KPLC (channel 7) is a television station in

Lake Charles, Louisiana Lake Charles (French: ''Lac Charles'') is the fifth-largest incorporated city in the U.S. state of Louisiana, and the parish seat of Calcasieu Parish, located on Lake Charles, Prien Lake, and the Calcasieu River. Founded in 1861 in Calcasi ...

, United States, affiliated with

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters ...

and

The CW Plus The CW Plus is a secondary national programming service feed of The CW that is fully controlled and 75% owned by Nexstar Media Group, with Paramount Global and Warner Bros. Discovery each owning a 12.5% stake in the network. It is intended prima ...

. It is owned by

Gray Television Gray Television, Inc. is an American publicly traded television broadcasting company based in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1946 by James Harrison Gray as Gray Communications Systems, the company owns or operates 180 stations across the United St ...

, which provides certain services to dual

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 (or ''brush''). Twelv ...

/ ABC affiliate KVHP (channel 29) under 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 th ...

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 ...

. Both stations share studios on Division Street in downtown Lake Charles, while KPLC's transmitter is located near Fenton, Louisiana.

History

KPLC-TV signed on September 29, 1954 with NBC's airing of the

1954 World Series The 1954 World Series matched the National League champion New York Giants against the American League champion Cleveland Indians. The Giants swept the Series in four games to win their first championship since , defeating the heavily favored Ind ...

. Owner T. B. Lanford of

Shreveport Shreveport ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is the third most populous city in Louisiana after New Orleans and Baton Rouge, respectively. The Shreveport–Bossier City metropolitan area, with a population of 393,406 in 2020, is t ...

had previously signed on KPLC radio (1470 AM, now

KLCL KLCL (1470 AM) is a radio station licensed to Lake Charles, Louisiana, United States. The station is currently owned by Townsquare Media. The station's studios are located on North Lakeshore Drive, just northwest of downtown Lake Charles, and i ...

, and 99.5 FM, now

KNGT KNGT (99.5 FM, "Gator 99.5") is a radio station licensed to Lake Charles, Louisiana, United States, broadcasting a country music format. The station is currently owned by Townsquare Media. The station is home to Mike Soileau and Chad Austin in th ...

) and was eager to expand into television, giving the new station the same callsign as their radio sisters. On the same day, Lanford helped sign on then- and current sister station

KALB-TV KALB-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Alexandria, Louisiana, United States, affiliated with NBC, CBS and The CW Plus. Owned by Gray Television, the station maintains studios on Washington Street in downtown Alexandria, and its transmitte ...

Alexandria Alexandria ( or ; ar, ٱلْإِسْكَنْدَرِيَّةُ ; grc-gre, Αλεξάνδρεια, Alexándria) is the second largest city in Egypt, and the largest city on the Mediterranean coast. Founded in by Alexander the Great, Alexandr ...

. KPLC was a major beneficiary of a quirk in the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisd ...

(FCC)'s plan for allocating stations. In the early days of broadcast television, there were twelve VHF channels available and 69 UHF channels (later reduced to 55 in 1983). The VHF bands were more desirable because they carried longer distances. Since there were only twelve VHF channels available, there were limitations as to how closely the stations could be spaced. After the FCC's Sixth Report and Order ended the license freeze and opened the UHF band in 1952, it devised a plan for allocating VHF licenses. Under this plan, almost all of the country would be able to receive two commercial VHF channels plus one noncommercial channel. Most of the rest of the country ("1/2") would be able to receive a third VHF channel. Other areas would be designated as "UHF islands" since they were too close to larger cities for VHF service. The "2" networks became CBS and NBC, "+1" represented non-commercial educational stations, and "1/2" became ABC (which was the weakest network usually winding up with the UHF allocation where no VHF was available). However, what would become of the Lake Charles market was sandwiched between

Houston Houston (; ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in Texas, the Southern United States#Major cities, most populous city in the Southern United States, the List of United States cities by population, fourth-most pop ...

