WLAJ (channel 53) 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 ...
in
Lansing, Michigan
Lansing () is the capital of the U.S. state of Michigan. It is mostly in Ingham County, although portions of the city extend west into Eaton County and north into Clinton County. The 2020 census placed the city's population at 112,644, making ...
, United States, affiliated 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 ...
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 primar ...
. It is owned by
Mission Broadcasting
Mission Broadcasting, Inc. is a television station group that owns 20 television stations in 17 markets in the United States. The group's Chair is Nancie Smith, the widow of David S. Smith, who founded the company in 1996 and died in 2011. All but ...
, which maintains 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
Nexstar Media Group
Nexstar Media Group, Inc. is an American publicly traded media company with headquarter offices in Irving, Texas; Midtown Manhattan; and Chicago, Illinois. The company is the largest television station owner in the United States, owning 197 te ...
, owner of
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
affiliate
WLNS-TV
WLNS-TV (channel 6) is a television station in Lansing, Michigan, United States, affiliated with CBS. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which provides certain services to dual ABC/ CW+ affiliate WLAJ (channel 53) under a shared services agreeme ...
(channel 6), for the provision of certain services. WLAJ and WLNS-TV share studios on East Saginaw Street in Lansing's
Eastside section; through a
channel sharing agreement, the stations transmit using WLAJ's spectrum from a tower on Van Atta Road in
Okemos, Michigan
Okemos ( ) is a census-designated place (CDP) in Ingham County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population of the CDP was 21,369 at the 2010 census. Okemos is located mostly within Meridian Charter Township, with a small portion extending sout ...
. There is no separate website for WLAJ; instead, it is integrated with that of sister station WLNS-TV.
History
WLAJ began broadcasting on October 13, 1990, operating from a converted appliance store. The station was originally owned by Joel Ferguson, the founding owner of the market's first independent station, WFSL-TV (now
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 ...
affiliate
WSYM-TV
WSYM-TV (channel 47) is a television station in Lansing, Michigan, United States, affiliated with Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox and MyNetworkTV. Owned by the E. W. Scripps Company, the station has studios on West Saint Joseph Street (along Inters ...
). Ferguson had used the proceeds from the sale of WFSL to launch WLAJ.
Prior to its sign-on in 1990, Lansing had been one of the biggest
markets
Market is a term used to describe concepts such as:
* Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand
* Market economy
*Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market
Geography
*Märket, a ...
in the United States without a full-time ABC affiliate, even though it had been large enough to support three full network affiliates since at least the 1960s. However, only two VHF licenses were assigned to the city—channels 6 and 10, occupied by CBS affiliate WLNS and NBC affiliate
WILX-TV
WILX-TV (channel 10) is a television station licensed to Onondaga, Michigan, United States, serving as the NBC affiliate for the Lansing area. Owned by Gray Television, the station maintains studios on American Road (near I-96) in Lansing, and i ...
. UHF was not considered viable even after the FCC mandated all-channel tuning in 1964. Although Lansing is a fairly compact market geographically, it is sandwiched between
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 ...
to the east,
Flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and start fir ...
–
Saginaw
Saginaw () is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the seat of Saginaw County. The city of Saginaw and Saginaw County are both in the area known as Mid-Michigan. Saginaw is adjacent to Saginaw Charter Township and considered part of Greater ...
–
Bay City to the north,
Toledo to the south, and
Grand Rapids
Grand Rapids is a city and county seat of Kent County in the U.S. state of Michigan. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 198,917 which ranks it as the second most-populated city in the state after Detroit. Grand Rapids is the ...
–
Kalamazoo
Kalamazoo ( ) is a city in the southwest region of the U.S. state of Michigan. It is the county seat of Kalamazoo County. At the 2010 census, Kalamazoo had a population of 74,262. Kalamazoo is the major city of the Kalamazoo-Portage Metropolit ...
