WSST-TV (channel 55) 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

Cordele, Georgia Cordele is a city in and the county seat of Crisp County, Georgia. The population was 11,165 at the 2010 census, and 10,220 in 2020. Cordele calls itself the watermelon capital of the world. History 19th century Cordele was incorporated on ...

, United States, serving as the

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 for the

Albany, Georgia Albany ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. Located on the Flint River, it is the county seat of Dougherty County, Georgia, Dougherty County, and is the sole incorporated city in that county. Located in Southwest Geo ...

, area. It is owned by

Marquee Broadcasting Marquee Broadcasting, Inc. is an American broadcasting company that owns several television stations in the United States. History Marquee began in 2013 when its owners, Brian and Patricia Lane, announced its intent to acquire WMDT and its re ...

alongside Valdosta-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

WSWG WSWG (channel 44) is a television station in Valdosta, Georgia, United States, serving as the CBS affiliate for the Albany, Georgia, area. It is owned by Marquee Broadcasting alongside Cordele-licensed MyNetworkTV affiliate WSST-TV (channel ...

(channel 44); Marquee also operates

Fox Foxes are small-to-medium-sized omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull; upright, triangular ears; a pointed, slightly upturned snout; and a long, bushy tail ("brush"). Twelve species ...

affiliate WFXL (channel 31) under joint sales and shared services agreements with

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 ...

. The three stations share offices on Slappey Boulevard in Albany; WSST-TV's transmitter is located in rural southwestern Crisp County. The station's digital signal extends only about from Cordele; however, the station is carried on many

cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

providers in the region, including in Albany and

Perry Perry or pear cider is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented pears, traditionally in England (particularly Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Worcestershire), parts of South Wales, France (especially Normandy and Anjou), Canada, Austral ...

. Since April 22, 2019, in order to increase its over-the-air reach, WSST-TV's primary channel has been simulcast on WSWG's third

digital subchannel In broadcasting, digital subchannels are a method of transmitting more than one independent program stream simultaneously from the same digital radio or television station on the same radio frequency channel. This is done by using data compress ...

History

WSST-TV signed on May 22, 1989, as an

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 ...

owned by Sunbelt-South Telecommunications Ltd. The station grew out of a cable-only station for Cordele and

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

that had started in 1981. Though primarily independent, at various points WSST's schedule has included programming from

Channel America Channel America (CA), officially Channel America Network, Inc., was the first United States terrestrial broadcast television network to be intentionally assembled out of LPTV, or low-power television licensees. The network was founded by David P ...

America One America One was an American television network established in 1995 by USFR Media Group through its America One Television subsidiary.

, and Youtoo America. WSST was originally jointly owned by William B. Goodson and Phillip A. Streetman; Goodson died in 2006, and Streetman assumed full control in 2007. On June 18, 2018, Marquee Broadcasting agreed to purchase WSST from Sunbelt-South Telecommunications. The sale was completed on September 3, 2018. Marquee subsequently acquired CBS affiliate WSWG from

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 ...

, making it a

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

to WSST. In May 2019, WSST-TV affiliated with MyNetworkTV; the affiliation was transferred from a WSWG subchannel.

Local programming

WSST-TV aired a rebroadcast of sister station WSWG's early evening newscast and a prime time newscast, which launched on May 6, 2019; prior to then, WSST produced its own evening newscast. Until 2022, WSST also produced ''South Georgia Sunrise'', a two-hour morning news and talk program, and ''Midday'', a half-hour talk and lifestyle program.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital 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— ...

Analog-to-digital conversion

WSST-TV began broadcasting a digital signal in 2003. Its digital transmitter facilities operated at low power for several years, due to Sunbelt-South Telecommunications, Ltd. being involved in

bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the deb ...

proceedings. The station ended regular programming on its analog signal, over

UHF Ultra high frequency (UHF) is the ITU designation for radio frequencies in the range between 300 megahertz (MHz) and 3 gigahertz (GHz), also known as the decimetre band as the wavelengths range from one meter to one tenth of a meter ...

channel 55, on April 15, 2009. WSST's digital signal broadcast on its pre-transition UHF channel 51. The station moved to channel 22 in early 2017, and to channel 34 in late 2018.

References

External links

* {{Marquee Broadcasting 1989 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state) Crisp County, Georgia Grit (TV network) affiliates Heroes & Icons affiliates Ion Mystery affiliates Laff (TV network) affiliates Marquee Broadcasting MeTV affiliates MyNetworkTV affiliates Television channels and stations established in 1989 Television stations in Georgia (U.S. state)