(channels 2, 8, 11 and 13), Beaumont– Port Arthur (channels 4, 6, and 12) and

Lufkin Lufkin is the largest city in Angelina County, Texas and the county seat. The city is situated in Deep East Texas and about 60 miles west of the Texas-Louisiana border. Its estimated population is 35,021 as of July 1, 2019. Lufkin was founded ...

( channel 9) to the west, Lafayette (channels 3 and 10),

Baton Rouge Baton Rouge ( ; ) is a city in and the capital of the U.S. state of Louisiana. Located the eastern bank of the Mississippi River, it is the parish seat of East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana's most populous parish—the equivalent of countie ...

(channels 2 and 9) and

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

4, 6, 8 and 12) to the east, and Alexandria (channel 5), Shreveport (channels 3, 6, and 12) and Monroe (channels 8, 10, and 13) to the north. This created a large "doughnut" in Southwestern Louisiana where there could only be one VHF license. KPLC-TV was fortunate to gain that license, and eventually became the only station to be based in Lake Charles when the market's original TV station, KTAG-TV (channel 25), went off the air due to being on the UHF frequency (before all-channel tuning was made mandatory on TVs in 1962) and unable to compete with KPLC in 1961. This changed in the early 1980s when LPB outlet KLTL (channel 18) signed on in 1981, and independent-turned-Fox affiliate KVHP (channel 29) signed on a year later. In 1964, Lanford sold KPLC to a St. Louis group headed by investor Elliot Stien. He visited KPLC frequently along with his friend, St. Louis Cardinals baseball legend

Stan Musial Stanley Frank Musial (; born Stanislaw Franciszek Musial; November 21, 1920 – January 19, 2013), nicknamed "Stan the Man", was an American baseball outfielder and first baseman. Widely considered to be one of the greatest and most consis ...

. Shortly after this sale, ABC programming began to disappear from the station's lineup, as then-recently launched stations KBMT provided a grade A signal to Lake Charles and KATC a grade B signal. Lanford continued to own fellow NBC affiliate KALB in Alexandria until 1993. In 1970, G. Russell Chambers purchased KPLC-TV from the St. Louis group and dramatically increased the station's coverage by adding a tower, providing a quality signal for the NBC affiliate as far north as Leesville, as far east as Lafayette and to the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United S ...

. FCC regulations required that the radio stations be sold. Perry Sanders purchased the AM/FM combo and changed its call letters to KLCL. On August 9, 1983, Chambers, acting both in his individual capacity and on behalf of CTR, entered into a purchase agreement to sell the station's facilities and broadcast license to respondent NASCO, Inc., for a purchase price of $18 million. The agreement was not recorded in the parishes in which the two properties housing the station's facilities were located. Consummation of the agreement was subject to the approval of the FCC; both parties were obligated to file the necessary documents with the FCC no later than September 23, 1983. By late August, however, Chambers had changed his mind and tried to talk NASCO out of consummating the sale. NASCO refused. On September 23, Chambers, through counsel, informed NASCO that he would not file the necessary papers with the FCC. In 1986, the U.S. District Court ordered Chambers to sell the station to NASCO, and the deal was consummated on August 26, 1986. Less than two months after the sale of KPLC to NASCO, Cosmos Broadcasting, a subsidiary of Liberty Life Insurance Company, purchased the station and

KAIT KAIT (channel 8) is a television station in Jonesboro, Arkansas, United States, affiliated with ABC, NBC, and The CW Plus. Owned by Gray Television, the station has studios on New Haven Church Road (County Road 766) north of Jonesboro, and it ...

Jonesboro, Arkansas Jonesboro is a city located on Crowley's Ridge in the northeastern corner of the U.S. State of Arkansas. Jonesboro is one of two county seats of Craighead County. According to the 2020 Census, the city had a population of 78,576 and is the ...

from NASCO. This resulted in KPLC becoming a sister station to

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

WDSU WDSU (channel 6) is a television station in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States, affiliated with NBC and owned by Hearst Television. The station's studios are located on Howard Avenue in the city's Central Business District, and its transmi ...