–
Battle Creek
Battle Creek is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan, in northwest Calhoun County, at the confluence of the Kalamazoo and Battle Creek rivers. It is the principal city of the Battle Creek, Michigan Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), which en ...
to the west. Therefore, it was not likely there would have been room to drop in a third VHF allocation. By the 1980s, cable and satellite had gained enough penetration in Mid-Michigan to make a UHF "Big Three" affiliate viable.
Before WLAJ signed on,
WJRT-TV
WJRT-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Flint, Michigan, United States, serving as the ABC affiliate for northeastern Michigan. Owned by Allen Media Broadcasting, the station maintains studios on Lapeer Road in Flint, with offi ...
in Flint had served as the default ABC outlet for the area from its 1958 sign-on until WLAJ debuted. WFSL had briefly carried a few ABC programs in an abortive attempt to become Lansing's ABC affiliate. Other parts of the market received ABC from WUHQ-TV (now
WOTV
WOTV (channel 41) is a television station licensed to Battle Creek, Michigan, United States, serving West Michigan as an affiliate of ABC. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside Grand Rapids–licensed NBC affiliate WOOD-TV (channel 8) an ...
) in Battle Creek and
WXYZ-TV
WXYZ-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Detroit, Detroit, Michigan, United States, affiliated with American Broadcasting Company, ABC. It is owned by the E. W. Scripps Company alongside Independent station (North America), independent st ...
in Detroit. As a condition of WLAJ receiving an ABC affiliation, its transmitter had to be located so there was minimum overlap with WJRT.
Ferguson eventually sold a half-stake in WLAJ to
Granite Broadcasting
Granite Broadcasting LLC is a broadcasting holding company in New York City which owns one television station in the United States, in Syracuse, New York. Granite was founded by W. Don Cornwell and Stuart Beck in 1988, in 1996. Granite had the option of buying out the rest of WLAJ, which it exercised six months later after a brief court battle when the owners of the transmitter site tried to stop the sale from taking place. The station was sold to
Freedom Communications
Freedom Communications, Inc., was an American media conglomerate that operated daily and weekly newspapers, websites and mobile applications, as well as ''Coast Magazine'' and other specialty publications. Headquartered at 625 N. Grand Avenue in ...
in 1999. In 2005, a company-wide consolidation of operations at its stations resulted in the move of WLAJ's
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 most other internal operations to the studios of sister station
WWMT
WWMT (channel 3) is a television station licensed to Kalamazoo, Michigan, United States, serving West Michigan as an affiliate of CBS and The CW. The station is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, and maintains studios on West Maple Street in Kal ...
in Kalamazoo. This left a skeleton crew of six people out of what began with eighty staffers in Lansing. Additionally, WWMT's president and general manager, James Lutton, took over the same capacity at WLAJ after the departure of Ross Reardon.
On September 24, 2007, WLAJ was re-branded as "ABC 3" since most Lansing-area cable providers carry it on channel 3. The logo introduced at that time featured the number "53" but emphasized its cable slot ("3") more than the over-the-air channel, with the "5" in
negative space
Negative space, in art, is the empty space around and between the subject(s) of an image. Negative space may be most evident when the space around a subject, not the subject itself, forms an interesting or artistically relevant shape, and su ...
. WOTV used a similar logo at the time. On April 7, 2008, a new image makeover including a new logo, similar to WWMT's, but with the hidden "5" like the previous logo was launched. It eventually dropped the hidden "5". WLAJ was unusual for airing ''
The Oprah Winfrey Show
''The Oprah Winfrey Show'', often referred to as ''The Oprah Show'' or simply ''Oprah'', is an American daytime broadcast syndication, syndicated talk show that aired nationally for 25 seasons from September 8, 1986, to May 25, 2011, in Chicag ...
'' at 5 p.m. instead of her traditional 4 p.m. timeslot. The series ended on May 25, 2011, and ''
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 prod ...
'' replaced ''Oprah'' on WLAJ.
WLAJ also aired
ESPN Plus
ESPN+ is an American over-the-top subscription video streaming service available in the United States, owned by Disney Media and Entertainment Distribution, in partnership with ESPN Inc., which is a joint venture between The Walt Disney Compa ...
