KGCW (TV) - History

History

The station signed-on August 2, 1984 as KJMH. It aired an analog signal on UHF channel 26 with an effective radiated power of 200 kilowatts (at a height of 96 meters) from a tower on Winegard Drive in Burlington. Originally an Independent, KJMH became a charter Fox affiliate on October 6, 1986 and primarily served the southern portion of the Quad Cities market. However, the station suffered interference and duplication from the area's other Fox affiliate, KLJB in Davenport serving the northern portions of the area. Finally in 1996, this station became a full-time satellite of KLJB. In 2001, KJMH broke off and became a The WB affiliate for the Quad Cities and adopted the KGWB-TV call sign.

In September 2006 as a result of The WB and UPN merging to form The CW, the station was picked as the new network affiliate for the Quad Cities. To reflect the change, KGWB adopted the KGCW-TV call letters on June 30, 2006. Meanwhile, the area's low-powered UPN affiliate WBQD-LP joined the other new service, News Corporation's MyNetworkTV. While broadcasting in analog, KGCW's signal failed to cover the Quad Cities adequately because WBQD also transmitted on channel 26 (and still does today). In addition, its coverage area was less than most full-powered UHF outlets in the United States due to its lower effective radiated power and antenna height. However, since 2001, this shortfall has been made up by it being available on cable systems in the area through a fiber optic link and a simulcast on KLJB-DT2.

In December 2009, it finally changed the PSIP identifier for the main channel on 26.1 from its pre-transition labeling of "KGCW-DT" to its current legal call sign "KGCW" without the "-DT" suffix in it. At noon on February 17, 2009, the station terminated its analog signal on channel 26 and continued digital broadcasts on channel 41. It transferred the "KGCW-TV" calls from its now-defunct analog signal on channel 26 to its digital signal on channel 41 and the "KGCW-DT" call sign was discontinued.

However, it changed the legal Federal Communications Commission (FCC) call sign again to KGCW around the revised digital transition date in June 2009 while continuing to use "KGCW-DT" through PSIP to identify channel 26.1 all the way up until December 2009. The current digital signal had been on-the-air from a new transmitter site near north of Seaton since November 2008 and from the station's original Burlington site on Winegard Drive prior to that. The remainder of the television stations in the Quad Cities terminated analog signals on the new analog shutoff date, June 12.