KUMV-TV (channel 8) 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 ...

licensed to Williston, North Dakota, United States, affiliated with NBC and

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''). Twelve sp ...

. 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 ...

, the station maintains a news studio and advertising sales office at the intersection of Main Street ( US 2 BUS) and 6th Street East in Williston, and its transmitter is located west of the city near the North Dakota–

Montana Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbi ...

border. KUMV is part of the four-station

NBC North Dakota NBC North Dakota is a network of four television stations that serve most of central and western North Dakota, along with parts of South Dakota and Montana. All four stations are dual NBC/Fox affiliates, and the flagship station is KFYR-TV in Bis ...

regional network of NBC affiliates in central and western North Dakota, originating from

flagship station In broadcasting, a flagship (also known as a flagship station or key station) is the broadcast station which originates a television network, or a particular radio or television program that plays a key role in the branding of and consumer loyalt ...

KFYR-TV KFYR-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Bismarck, North Dakota, United States, affiliated with NBC and Fox. Owned by Gray Television, the station has studios on North 4th Street and East Broadway Avenue in downtown Bismarck, and its trans ...

(channel 5) in Bismarck. The NBC North Dakota network relays NBC network and other programming from KFYR across central and western North Dakota, as well as bordering counties in Montana and

South Dakota South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...

. The four stations along with fellow NBC affiliate KVLY-TV in Fargo often share news stories.

Master control Master control is the technical hub of a broadcast operation common among most over-the-air television stations and television networks. It is distinct from a production control room (PCR) in television studios where the activities such as switc ...

and some internal operations of KUMV are based at KFYR's facilities on North 4th Street and East Broadway Avenue in downtown Bismarck. The four stations are counted as a single unit for ratings purposes. KUMV operates as a

semi-satellite A broadcast relay station, also known as a satellite station, relay transmitter, broadcast translator (U.S.), re-broadcaster (Canada), repeater (two-way radio) or complementary station (Mexico), is a broadcast transmitter which repeats (or tran ...

KMOT KMOT (channel 10) is a television station in Minot, North Dakota, United States, affiliated with NBC and Fox. The station is owned by Gray Television, and maintains studios and transmitter facilities at the intersection of 16th Street and 18th ...

(channel 10) in

Minot Minot ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Ward County, North Dakota, Ward County, North Dakota, United States, in the state's north-central region. It is most widely known for the Minot Air Force Base, Air Force base approximately north of ...

. KMOT is itself a semi-satellite of KFYR-TV in Bismarck, which also has semi-satellite

KQCD-TV KQCD-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Dickinson, North Dakota, United States, affiliated with NBC and Fox. The station is owned by Gray Television, and maintains a news bureau and advertising sales office on 21st Street East in Dickinso ...

(channel 7) in Dickinson. KUMV identifies itself as a separate station in its own right, but clears all network and syndicated programming as provided through KMOT. However, KUMV airs local news inserts into KMOT's weeknight newscasts, as well as separate commercial inserts and legal identifications. The Montana viewing portion of KUMV's coverage area is within the

Mountain Time Zone The Mountain Time Zone of North America keeps time by subtracting seven hours from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) when standard time ( UTC−07:00) is in effect, and by subtracting six hours during daylight saving time ( UTC−06:00). The clo ...

, and the station's prime time schedule starts at 6 p.m. rather than the usual 7 p.m. for the time zone. The over-the-air signal of KUMV reaches portions of the

Canadian province Within the geographical areas of Canada, the ten provinces and three territories are sub-national administrative divisions under the jurisdiction of the Canadian Constitution. In the 1867 Canadian Confederation, three provinces of British North ...

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

, but is no longer available on any cable systems there. KUMV is also carried in the

Glendive, Montana Glendive is a city in and the county seat of Dawson County, Montana, United States, and home to Dawson Community College. Glendive was established by the Northern Pacific Railway when they built the transcontinental railroad across the northern ...

market through cable television; and until 2013, it operated a

translator Translation is the communication of the Meaning (linguistic), meaning of a #Source and target languages, source-language text by means of an Dynamic and formal equivalence, equivalent #Source and target languages, target-language text. The ...

, K13PL in that city. CBS affiliate KXGN-TV in Glendive also has a

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 ...

carrying NBC programming, but it is not associated with KUMV and airs separate programming that includes newscasts from

Billings Billings is the largest city in the U.S. state of Montana, with a population of 117,116 as of the 2020 census. Located in the south-central portion of the state, it is the seat of Yellowstone County and the principal city of the Billings Metrop ...

NBC affiliate KULR-TV.

History

KUMV-TV signed on February 6, 1957, after Meyer obtained the construction permit on July 18, 1956. It was a semi-satellite of KFYR for a year. KMOT signed on January 23, 1958, as the third station in the Meyer group, and KUMV became a semi-satellite of KMOT. Until

KBMY KBMY (channel 17) is a television station in Bismarck, North Dakota, United States, affiliated with ABC and MyNetworkTV. Owned by Forum Communications Company, the station maintains a news bureau and advertising sales office on North 15th Street ...