'
Big Ten
The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference) is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representati ...
college football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States.
Unlike most ...
coverage until the launch of the
Big Ten Network
Big Ten Network (BTN) is an American sports network based in Chicago, Illinois. The channel is dedicated to coverage of collegiate sports sanctioned by the Big Ten Conference, including live and recorded event telecasts, news, analysis programs, ...
. While most ABC affiliates in Michigan saw their college football coverage reduced primarily to the network's games, WLAJ and WLAJ-DT2 have in recent years become the Lansing affiliate of the
Central Michigan University
Central Michigan University (CMU) is a public research university in Mount Pleasant, Michigan. Established in 1892 as the Central Michigan Normal School and Business Institute, the private normal school became a state institution and renamed Cen ...
Chippewas
The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains.
According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...
and the
Western Michigan University
Western Michigan University (Western Michigan, Western or WMU) is a public research university in Kalamazoo, Michigan. It was initially established as Western State Normal School in 1903 by Governor Aaron T. Bliss for the training of teachers ...
Broncos
A bucking horse is any breed or either gender of horse with a propensity to buck. They have been, and still are, referred to by various names, including bronco, broncho, and roughstock.
The harder they buck, the more desirable they are for rod ...
. Today, whenever a football game involving either CMU or WMU kicks off at noon, the game airs on WLAJ as a lead-in to
ABC's college football coverage. All other CMU and WMU football games air on WLAJ-DT2.
Freedom announced on November 2, 2011, that it would bow out of television and sell its stations, including WLAJ, to the
Sinclair Broadcast Group
Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. (SBG) is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. Headquartered in the Baltimore suburb of Cockeysville, Maryland, t ...
.
The deal closed on April 2, 2012, but only six months later (on October 11), Sinclair filed to sell WLAJ to Shield Media (owned by
White Knight Broadcasting White Knight Broadcasting is a company based in Lafayette, Louisiana owning three stations, based in Louisiana and Texas. It was founded in 1995 when it purchased then-religious independent station KWLB (now KSHV-TV) in Shreveport, LA.
On April 24, ...
vice president Sheldon Galloway). After the sale's completion, the station then entered into a shared services agreement with Young Broadcasting-owned WLNS.
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 jurisdiction ...
(FCC) granted its approval of the license assignment on December 4; the sale was completed on March 1. This transaction resulted in Young controlling four of the six largest
English-language
English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the is ...
network affiliates in Lansing (CBS, ABC, The CW, and MyNetworkTV).
[ On April 1, 2013, WLAJ's master control moved from WWMT's studios to the WLNS facility in Lansing. Most internal operations moved to WLNS as well. WLAJ also shut down its local advertising sales office and former news studio on South Pennsylvania Avenue. In effect, the move reunited WHTV's intellectual unit with WLAJ since the former station was once housed at the ABC outlet's studios. However, WLNS technically operated WHTV through an already established separate outsourcing arrangement from WLAJ.
In August 2013, WLAJ returned to branding itself as "ABC 53" using the updated ABC logo. Young Broadcasting merged with Media General on November 12, 2013.] As a result of these changes, WHTV announced it would not renew its operational outsourcing agreement with WLNS. In July 2014, WHTV entered into a new local marketing agreement with WSYM (then owned by the Journal Broadcast Group
Journal Media Group (formerly Journal Communications) was a Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based newspaper publishing company. The company's roots were first established in 1882 as the owner of its namesake, the ''Milwaukee Journal'', and expanded into br ...
) and relocated its advertising sales operation to that outlet's studios.
On August 21, 2020, it was announced that Mission Broadcasting
Mission Broadcasting, Inc. is a television station group that owns 20 television stations in 17 markets in the United States. The group's Chair is Nancie Smith, the widow of David S. Smith, who founded the company in 1996 and died in 2011. All but ...
would acquire WLAJ. The acquisition was completed on November 23.