until that station was sold in 1989. Within the next two years, the station adopted a circle 7 logo and its current slogan "7 at your service." KPLC was one of the first television stations in the U.S. to launch its own website in the 1990s. In 2004, KPLC began broadcasting in digital as well as analog with the launch of KPLC-DT. Later in the year, the station launched its first local 24-hour weather channel, "KPLC WeatherPlus." Simultaneously, the station launched a service specifically for cellphones and PDAs, "7 On Your Cell." In March 2004, while workers were installing a new transmission tower in high winds, the old transmission tower fell, causing a service disruption lasting about two weeks to over-the-air viewers in Southwest Louisiana. Service to cable customers was not interrupted due to the station's signal being delivered by fiber lines. A lower-power temporary tower was erected on top the station's broadcast studios a couple of days after the tower fell, allowing viewers within a few miles of the station to again receive the signal over-the-air. KPLC was also simulcast on

KJEF-CA KJEF-CA, VHF analog channel 13, was a low-powered, Class A independent station television station licensed to Jennings, Louisiana, United States. The station was the only television station owned by Townsquare Media, a company that otherwise s ...

in Jennings. In January 2006, Liberty and KPLC were purchased by Raycom Media, which also owned two other Louisiana television stations, KSLA in Shreveport and WAFB in Baton Rouge. In August 2012, KPLC started broadcasting in HD with a new HD studio. Until 2015, KPLC doubled as the default NBC affiliate for the Lafayette market, since that market did not have an NBC affiliate of its own. Prior to its purchase by Raycom, it even included Lafayette as one of the cities it served in station identifications. It operated a "virtual station" for Acadiana cable systems and sold advertising in the area. On July 1, 2015, KLAF-LD became Lafayette's first locally based NBC affiliate since KLNI's shutdown in 1975, and local cable providers removed KPLC and Baton Rouge NBC affiliate WVLA from channel lineups. On August 31, 2017, KPLC-DT2 became the market's CW affiliate. Virtual sister KVHP, which formerly operated as an affiliate of

on its DT2 subchannel, launched a new station, "SWLA ABC" on that day over KVHP-DT2, carrying ABC and syndicated programming.

Grit Grit, Grits, or Gritty may refer to: Food * Grit (grain), bran, chaff, mill-dust or coarse oatmeal * Grits, a corn-based food common in the Southern United States Minerals * Grit, winter pavement-treatment minerals deployed in grit bins * ...

, which formerly occupied DT2, was subsequently moved to a new fourth subchannel. By September 2017, the over-the-air signal of KPLC-DT2 had been upgraded into

720p 720p (1280×720 px; also called HD ready, standard HD or just HD) is a progressive HDTV signal format with 720 horizontal lines/1280 columns and an aspect ratio (AR) of 16:9, normally known as widescreen HDTV (1.78:1). All major HDTV broadcas ...

16:9 HD. On June 25, 2018, Gray Television announced its intent to acquire Raycom for $3.65 billion. Coincidentally, in 1983, Gray attempted to purchase KPLC from Chambers at the same time NASCO consider purchasing the station. The sale was approved by the FCC on December 20. The sale was completed on January 2, 2019.

Effects of Hurricanes Laura and Delta

KPLC and KVHP began 24-hour continuous coverage of Hurricane Laura on August 25, 2020 from their shared studio building, a few days after it provided some coverage of

Hurricane Marco The name Marco has been used for four tropical cyclones in the Atlantic Ocean. * Tropical Storm Marco (1990), hugged west coast of Florida, making landfall as a tropical depression, causing heavy rain and moderate damage * Hurricane Marco (1996), ...

, which had affected Louisiana earlier that week; KPLC and KVHP were forced to relocate their operations to that of Baton Rouge sister station WAFB in the late afternoon hours of August 26, as mandatory evacuation orders had been issued for the city of Lake Charles ahead of the hurricane's landfall. When the hurricane made landfall in the early morning hours of August 27, both stations were forced off the air after their studio-to-transmitter-link tower collapsed onto the roof of their shared studio building and punctured a hole in the building's roof; the city's NWS radar was also destroyed in the storm. Staff returned to the KPLC building on September 26; the anchor desk was moved to the station's newsroom. While KPLC was able to resume operations following the hurricane, KVHP remained silent due to a lack of an alternate transmitter; as a result, Fox provided a

Foxnet Foxnet was an American cable television channel that was owned by the Fox Entertainment Group division of News Corporation. Serving as a national feed of the Fox Broadcasting Company (known simply as Fox), the service was intended for American ...

