WQHS-DT

WQHS-DT (channel 61) is a television station in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, broadcasting the Spanish-language networks Univision and UniMás. Owned and operated by TelevisaUnivision, it is the only full-power Spanish-language television station in the state of Ohio. WQHS-DT's studios and transmitter are located on West Ridgewood Drive in suburban Parma.

This station's sign on in 1981 as WCLQ-TV marked the return of broadcasting over channel 61 in Cleveland, a frequency unused since the closure of WKBF-TV six years earlier. It served as the market's original outlet for subscription television service Preview, and also carried a general slate of entertainment programming. Preview's 1983 closure forced WCLQ-TV to operate as a full-time independent station under the ownership of Channel Communications, which aggressively purchased syndicated reruns and movies but consistently ranked near the bottom of the local ratings. With the sign-on of two competing independent stations in 1985 and limited chance for profitability, the station was sold to Silver King Broadcasting, becoming one of the first owned-and-operated outlets for the Home Shopping Network ( HSN) in 1986, when it changed its call sign to the present WQHS. Purchased by Univision in 2002, WQHS has largely operated as a "pass-through" for Univision programming ever since.

Prior history of channel 61

A previous license owned by Kaiser Broadcasting occupied channel 61 as WKBF-TV from January 1968 to April 1975. It was the first actual independent station to sign on in Cleveland and was Cleveland's first commercial UHF station. Despite some innovative local programming and an inventory of some popular off-network shows, WKBF struggled for the majority of its existence due to poor revenue growth. The station failed to achieve profitability while competing against rival independent WUAB (channel 43), which signed on nine months after WKBF in September 1968. In April 1975, Kaiser Broadcasting shut down WKBF-TV, returned the license to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and sold off WKBF's assets to WUAB's owner, United Artists Broadcasting; Kaiser then purchased a minority ownership in that station, which it retained until WUAB was sold in 1977.

History

WCLQ-TV (1981–1986)

Even though WKBF-TV had largely failed, interest in channel 61 was fueled by the imminent maturity of subscription television (STV) technology. In January 1977, Cleveland Associates Co.—a consortium of Chicago firms Froelich Corporation, Balaban Television Corporation, Friedland Corporation, and Bray Corporation—filed an application for a construction permit to build channel 61 as a station that would operate on a hybrid basis. The station would air commercial, advertiser-supported programs during the day and scrambled STV programs to paying subscribers at night. A construction permit was awarded by the FCC in 1978, and WCLQ-TV began broadcasting on March 3, 1981, with a special prime time airing of the movie '' The Deer Hunter'' as its marquee program on launch day. Four days later, WCLQ-TV began airing STV programs from Preview, a division of Time Inc.'s American Television and Communications, after 8 p.m. on weekdays and 7 p.m. on weekends; the remaining time was occupied by a general-entertainment independent lineup. The station even revived a character from the old WKBF-TV—The Ghoul, portrayed by Ron Sweed—when it added a horror movie showcase on September 25, 1982.

Preview's run on WCLQ-TV initially boasted a subscription base of nearly 35,000 at its peak in February 1982. The service carried select Cleveland Cavaliers games starting with the 1981–82 season, with executives mentioning a possible alliance with Cavaliers owner Ted Stepien's "Total Entertainment Network" as an additional programming tier. Ultimately, Preview lost nearly half of their subscription base to cable television systems in the market's affluent suburbs, along with piracy from different decoder boxes and a struggling area economy. Preview added a secondary service—the "adult"-themed Niteview—which only attracted half of Preview's subscribers, while the service itself was largely criticized for poor marketing and customer service. In addition to Preview's struggles, WCLQ-TV faced low ratings and a lack of media exposure, with general manager Gary Brandt publicly musing about ''The Chronicle-Telegram'' in Elyria listing the station as "WQLC". The station did make a further attempt at local programming with ''Video Arcade'', a daily variety show aimed at older children with various old films, cartoons, music videos via '' Video Jukebox'', and a local version of '' TV Powww''.

When Time Inc. announced the closure of Preview in Cleveland on May 12, 1983, the service only had 22,000 subscribers; for its final day on August 31, that number dropped to 14,000. The shutdown announcement caught station executives off guard, as syndicated programming for the coming television season had largely been committed to months earlier. WCLQ-TV filled the loss of Preview with a traditional mixture of off-network reruns, movies and '' Independent Network News'' (anchored by former Cleveland newscaster Bill Jorgensen); it also picked up '' CBS Late Night'', which WJKW declined. WCLQ-TV also began carrying various sports packages—including Big Ten Conference football and basketball, Cleveland State Vikings men's basketball, and select ''NBA on CBS'' games WJKW deferred—but dropped much of these sports packages in the summer of 1985 for schedule consistency. The Ghoul was cancelled in the spring of 1984, attributed to low ratings, but it was later suggested that Brandt dropped it after an on-air skit involving a shed being set on fire outside of the studios.

Balaban Broadcasting and the other partners in Cleveland Associates sold WCLQ-TV to Channel Communications, a subsidiary of Nashville, Tennessee–based NASCO, Inc., on May 4, 1984, for $14 million (equivalent to $ in ). NASCO, which primarily handled National Football League merchandise, established Channel as a diversification move, purchasing WCLQ-TV along with two small-market network affiliates—KAIT in Jonesboro, Arkansas, and KPLC in Lake Charles, Louisiana—for a combined $48.8 million. Brandt resigned in late April 1985, with Channel director of operations Jack White taking over as interim general manager; rumors among staffers suggested Brandt was not asked to leave willingly. In a bid to remain competitive, WCLQ-TV acquired syndication rights to ''Dallas'', ''Simon & Simon'' and ''The Love Boat'' in expensive contracts and began using Ernest P. Worrell (Jim Varney) in promotional spots and billboards. Later purchases included reruns of ''The A-Team'' and "lost episodes" of ''The Honeymooners''. ''Dallas'' reruns fared poorly, only running on WCLQ-TV for six months before being removed from the schedule entirely.

The summer of 1985 saw both WOIO and WBNX-TV sign on as independents: while WBNX-TV was owned by the ministry of televangelist Ernest Angley and positioned itself on family-oriented and religious fare, WOIO was financially backed by Malrite Communications (owners of WHK and WMMS) and Metroplex Communications (later owners of WNCX and WERE). WCLQ-TV's purchasing of expensive syndicated programming, in turn, increased prices for programming at both WOIO and WUAB substantially. The addition of competition also drove down ratings and advertising rates, with WOIO charging basic cable rates for a typical commercial. Driven into a financial crunch, WOIO's ownership group sought to sell outright to Malrite for an infusion of capital by June 1986, permissible by FCC regulations that typically barred common ownership of radio and UHF television stations except when the television station was in need of financial assistance. WCLQ-TV filed a petition to deny the sale.

The aggressive approach Channel Communications took with WCLQ-TV failed to yield a positive return on investment, with the station losing "a few million dollars" annually. The May 1985 sweeps period saw WUAB with 9 percent of viewers, WOIO with 6 percent, and WCLQ-TV with 5 percent, a trend that continued into the fall and spring. In January 1986, Channel president Brian Byrnes initiated a study with Shearson Lehman Brothers

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