WLAJ-DT2
On September 21, 1998, alongside the launch of The WB 100+ Station Group
The WB 100+ Station Group (originally called The WeB from its developmental stages until March 1999) was a national programming service of The WB—owned by the Warner Bros. Entertainment division of Time Warner, the Tribune Company, and group fo ...
(The WB 100+), WLAJ began operating a 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 ...
-only affiliate of The WB
The WB Television Network (for Warner Bros., or the "Frog Network", for its former mascot, Michigan J. Frog) was an American television network launched on broadcast television on January 11, 1995, as a joint venture between the Warner Bros. ...
which was part of the national service. This was available exclusively on Comcast
Comcast Corporation (formerly known as American Cable Systems and Comcast Holdings),Before the AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corpora ...
channel 30, had its own logo, and used the "WBL" call sign
In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigne ...
in a fictional manner. From 2002 until 2006, the internal operations (such as advertising sales) of UPN
The United Paramount Network (UPN) was an American broadcast television network that launched on January 16, 1995. It was originally owned by Chris-Craft Industries' United Television. Viacom (through its Paramount Television unit, which pr ...
affiliate WHTV were housed at WLAJ's studios. That station then relocated to the WLNS facility after entering into a joint sales agreement with WLNS' then-owner Young Broadcasting
Young Broadcasting, LLC was an American media company that owned or operated 12 television stations in 10 markets with a total U.S. television household coverage of 5.9%. The company was formerly known as Young Broadcasting Inc. and was the outgr ...
. Prior to 1998, The WB programming was available in the Lansing market via WGN's national feed, or off-market stations, such as WXON (now WMYD
WMYD (channel 20) is an independent television station in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It is owned by the E. W. Scripps Company alongside ABC affiliate WXYZ-TV (channel 7). Both stations share studios at Broadcast House on 10 Mile Road i ...
) in Detroit. On January 24, 2006, CBS Corporation (which split from Viacom after 2005) and Warner Bros. Television (the company which owned The WB) announced they then would cease operating the UPN and The WB networks and combine their resources to create a programming service entitled The CW. The letters would represent the first initial of the new network's respective corporate parents.
On February 22, News Corporation
News Corporation (abbreviated News Corp.), also variously known as News Corporation Limited, was an American multinational mass media corporation controlled by media mogul Rupert Murdoch and headquartered at 1211 Avenue of the Americas in Ne ...
announced that it would start up another new network called MyNetworkTV
MyNetworkTV (unofficially abbreviated MyTV, MyNet, MNT or MNTV, and sometimes referred to as My Network) is an American commercial broadcast television syndication service and former television network owned by Fox Corporation, operated by its ...
. This new service, which would be a sister network to Fox, would be operated by Fox Television Stations
Fox Television Stations, LLC (FTS; alternately Fox Television Stations Group, LLC), is a group of television stations located within the United States, which are owned-and-operated by the Fox Broadcasting Company, a subsidiary of the Fox Corp ...
and its syndication division 20th Television
20th Television (formerly 20th Century Fox Television, 20th Century-Fox Television, and TCF Television Productions, Inc.) is an American television production company that is a division of Disney Television Studios, part of The Walt Disney Compa ...
. MyNetworkTV was launched on September 5 and former UPN affiliate WHTV joined the network. This left WBL to affiliate with The CW via 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 primar ...
, a service similar to The WB 100+, on September 18. On that date, WLAJ created a new second 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 ...
to simulcast WBL and offer non-cable subscribers access to The CW. That channel then began using the WLAJ-DT2 call letters in an official manner and relocated to Comcast channel 5.
News operation
WLAJ launched a news department (under the branding ''53 Newsbeat'') a month after it began operations. However, after only fifteen months, station management decided to pull the plug on the production and replace it with simulcasts of ''Action News
''Action News'' is a local television newscast format originating in the United States. First conceived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, it is characterized by a tight format with strict time limits on set packages, a focus on surrounding suburbs, ...