-like feed to cable companies in Southwestern Louisiana for a temporary period until KVHP resumed full operations at the end of 2020.

Programming

Syndicated Syndication may refer to: * Broadcast syndication, where individual stations buy programs outside the network system * Print syndication, where individual newspapers or magazines license news articles, columns, or comic strips * Web syndication, ...

programming on KPLC includes ''

The Ellen DeGeneres Show ''The Ellen DeGeneres Show'' (often shortened to ''Ellen'' or ''The Ellen Show'') is an American daytime television variety comedy talk show that was created and hosted by its namesake Ellen DeGeneres. Debuting on September 8, 2003, it was pr ...

'', ''

Dr. Phil Phillip Calvin McGraw (born September 1, 1950), better known as Dr. Phil, is an American television personality and author best known for hosting the talk show '' Dr. Phil''. He holds a doctorate in clinical psychology, though he ceased rene ...

'' and ''

Entertainment Tonight ''Entertainment Tonight'' (or simply ''ET'') is an American first-run syndicated news broadcasting newsmagazine program that is distributed by CBS Media Ventures throughout the United States and owned by Paramount Streaming. ET also airs in Aust ...

'', among others. KPLC is one of a few NBC affiliates to air paid programming on weekdays.

News operation

KPLC presently broadcasts 27 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with five hours each weekday and two hours each on Saturdays and Sundays).

During

Hurricane Rita Hurricane Rita was the most intense tropical cyclone on record in the Gulf of Mexico and the fourth-most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded. Part of the record-breaking 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, which included three of the top ten ...

, which struck in September 2005, the station delivered around-the-clock news from a temporary, makeshift studio in a safer location than its normal studios in downtown Lake Charles. Similarly, during Hurricane Laura in August 2020, the station evacuated to the studios of sister station WAFB in Baton Rouge. At the time, KPLC's tower ripped and partially collapsed during the storm.

Notable former on-air staff

Rob Marciano Robert Mark Marciano (born June 25, 1968) is an American journalist and meteorologist who is currently employed by ABC News. Marciano provides forecasts for the weekend editions of ''Good Morning America'', a position Ginger Zee vacated when she ...

– chief meteorologist (1994–1997; later ''

'' co-host; now meteorologist at

ABC News ABC News is the journalism, news division of the American broadcast network American Broadcasting Company, ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other progra ...

) * Bonnie Schneider – meteorologist (now meteorologist at CNN)

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 - a ...

Analog-to-digital conversion

KPLC shut down its analog signal, over

VHF Very high frequency (VHF) is the ITU designation for the range of radio frequency electromagnetic waves (radio waves) from 30 to 300 megahertz (MHz), with corresponding wavelengths of ten meters to one meter. Frequencies immediately below VHF ...

channel 7, on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition VHF channel 8 to channel 7 for post-transition operations.

Translators

In 2021, KPLC launched two UHF translators, K36QM in

Iowa Iowa () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wiscon ...

and K32PB in western

Calcasieu Parish Calcasieu Parish (; french: Paroisse de Calcasieu) is a parish located on the southwestern border of the U.S. state of Louisiana. As of the 2020 census, the population was 216,785. The parish seat is Lake Charles. Calcasieu Parish is part of ...

between Starks and Vinton to help strengthen its signal along

Interstate 10 Interstate 10 (I-10) is the southernmost cross-country highway in the American Interstate Highway System. I-10 is the fourth-longest Interstate in the United States at , following I-90, I-80, and I-40. This freeway is part of the originally ...

and Lake Charles' southwestern suburbs.

References

External links

*
Official website for KPLC-DT2 "CW Lake Charles"
{{Gray TV Gray Television NBC network affiliates Grit (TV network) affiliates Bounce TV affiliates Television channels and stations established in 1954 1954 establishments in Louisiana PLC