanWest, as a Canadian company, could not own stations outright, but it could provide them with subscription programming. As part of the deal, channel 67 changed its city of license from Patchogue to Smithtown, where enough commercial, free TV stations were received to permit FCC licensing of an STV station. The station began plans for reactivation in late 1979; in addition to subscription programming from Universal Subscription Television, WSNL-TV would air some local programming as a condition of its license.

WSNL-TV returned to Long Island screens on December 15, 1979, after nearly years of silence, with a limited schedule of prime time programming during the week and daytime programs on weekends. A month later, Suburban filed to sell the station to a new joint venture led by Wometco Enterprises. This sale meant that, instead of programming from Universal Subscription Television, WSNL would provide STV programming from Wometco Home Theater (WHT). WHT had been operating in the New York market on channel 68 from Newark, New Jersey, at this point known as WWHT, since March 1, 1977; CanWest approached WHT because it was worried about the viability of a standalone STV service from WSNL. From January 30 to June 2, 1980, channel 67 was out of service because of an electrical fire at its Central Islip studios; the fire gutted the control room and burned so hot that a brick wall cracked. The station began airing Wometco Home Theater after returning to the air. It also offered old movies and a nightly newscast.

The FCC approved of Wometco acquiring WSNL-TV in November 1980. Because channels 67 and 68 had overlapping signals, Wometco would operate WSNL-TV as a simulcast of WWHT with up to four and a half hours a week of its own programming. Wometco closed on the purchase in January 1981, and in June, it bought out CanWest's interest in the joint venture and became the sole owner of WSNL while sharing ownership of WWHT with Blonder-Tongue Laboratories.

In 2017, Univision reached a deal with the Justice Network, a diginet focusing on true crime and law enforcement programming, and provided it carriage in 11 markets, including New York City. Justice Network rebranded as True Crime Network in 2020.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's signal is multiplexed:

Analog-to-digital conversion

WFTY ended regular programming on its analog signal, over UHF channel 67, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 23, using virtual channel 67.

See also

* WFUT-DT

References

External links

Univision

YouTube WSNL-TV: A Remembrance

{{Major U.S. TV O-O Stations

1973 establishments in New York (state)
Companies based in Bergen County, New Jersey
Grit (TV network) affiliates
Ion Mystery affiliates
Mass media in Suffolk County, New York
Nuestra Visión affiliates
Television channels and stations established in 1973
FTY-DT
True Crime Network affiliates
UniMás affiliates
Univision affiliates
Wometco Enterprises