'' from WXYZ. Due to continual low ratings, this was eventually replaced by syndicated programming. In 1997, it re-launched a news operation but still found itself with few viewers having to compete with established broadcasts at longtime dominant WLNS and runner-up WILX-TV.
New weeknight 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. broadcasts were branded as ''ABC 53 News Now'' and featured anchor Joe Parker, sports with Shaun Broyls, and weather outsourced to the National Weather Network (now known as WeatherVision
WeatherVision is a TV syndication company based in Jackson, Mississippi. WeatherVision produces and distributes customized weather forecast segments for local airing by over 200 commercial and public television (and radio) stations nationwide. The ...
) of Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson, officially the City of Jackson, is the Capital city, capital of and the List of municipalities in Mississippi, most populous city in the U.S. state of Mississippi. The city is also one of two county seats of Hinds County, Mississippi, ...
. Kirk Montgomery eventually took over as meteorologist
A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists in research, while t ...
after an in-house weather department was added. After Freedom bought the station in 1999, a management change occurred and sales manager Mike King (from sister station WWMT) was brought in as the new general manager at WLAJ.
During this time, the news department won several awards including Best Newscast from the Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
. Initially retaining the ''ABC 53 News Now'' branding, the shows were eventually relaunched as ''ABC 53 News Express'' which consisted of ten minutes of news, weather, and sports followed by an interview segment. Parker left in 2002 to become the main weeknight anchor at Freedom's WRGB
WRGB (channel 6) is a television station licensed to Schenectady, New York, United States, serving the Capital District as an affiliate of CBS. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group alongside CW affiliate WCWN (channel 45, also licensed to Sch ...
in Albany, New York
Albany ( ) is the capital of the U.S. state of New York, also the seat and largest city of Albany County. Albany is on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River, and about north of New York City ...
, and was replaced by Darcy Sullivan. Despite the new format and the critical acclaim, WLAJ was still unable to make significant headway in the ratings. It frequently found itself as the third station in a two-station market, with WLNS and WILX waging a fierce battle for first. Eventually, Suzanne Wangler (using her on-air name "Suzanne Page") from Detroit's WDIV-TV
WDIV-TV (channel 4) is a television station in Detroit, Michigan, United States, affiliated with NBC. It serves as the flagship broadcast property of the Graham Media Group subsidiary of Graham Holdings Company. WDIV-TV maintains studio facili ...
replaced Darcy Sullivan as producer and news anchor. Cathy Younkin from WWMT replaced Jim Fordyce as news director
A news director is an individual at a broadcast station or network or a newspaper who is in charge of the news department. In local news, the news director is typically in charge of the entire news staff, including journalists, news presenters, ...
and Hondo Carpenter remained sports director
The title of sports director can refer to the director of a live sports broadcast. It can also refer to an individual at a television or radio station who is in charge of the sports department.
Director
{{Job-stub ...
.
On September 24, 2007, a significant change occurred at WLAJ after the station dropped the ''News Express'' format for its newscasts. The news production returned to a more traditional presentation complete with a newly renovated set at its South Pennsylvania Avenue studios. The station began producing full-length newscasts branded as ''ABC 3 News'' (referring to its on-air identification based on its universal cable channel location). By this point, WLAJ was airing local news weeknights at 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. and also introduced a prime time newscast at 10 p.m. on its CW-affiliated second digital subchannel. The half-hour prime time program on the subchannel, called ''ABC 3 News Live at 10 on CW 5'', competed with another sixty-minute local newscast seen every night at the same time on Fox outlet WSYM (which has all of its news programming produced by WILX).
