Subchannels 3.1 NBC
3.2 Antenna TV Owner Sarkes Tarzian, Inc. | Affiliations NBC | |
Branding Channel 3 (general)
Channel 3 Eyewitness News (newscasts) Slogan Channel 3, More Colorful (general)
Coverage You Can Count On (newscasts) Channels Digital: 13 (VHF)
Virtual: 3 (PSIP) | ||
WRCB, virtual channel 3, is an NBC-affiliated television station based in Chattanooga, Tennessee, United States, serving southeastern Tennessee, northwestern Georgia, northeastern Alabama and extreme southwestern North Carolina. The station's studios are located on Whitehall Road in Chattanooga's North side and its transmitter and tower are located in the town of Walden on Signal Mountain. The station is carried on Comcast Xfinity cable channels 4 and 432, and on EPB Fiber Optics on channels 3 and 303 in the Chattanooga area. Although parts of the Chattanooga market are in the Central Time Zone, all schedules are listed in Eastern Time.
Contents
History
The station began broadcasting on May 6, 1956 on analog Channel 3 as WRGP-TV. The call letters came from its founder, Ramon G. Patterson. It picked up the NBC affiliation from WROM-TV in Rome, Georgia (now WTVC, located today in Chattanooga proper). Its studios were first located at 1214 McCallie Avenue, between downtown and Missionary Ridge.
The station has belonged to several owners over the years. In 1959, Friendly Broadcasting, owner of WSTV-TV in Steubenville, Ohio (now WTOV-TV) bought WRGP from Patterson's group. In 1961 WSTV and WRGP were sold to the Massachusetts-based United Printers And Publishers, who later became Rust Craft Broadcasting, named after its greeting card line, which has since been acquired by American Greetings. These owners changed the station's call letters to WRCB-TV in 1963, to reflect the initials of the licensee. In 1968 the station moved to new facilities on Whitehall Road, on Chattanooga's north side, across the Tennessee River from downtown. Those new studios and equipment enabled channel 3 to begin broadcasting in color. In 1979, Rust Craft merged with magazine publisher Ziff Davis, who, in turn, sold WRCB to current owner Sarkes Tarzian, Inc. of Bloomington, Indiana, in 1982.
Digital channels
The station's digital channel is multiplexed:
On November 1, 2008, WRCB added Retro Television Network (RTV) on its second digital subchannel; the station had previously aired NBC Weather Plus on the subchannel, but that network was shut down by the end of the year. On January 1, 2012, WRCB replaced RTV with Antenna TV.
Analog-to-digital conversion
WRCB shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 3, 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 remained on its pre-transition VHF channel 13. Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former VHF analog channel 3.
As part of the SAFER Act, WRCB kept its analog signal on the air until July 12 to inform viewers of the digital television transition through a loop of public service announcements from the National Association of Broadcasters.
Programming
Syndicated programming on WRCB includes: Entertainment Tonight, Inside Edition (which is hosted by North Georgia native Deborah Norville), Ellen, and Rachael Ray.
News operation
WRCB produces five and a half hours of news a day weekdays, and six hours of news on weekends. The station is known for its School Patrol and Crimestoppers reports, which have been popular features on its newscasts for more than twenty years. On September 28, 2012, WRCB made the on-air transition from standard definition (4:3) to high definition (16:9).