WVUT (channel 22), branded on-air as Vincennes PBS, is a PBS 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 ea ...

Vincennes, Indiana Vincennes is a city in and the county seat of Knox County, Indiana, United States. It is located on the lower Wabash River in the southwestern part of the state, nearly halfway between Evansville and Terre Haute. Founded in 1732 by French fur ...

, United States (which is technically part of the

Terre Haute Terre Haute ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Vigo County, Indiana, United States, about 5 miles east of the state's western border with Illinois. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 60,785 and its metropolitan area had a ...

television market, for which WVUT is the PBS member station of record). Owned by

Vincennes University Vincennes University (VU) is a public college with its main campus in Vincennes, Indiana. Founded in 1801 as Jefferson Academy, VU is the oldest public institution of higher learning in Indiana. VU was chartered in 1806 as the Indiana Terri ...

, it is sister to

campus radio Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...

station WVUB (91.1 FM). WVUT's studios are located on North 2nd Street and Rosedale Avenue in Vincennes, and its transmitter is located southeast of the city off SR 61.

History

The station's history traces back to the launch of a television station in

Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the nin ...

, WRAY-TV (channel 52), a

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

independent station An independent station is an independent radio or terrestrial television station which is independent in some way from broadcast networks. The definition of "independence" varies from country to country, reflecting governmental regulations, marke ...

that signed on in December 1953; it was co-owned with radio station WRAY (1250 AM), which shared studio space with WRAY-TV. With competition from two television stations— WTVW and WFIE-TV—out of the nearby

Evansville Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 census, making it the state's third-most populous city after Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, the largest city in ...

market, WRAY-TV was never successful and ceased operations after seven months, except for annual

March of Dimes March of Dimes is a United States nonprofit organization that works to improve the health of mothers and babies. The organization was founded by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1938, as the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, to comb ...

telethons through 1960. In late 1960, Vincennes University purchased the studio equipment; WRAY-TV's

license A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...

was surrendered to 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 jurisdicti ...

(FCC) in February 1961. Vincennes University applied for channel 52 to be substituted for the originally provided 44 in Vincennes to avoid retuning equipment. This was granted, and an application for construction permit followed in 1964. In 1965, the old channel 52 allocation was changed to UHF channel 34, and the

construction permit Planning permission or developmental approval refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. It is usually given in the form of a building perm ...

originally issued on February 8, 1966, was issued under that allocation, only to be changed by the FCC to channel 22 a few weeks later as part of a second nationwide realignment of channel allocations for stations that had not yet been built. WVUT first

signed on Signing may refer to: * Using sign language * Signature, placing one's name on a document * Signature (disambiguation) * Manual communication, signing as a form of communication using the hands in place of the voice * Digital signature A digi ...

the air on February 15, 1968 (formal programming began four days later), as a member station of

National Educational Television National Educational Television (NET) was an American educational broadcast television network owned by the Ford Foundation and later co-owned by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It operated from May 16, 1954 to October 4, 1970, and ...

(NET). WVUT joined PBS when the reorganized network launched on October 5, 1970.

Programming

Local programming on WVUT includes a student-produced newscast, titled ''NewsCenter 22'', which airs during Vincennes University's fall, winter and spring terms, as well as the weekly public affairs program ''22 Magazine''.

Technical information

Subchannels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:

Analog-to-digital conversion

WVUT discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over

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 22, 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 UHF 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 UHF channel 22 for post-transition operations. As a result of the FCC repack, the station now broadcasts on UHF channel 31.

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wvut Television channels and stations established in 1968 VUT Vincennes University 1968 establishments in Indiana