On February 15, 2008, Suzanne Wangler (who anchored under the name "Suzanne Page") resigned as the anchor/producer/news director of WLAJ. Wangler cited the "stress" of the job serving in her position leading to her resignation. She previously had a week-long absence due to family problems. Her resignation, however, may have been due to an investigation where she was accused of taking almost $150,000 from an Oakland County
Oakland County is a county in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is part of the metropolitan Detroit area, located northwest of the city. As of the 2020 Census, its population was 1,274,395, making it the second-most populous county in Michigan, b ...
man named Les Pingilley. The charges led to an ''Investigators'' report at WXYZ by Heather Catallo. On February 23, Wangler was found dead in her home by police. According to Detroit's Fox owned-and-operated station
In the broadcasting industry, an owned-and-operated station (frequently abbreviated as an O&O) usually refers to a television or radio station owned by the network with which it is associated. This distinguishes such a station from an affiliate ...
WJBK
WJBK (channel 2) is a television station in Detroit, Michigan
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 o ...
(channel 2), it was an "apparent suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Mental disorders (including depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, personality disorders, anxiety disorders), physical disorders (such as chronic fatigue syndrome), and s ...
" and she "had hanged herself." Also according to that station, she went to a local police department to get her blood alcohol level checked for a previous driving under the influence
Driving under the influence (DUI)—also called driving while impaired, impaired driving, driving while intoxicated (DWI), drunk driving, operating while intoxicated (OWI), operating under the influence (OUI), operating vehicle under the infl ...
charge. Her blood alcohol content
Blood alcohol content (BAC), also called blood alcohol concentration or blood alcohol level, is a measurement of alcohol intoxication used for legal or medical purposes; it is expressed as mass of alcohol per volume or mass of blood. For exampl ...
tested at 0.05% (0.08% is legally drunk in Michigan). However, due to prior offenses, she was not allowed to have any alcohol in her system. A family member discovered her dead around 3 p.m. that day and called police. An autopsy to find the exact cause of death was scheduled; it was confirmed by the autopsy as suicide by hanging.
Since WLAJ lacked a weather department, all weather forecasts
Weather forecasting is the application of science and technology to predict the conditions of the atmosphere for a given location and time. People have attempted to predict the weather informally for millennia and formally since the 19th centu ...
were taped in advance by meteorologists from WWMT's studios on West Maple Street in Kalamazoo. Except for a news anchor and sports director based in Lansing, WLAJ maintained a very minimal news presence in Lansing with only two news reporters. Additional reporters from WWMT were included when coverage was presented that featured a regional and/or statewide interest. On weekdays from 7 a.m. until 9 a.m., WLAJ aired news and weather cut-ins (at :25 and :55 past the hour) during ''Good Morning America
''Good Morning America'' (often abbreviated as ''GMA'') is an American morning television program that is broadcast on ABC. It debuted on November 3, 1975, and first expanded to weekends with the debut of a Sunday edition on January 3, 1993. Th ...
'' that were recorded in advance by WWMT personnel. At some point in time, its 6 p.m. broadcast was expanded to an hour displacing ''ABC World News With Charles Gibson
''ABC World News Tonight'' (titled ''ABC World News Tonight with David Muir'' for its weeknight broadcasts since September 2014) is the flagship daily evening television news program of ABC News, the news division of the American Broadcasting ...
'' to a 30-minute delay
Delay (from Latin: dilatio) may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* ''Delay 1968'', a 1981 album by German experimental rock band Can
* ''The Delay'', a 2012 Uruguayan film
People
* B. H. DeLay (1891–1923), American aviator and acto ...
at 7 p.m. Despite a credible effort to offer a third option of newscasts in Lansing, WLAJ finally discontinued its news department altogether on September 25, 2009.
As a result, WWMT began producing a five-minute news and weather brief seen weeknights at 11 p.m. (which was taped earlier in the evening) featuring rotating WWMT personalities. Known as ''ABC 3 News Update'', regional and state coverage was presented during the show since WLAJ no longer maintained any news-related personnel at its studios in Lansing. WWMT also continued to provide WLAJ with taped local weather cut-ins during ''Good Morning America'' on weekday mornings. All news and weather updates on this outlet were upgraded to high definition level on April 16, 2011, after WWMT made the switch.