/KMCY signed on in 1986, the Meyer stations carried a secondary affiliation with

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

. Until

KXMD-TV KXMD-TV (channel 11) is a television station in Williston, North Dakota, United States, affiliated with CBS and The CW Plus. Owned by Nexstar Media Group, the station maintains a news bureau and advertising sales office at the intersection of 13th ...

signed on in 1969, KUMV carried CBS on a per-program basis. In the late 1970s, KUMV became one of the first stations to be transmitted via terrestrial cable television into most of

; it even maintained a sales office in

Saskatoon Saskatoon () is the largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It straddles a bend in the South Saskatchewan River in the central region of the province. It is located along the Trans-Canada Hig ...

, as did KXMD and

KFBB-TV KFBB-TV (channel 5) is a television station in Great Falls, Montana, United States, affiliated with ABC, Fox and MyNetworkTV. Owned by the Cowles Company, the station maintains studios and transmitter facilities on Old Havre Highway in Black Eagl ...

, the ABC affiliate in

Great Falls, Montana Great Falls is the third most populous city in the U.S. state of Montana and the county seat of Cascade County. The population was 60,442 according to the 2020 census. The city covers an area of and is the principal city of the Great Falls, M ...

. This arrangement continued until early 1985, when the three North Dakota network affiliates were replaced by CANCOM feeds of the

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

stations by Saskatchewan cable providers who felt the switch would improve signal quality. The Meyers sold off their broadcast holdings in 1997, with the television stations going to Sunrise Television Corporation. Sunrise sold them to The Wicks Group of Companies of

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 2002.

Hoak Media Hoak Media Corporation was a broadcast media company based in Dallas, Texas. Hoak once owned eighteen television stations (including satellites), all in medium and small-markets, mostly in the Great Plains states and Colorado. Hoak Media was e ...

bought KFYR-TV, KMOT, KUMV, and KQCD in July 2006, as well as KVLY-TV in Fargo and KSFY in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and its satellite stations. On November 17, 2006, the sale was approved by the FCC. KUMV began broadcasting digital-only on February 16, 2009. KUMV picked up MeTV in April 2013, with an official launch date of May 1, 2013. On November 20, 2013, Hoak announced the sale of most of its stations, including KUMV-TV, to

. Gray initially planned, through Excalibur Broadcasting, to also acquire Fox affiliate KXND and its Williston translator from Prime Cities Broadcasting and operate it 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, which would have made it a sister station to KUMV. On March 25, 2014, Prime Cities Broadcasting requested that the FCC dismiss the sale of KXND to Excalibur; Gray would instead acquire the non-license assets of KXND, as well as the license of Williston repeater KXND-LP. The sale of the Hoak stations was completed on June 13; at that time, Gray shut down KXND's full-power signal and moved Fox programming to the second digital subchannel of KUMV.

Programming

Syndicated programming

Syndicated programming on KUMV-TV includes '' Rachael Ray'', '' Dateline'', and ''

Wheel of Fortune The Wheel of Fortune or ''Rota Fortunae'' has been a concept and metaphor since ancient times referring to the capricious nature of Fate. Wheel of Fortune may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Art * ''The Wheel of Fortune'' (Burne-Jo ...

'', among others.

Newscasts

KUMV airs its own newscasts from Monday through Friday at 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. The first 10 minutes (which includes regional news and weather) originate at KMOT. KUMV has its own news and sports anchor who fill the remaining 20 minutes. Weekend newscasts are simulcast from KFYR. From 2002 to 2007, KMOT was forced to cut its newscasts to 20 minutes while simulcasting the first 10 minutes of KFYR-TV's 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. newscasts, much as KUMV does now. In January 2007, KMOT began broadcasting a full half-hour of news at 6:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m once again. It also added a weatherman and photographer/reporter to the staff. The stations occasionally share stories with co-owned KVLY-TV. The five stations simulcast major North Dakota sporting events and statewide political debates under the NBC North Dakota brand name and share certain equipment, such as remote broadcasting vehicles. On April 30, 2012, NBC North Dakota began broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. NBC North Dakota has long dominated the ratings in western North Dakota as a whole; the main stations and their semi-satellites count as one station for ratings and regulatory purposes. However, KMOT has spent most of its history as a distant runner-up to KXMC-TV in the northern half of the market. The Fox-affiliated subchannel debuted ''West Dakota Fox News at Nine'' during October 2014, originating from KFYR's studios in Bismarck.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:

Analog-to-digital conversion

KUMV-TV 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 8, on February 16, 2009, the day prior to the original date in which full-power television stations in the United States were set to transition from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate (which was later rescheduled for June 12, 2009). The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition

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 (on ...

channel 52, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the transition, to its analog-era VHF channel 8 for post-transition operations.

Translators

References

External links

* {{Gray TV Television channels and stations established in 1957 1956 establishments in North Dakota UMV-TV NBC network affiliates Fox network affiliates MeTV affiliates Circle (TV network) affiliates Gray Television Williston, North Dakota