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WBBJ-TV (channel 7) 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 ear ...
in
Jackson, Tennessee Jackson is a city in and the county seat of Madison County, Tennessee, United States. Located east of Memphis, it is a regional center of trade for West Tennessee. Its total population was 68,205 as of the 2020 United States census. Jackso ...
, United States, affiliated with ABC and CBS. Owned by Bahakel Communications, the station maintains studios on Muse Street in Jackson, and its transmitter is located on Potts Chapel Road in unincorporated eastern Madison County.


History

The station signed on March 6, 1955, as WDXI-TV, Jackson's first television station. It operated an
analog Analog or analogue may refer to: Computing and electronics * Analog signal, in which information is encoded in a continuous variable ** Analog device, an apparatus that operates on analog signals *** Analog electronics, circuits which use analo ...
signal on
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, and was a CBS affiliate owned by Aaron Robinson along with WDXI radio (1310 AM). Cy Bahakel bought the station in 1966 and changed the call letters to the current WBBJ-TV in 1967 (as Robinson's estate held on to WDXI radio). Since then, WBBJ has had the longest ownership tenure of any station in Tennessee, surpassing stations in much larger markets in the state. Soon after Bahakel took over, in January 1967, the station dropped CBS in favor of ABC (which WDXI-TV had carried as a secondary affiliation for some time beforehand); since then (and until the launch of WBBJ's CBS-affiliated subchannel), Jackson has received CBS programming from WREC-TV/WREG-TV in Memphis. Like many of the stations that operated in analog on channel 7, the station has used various versions of the circle 7 logo over the years; since 2003, WBBJ has used the original, ABC-trademarked version. Area viewers can also see ABC programming over-the-air in some areas from WATN-TV in Memphis, but that outlet is not carried by local cable providers.


WBBJ-DT3 (CBS) and WBBJ-DT4 (MeTV)

On January 1, 2012, WBBJ-DT3 became the area's CBS affiliate, bringing the network back to the market (and back to WBBJ, which carried the network until 1967). Outside of CBS programming, WBBJ-DT3 also carries syndicated programming and WBBJ newscasts (either simulcast with the main channel or shown exclusively on the subchannel). Additionally, between January 1, 2012, and September 2021, WBBJ-DT3 had served as a dual CBS/MeTV affiliate, offering programming from the MeTV service during select hours (on weekday afternoons and during overnight hours on weekends), in addition to the CBS affiliation, until MeTV programming was moved to a new fourth subchannel, which airs its full schedule uninterrupted. Prior to its CBS affiliation, WBBJ-DT3 served as a 24-hour live feed of a
NOAA The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (abbreviated as NOAA ) is an United States scientific and regulatory agency within the United States Department of Commerce that forecasts weather, monitors oceanic and atmospheric conditio ...
National Weather Service The National Weather Service (NWS) is an agency of the United States federal government that is tasked with providing weather forecasts, warnings of hazardous weather, and other weather-related products to organizations and the public for the ...
Doppler
weather radar Weather radar, also called weather surveillance radar (WSR) and Doppler weather radar, is a type of radar used to locate precipitation, calculate its motion, and estimate its type (rain, snow, hail etc.). Modern weather radars are mostly puls ...
with audio from
NOAA Weather Radio NOAA Weather Radio NWR; also known as NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards is an automated 24-hour network of VHF FM weather radio stations in the United States (U.S.) that broadcast weather information directly from a nearby National Weather Serv ...
. As of September 2018, WBBJ-DT3 has been airing in
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 ...
high definition High definition or HD may refer to: Visual technologies *HD DVD, discontinued optical disc format *HD Photo, former name for the JPEG XR image file format *HDV, format for recording high-definition video onto magnetic tape * HiDef, 24 frames-pe ...
(upgraded from its original 16:9
widescreen Widescreen images are displayed within a set of aspect ratios (relationship of image width to height) used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than t ...
standard definition picture format), downconverted from the native resolution of 1080i for the CBS network. A direct-to-cable full 1080i high definition feed of WBBJ-DT3 is available on select cable providers.


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 the station includes '' The Drew Barrymore Show'', '' Wheel of Fortune'', ''
Jeopardy! ''Jeopardy!'' is an American game show created by Merv Griffin. The show is a quiz competition that reverses the traditional question-and-answer format of many quiz shows. Rather than being given questions, contestants are instead given ge ...
'', and ''
Live with Kelly and Ryan ''Live with Kelly and Ryan'' (or simply ''Live'') is an American syndicated morning talk show hosted by Kelly Ripa and Ryan Seacrest. Executive produced by Michael Gelman, the ''Live with...'' show formula has aired under various hosts since ...
'', among others.


News operation

On August 1, 2007, WBBJ debuted new graphics, logo, music, and an updated weather set. The station, which had been using
Frank Gari Frank Daniel Garofalo (born April 1, 1944), known professionally as Frank Gari, is an American singer-songwriter and composer. Early life Gari was a popular singer and songwriter from the late 1950s and early 1960s. His best known songs as a ...
's "Image News" music package since 1999, switched to "In-Sink" by
Nashville Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and t ...
-based company 615 Music. Also on this date, the weeknight 5 o'clock newscast dropped the ''Live at 5'' branding and returned to ''ABC 7
Eyewitness News ''Eyewitness News'' is a style of television news presentation that emphasizes visual elements and action video, replacing the older "man-on-camera" newscast. History Pioneered by Westinghouse The earliest known use of the ''Eyewitness Ne ...
at 5'' which is simulcast on local
radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radi ...
WFHU (91.5 FM). The ninety-minute weekday morning show became ''Good Morning West Tennessee''. In addition to network and syndicated programming, there are local newscast offerings on WBBJ-DT3 through simulcasts with the main channel and broadcasts in new time slots. It offers local news weekdays at noon for thirty minutes as well as weeknights at 5:30 and 6:30 seen exclusively on the CBS subchannel. As a result, ''
CBS Evening News The ''CBS Evening News'' is the flagship evening television news program of CBS News, the news division of the CBS television network in the United States. The ''CBS Evening News'' is a daily evening broadcast featuring news reports, feature s ...
'' airs weeknights at 6:00, which is a half-hour later than most affiliates in the
Central Time Zone The North American Central Time Zone (CT) is a time zone in parts of Canada, the United States, Mexico, Central America, some Caribbean Islands, and part of the Eastern Pacific Ocean. Central Standard Time (CST) is six hours behind Coordina ...
. On January 23, 2013, the station debuted a brand new set that has a working newsroom behind the main anchor desk. Also, the new set shows the Circle 7 logo, but no longer features the ABC logo, since the station is affiliated with both ABC and CBS.


Notable former on-air staff

* Courtney Friel – news anchor * Lew Jetton – reporter, weather, and sports anchor * Anne Pressly – reporter (one month at WBBJ; now deceased)


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 ...
: WBBJ-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 7, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog broadcasts to digital broadcasts.


References


External links


WBBJTV.com
– Official WBBJ-TV website
MeTVJacksonTN.com
– Official
MeTV MeTV, an acronym for Memorable Entertainment Television, is an American broadcast television network owned by Weigel Broadcasting. Marketed as "The Definitive Destination for Classic TV", the network airs a variety of classic television program ...
Jackson website {{DEFAULTSORT:Wbbj-Tv Bahakel Communications Television channels and stations established in 1955 BBJ-TV ABC network affiliates MeTV affiliates 1955 establishments in Tennessee