At some point in March 2013 after WLNS took over operations of WLAJ, all of the WWMT-produced news and weather cut-ins were dropped. On April 1, WLNS began simulcasting its weeknight 6 p.m. and 11 pm newscasts on WLAJ. Their morning newscast started simulcasting (from 5 a.m. until 7 a.m.) on April 15 and includes separate, recorded cut-ins during ''Good Morning America''. In addition to its main studios, WLNS operates a bureau within the ''Jackson Citizen Patriot
''Jackson Citizen Patriot'' is a daily newspaper published in Jackson, Michigan.
Since 2012, the ''Citizen Patriot'' has been published at AnnArbor.com
''AnnArbor.com'' was an online newspaper that covered local news of Ann Arbor, Michigan, ...
'' newsroom on East Michigan Avenue in downtown Jackson. Unlike most ABC affiliates, WLAJ does not air midday news during the week, a 5 p.m. weeknight show, or weekend newscasts. As a CW Plus station, WLAJ-DT2 formerly aired the nationally syndicated weekday morning show ''The Daily Buzz
''The Daily Buzz'' (occasionally abbreviated ''"theDBZ"'') is a nationally syndicated news and infotainment program. The show premiered as a 3-hour weekday morning television show on September 16, 2002, initially airing on 10 stations owned and ...
'', replacing it with paid programming in June 2014. The CW Plus dropped the show in September 2014.
Technical information
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 ...
:
In 2014, WLAJ began carrying the Justice Network
True Crime Network (formerly Justice Network) is an American digital multicast television network that is operated by True Crime Network, LLC, a limited liability company, which is owned by Tegna Inc. The network specializes in true crime, in ...
on a newly created third subchannel.
WLNS sold its spectrum in the FCC spectrum auction, and reached a channel sharing agreement with WLAJ. On June 11, 2018; WLNS discontinued broadcasting from its transmitter in Okemos
Okemos ( ) is a census-designated place (CDP) in Ingham County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population of the CDP was 21,369 at the 2010 census. Okemos is located mostly within Meridian Charter Township, with a small portion extending sout ...
and began broadcasting from WLAJ's transmitter in Rives Junction on channel 25; it continues to appear as channel 6 via PSIP. This created a situation where the senior partner in an operating agreement transmits on the spectrum of its junior partner. As a consequence of the WLNS channel share, and the need to transmit three high-definition signals (1080i for WLNS, and 720p for WLAJ's two ABC and CW channels), WLAJ dropped Justice Network from its third subchannel. In 2020, the transmitter was moved to the old WLNS transmitter location in Okemos.
Analog-to-digital conversion
WLAJ shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 53, on June 12, 2009, as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 51, using PSIP
The Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP) is the MPEG (a video and audio industry group) and privately defined program-specific information originally defined by General Instrument for the DigiCipher 2 system and later extended for the AT ...
to display WLAJ's virtual channel
In most telecommunications organizations, a virtual channel is a method of remapping the ''program number'' as used in H.222 Program Association Tables and Program Mapping Tables to a channel number that can be entered via digits on a receiver's ...
as 53 on digital television receivers, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the transition. On May 22, 2015, WLAJ relocated its digital signal to UHF channel 25, with the FCC license issued on June 5, 2015.
See also
*Channel 14 digital TV stations in the United States The following television stations broadcast on digital channel 14 in the United States:
* K14AG-D in Circle, etc., Montana
* K14AL-D in Ely, Nevada
* K14AR-D in Glasgow, Montana
* K14AT-D in Ridgecrest, California, on virtual channel 52, which ...
*Channel 53 virtual TV stations in the United States The following television stations operate on virtual channel 53 in the United States:
* K42IH-D in East Wenatchee, Washington
* KETD in Castle Rock, Colorado
* KGEB in Tulsa, Oklahoma
* W23FC-D in Eau Claire, Wisconsin
* WCDN-LD in Cleveland, Oh ...
References
External links
*
{{Major U.S. TV O-O Stations
ABC network affiliates
Television channels and stations established in 1990
LAJ
1990 establishments in Michigan
Nexstar Media Group