WDBJ - History

History

The station—Roanoke's third-oldest—first went to the air on October 3, 1955 under the ownership of the Times-World Corporation, owners of the Roanoke Times and Roanoke World-News newspapers along with WDBJ radio (AM 960, now WFIR; and FM 94.9, now WSLC). It has always been a CBS affiliate, owing to WDBJ-AM's long affiliation with CBS Radio. Before the station signed on, CBS had been available part-time on ABC affiliate WLVA-TV (now WSET-TV). During the late 1950s, the station was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network.

The station's studio was originally located in the Mountain Trust Bank Building in downtown Roanoke along with its radio sisters. Its transmitter was located temporarily on Mill Mountain; it originally planned to broadcast from Poor Mountain, but could not due to concerns about interference with then-under construction WSPA-TV in Spartanburg, South Carolina. In 1956, WDBJ-AM-TV moved to the Times-World Building. It also relocated its transmitter to Poor Mountain.

Due to its affiliation with the Times and Virginia's second-oldest radio station, channel 7 overtook WSLS-TV as the area's highest-rated station within three years of signing on. It has remained in the lead more or less ever since, although in recent years it has been in a spirited three-way race with WSLS and WSET. As channel 7 grew during the late 1950s, plans were drawn for a new studio at the corner of Brandon and Colonial Avenues in southwest Roanoke. The WDBJ stations moved to the then state-of-the-art building in the summer of 1961.

Times-World merged with Landmark Communications of Norfolk in 1969. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) forced Times-World to sell off WDBJ-TV due to a significant signal overlap with Landmark-owned WFMY-TV in Greensboro, North Carolina. Channel 7's city-grade signal reaches Patrick County, which is part of the Triad market. It also provides grade B coverage as far south as Reidsville, North Carolina. At the time, the FCC normally did not allow common ownership of two stations with overlapping signals, and would not even consider granting a waiver for stations with overlapping city-grade coverage. As a result, channel 7 was sold to its current owner, Schurz Communications. It is not likely that the FCC would have allowed Landmark to keep WDBJ-TV in any case, since the agency had recently banned cross-ownership of broadcasting outlets and newspapers. It had already grandfathered Landmark's flagship cluster of The Virginian-Pilot and WTAR-AM-FM-TV in Norfolk, and past precedent indicated it wouldn't have been willing to do so for the Times, World-News and WDBJ-AM-FM-TV. The transaction would have also brought two of Virginia's three CBS affiliates under common ownership.

In 1979, WDBJ opened its Central Virginia Bureau in Lynchburg. Weekend anchor Graham Wilson served as Bureau Chief, and the bureau covered the eastern part of the Roanoke-Lynchburg market, from Charlottesville to Danville. In the 1980s, the station did a series of spots for its programming featuring the popular "Ernest P. Worrell", portrayed by Jim Varney.

In 2000, WDBJ announced plans for a new digital facility on the site of the Best Products building in northwest Roanoke. That June, the Best Products building was demolished and construction of a new digital facility began. Photos of the complete demolition of the Best Products building & construction of the new "Digital Broadcast Center" are located here . In April 2002, WDBJ began broadcasting from the new "Digital Broadcast Center". WDBJ has newsrooms in Lynchburg, Blacksburg and Richmond, along with its Roanoke newsroom.