History
Early history as Smile of a Child
Founded as Smile of a Child TV by TBN co-founder Jan Crouch, the network was developed and named after Smile of a Child, a children's outreach ministry founded by Jan and Paul Crouch in the 1990s to provide services and donations to needy children worldwide. The network launched on December 24, 2005 at 3:00 a.m.Multicasting consolidation with JUCE TV
On June 1, 2015, Smile of a Child was combined into a single subchannel with a sister network JUCE TV (which targeted teenagers and young adults 13 to 30 years of age), under a timeshare arrangement. As a result of the realignment, for over-the-air viewers, Smile was originally reduced to a 9-hour daily programming schedule (from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. Eastern Time) on the third subchannel occupied by JUCE (which continued to air over its existing subchannel slot for the remainder of the broadcast day) on the 38 stations owned directly by TBN and through its subsidiary Community Educational Television. The following week, the timeshare was modified so that Smile would air from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Eastern), with JUCE airing the remainder of the day, giving each network a daily 12-hour window on its O&O stations' DT3 subchannels. The change, which was required due to multiplexing limitations at the time with TBN's over-the-air stations, was required due to the launch of TBN Salsa, a digital subchannel network targeting English-speaking Latino viewers which launched on that date. Though it had a reduced presence on broadcast television, Smile continued to maintain a 24-hour-day schedule via live stream on TBN's website, and mobile and digital media players as well as on select cable and satellite providers that carry the TBN multicast networks, as was the case before the over-the-air consolidation of the two networks. The network rebranded as simply "Smile" on January 1, 2017, with an updated network imaging, including its logo and continuity.Resumption of 24-hour service
On January 1, 2020, TBN resumed offering a 24-hour feed of Smile on its multicast tier over the DT3 subchannel of its owned-and-operated stations. (Concurrently, JUCE TV was moved to the DT5 feed previously occupied by TBN Salsa, which was discontinued from its broadcast stations in May 2019, when a standard definition feed of the main TBN signal began being offered as a placeholder feed.) In late February 2021, ''Olympusat'', the main provider of TBN's networks to cable providers in the United States (including Verizon FiOS and Xfinity), discontinued carriage of the network, thus affecting carriage of Smile to those systems.Closure
On December 10, 2024, Smile began notifying viewers that Smile would discontinue its service on this channel January 12, 2025. TBN promoted Yippee TV (and redirected Smile's website upon closure to that service), a separate streaming service, and a live feed on TBN+ to its viewers looking for similar faith-based children's content. The network ceased over-the-air throughout the day on January 12, with the feed terminating at 2:59 a.m. ET/11:59 p.m. PT the same evening. Outside TBN's non-commercial broadcast stations (which removed their former Smile channel entirely), the channel space is currently leased by OnTV4U, an all- paid programming network.Programming
Awards and honors
2008:See also
* TCT Kids * JUCE TV * PositivReferences
External links