WDSE (channel 8), branded on-air as PBS North, is a
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...
member
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 eart ...
in
Duluth, Minnesota
, settlement_type = City
, nicknames = Twin Ports (with Superior), Zenith City
, motto =
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top: urban Duluth skyline; Minnesota ...
, United States. Owned by the Duluth–Superior Area Educational Television Corporation, it is
sister
A sister is a woman or a girl who shares one or more parents with another individual; a female sibling. The male counterpart is a brother. Although the term typically refers to a family, familial relationship, it is sometimes used endearingly to r ...
to
adult album alternative
Adult album alternative (also triple-A, AAA, or adult alternative) is a radio format. See pages 9 and 10Mills, Joshua. "A New Radio Music Format: Rock for Prosperous Adults" New York Times, Feb 28 1994, p. 2. ProQuest. Web. Accessed September 4, 2 ...
radio station
WDSE-FM (103.3). The two outlets share studios on rented space at the
University of Minnesota Duluth
The University of Minnesota Duluth (UMD) is a public university in Duluth, Minnesota. It is part of the University of Minnesota system and offers 16 bachelor's degrees in 88 Academic major, majors, graduate programs in 25 different fields, and a ...
; the television station's transmitter is located west of downtown Duluth in Hilltop Park.
WRPT (channel 31) in
Hibbing, Minnesota
Hibbing is a city in Saint Louis County, Minnesota, United States. The population was 16,214 at the 2020 census. The city was built on mining the rich iron ore of the Mesabi Iron Range and still relies on that industrial activity today. At th ...
, operates as a full-time
satellite
A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioi ...
of WDSE; this station's transmitter is located at Maple Hill Park south of Hibbing. WRPT covers areas of Minnesota's
Iron Range
The term Iron Range refers collectively or individually to a number of elongated iron-ore mining districts around Lake Superior in the United States and Canada. Much of the ore-bearing region lies alongside the range of granite hills formed by ...
(including
Grand Rapids,
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
and
Chisholm) that receive a marginal to non-existent
over-the-air signal from WDSE, although there is significant overlap between the two stations'
contours
Contour may refer to:
* Contour (linguistics), a phonetic sound
* Pitch contour
* Contour (camera system), a 3D digital camera system
* Contour, the KDE Plasma 4 interface for tablet devices
* Contour line, a curve along which the function has a ...
otherwise. WRPT is a straight
simulcast
Simulcast (a portmanteau of simultaneous broadcast) is the broadcasting of programmes/programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time (that is, simulta ...
of WDSE; on-air references to WRPT are limited to
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 jurisdicti ...
(FCC)-mandated hourly
station identification
Station identification (ident, network ID or channel ID or bumper) is the practice of radio and television stations and networks identifying themselves on-air, typically by means of a call sign or brand name (sometimes known, particularly in th ...
s during programming. Aside from the transmitter, WRPT does not maintain any physical presence locally in Hibbing.
History
WDSE first went on the air on September 13, 1964, as the second educational station in Minnesota. The founding general manager was George Beck, former principal of
Duluth Central High School, who had led the campaign for educational television in the Twin Ports for over a decade.
The station originally operated from the Bradley Building in downtown Duluth. When the building was condemned to make room for
Interstate 35
Interstate 35 (I-35) is a major Interstate Highway in the central United States. As with most primary Interstates that end in a five, it is a major cross-country, north–south route. It stretches from Laredo, Texas, near the Mexican border ...
, UMD offered the station space on campus for a new studio. WDSE moved to its current facility in 1978. It is named the Sax Brothers Memorial Communications Center in honor of the brothers of Duluth physician Milton Sax, who gave the initial $200,000 bequest for the project.
In November 1982, WDSE was the first Minnesota television broadcaster to utilize a circularly polarized broadcast antenna, and in April 1985 it was the first in Minnesota to begin full-time
stereo television broadcasting. Its digital signal first went on the air on April 28, 2003, and in May 2003, WDSE became the first broadcaster in Minnesota to launch a channel, 8.2 PBS-HD, fully devoted to high-definition programming. In June 2008, WDSE became the first station in the Duluth–Superior market to begin producing local programming in high definition. WDSE/WRPT was the first station in the Duluth–Superior market to begin broadcasting in 5.1
Dolby surround sound starting June 12, 2009. On June 16, 2009, WDSE-TV/DT officially changed the station's call sign to simply WDSE, dropping the "TV" or "DT" at the end of the call sign.
WRPT began broadcasting December 27, 2008, utilizing a directional antenna that beams the signal across the Minnesota Iron Range communities. Much of this area had been among the few areas without a clear over-the-air signal from a PBS station; Iron Range viewers had only been able to watch WDSE when cable arrived in the area in the 1970s. WRPT was one of the first of two construction permits ever granted by the FCC as a "digital singleton" facility; making it a rare ground-up digital only station that had no analog counterpart. On March 1, 2010, WRPT-DT officially changed the station's call sign to simply WRPT dropping the "DT" at the end of the call sign.
In late August 2010, WDSE was rebranded from "PBS eight" to "PBS North" to reflect their extended coverage with WRPT into more of northeastern Minnesota. In 2012, the stations rebranded under their call letters as "WDSE-WRPT". The PBS North branding was reinstated in January 2023.
Programming
Along with programming from PBS, Minnesota Public Television and
PBS Wisconsin
PBS Wisconsin (formerly Wisconsin Public Television or WPT) is a state network of non-commercial educational television stations operated primarily by the Wisconsin Educational Communications Board and the University of Wisconsin–Madison. It c ...
, locally produced programs such as ''Minnesota Legislative Report'', ''WDSE Cooks'', ''Almanac North'', ''Venture North'', ''Native Report'', ''Great Gardening'', ''Lawyers on the Line'', and ''Doctors on Call'' are area favorites included in the broadcast schedule. WDSE produces, broadcasts, and supplies to the networks an intensive schedule of local and regional programming.
Technical information
Subchannels
The stations' digital signals are
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
WDSE discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over
VHF channel 8, on June 12, 2009, as part of the
federally mandated transition from analog to digital television.
[List of Digital Full-Power Stations](_blank)
/ref> The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 38 to VHF channel 8.
Translator
The last translator owned directly by WDSE was K67CT in Grand Marais. Rather than move from channel 67 to a channel between 2 and 51 as required to comply with the digital television transition in the United States
The digital transition in the United States was the switchover from analog to exclusively digital broadcasting of terrestrial television programming. According to David Rehr, then president and CEO of the National Association of Broadcasters, t ...
, the translator was taken off the air December 1, 2011.
References
External links
Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wdse (Tv)
PBS member stations
Television channels and stations established in 1964
University of Minnesota Duluth
Public broadcasting in Wisconsin
Television stations in Duluth, Minnesota
1964 establishments in Minnesota