WLMT - History

History

It signed-on as WMKW-TV on April 18, 1983 and aired an analog signal on UHF channel 30. The station was the market's second Independent outlet. The "KW" in its calls sign referred to Kemmons Wilson, founder of Holiday Inn, which was then based in Memphis. This station was founded by the TVX Broadcast Group, which at that time, owned several medium market UHF Independent stations. WMKW aired a general entertainment format featuring afternoon cartoons, sitcoms, old movies, drama shows and some sports. Right from the start, it began a rivalry with Independent outlet WPTY for viewership and ratings. In April 1987 along with the rest of the TVX stations, WMKW became the market's first affiliate of Fox and became known on-air as "Fox 30". It was at this point that WMTU (now WJKT) in Jackson became a semi-satellite of this station.

Also in 1987, WMKW was put on the market by TVX to finance the company's purchasing of other television stations in the United States. It was bought in 1988 by MT Communications and the call letters were changed to WUMT on October 1, 1989. Fox pulled its affiliation in the spring of 1990 and gave it to WPTY making WUMT an Independent once again. The call sign became WLMT on April 2 of that year. WMTU also continued to simulcast WLMT except in prime time where WMTU remained with Fox until 1995. MT Communications sold the station to Max Media in 1992. WLMT then established a local marketing agreement (LMA) with WPTY (then owned by Clear Channel Communications) and the two stations pooled resources and programming.

This outlet became a charter UPN affiliate at the network's launch on January 16, 1995 while WMTU took on the network as a secondary affiliation until later that year when Fox was taken off that station. In 2001, WLMT was bought outright by Clear Channel making WPTY and WLMT full sisters. In 2003, programming from The WB moved from WPTY (where it was a secondary affiliation and shown during late nights slots) to WLMT where it also aired out of pattern.

On January 24, 2006, CBS Corporation and Time Warner announced they would shut down both UPN and The WB that fall. In place of these two networks, a new "fifth" network, jointly owned by both companies, would launch, with a lineup of the most popular programming of both networks. The network was given the name "The CW Television Network" ("CW" representing the first initials of CBS and Warner). On February 22, 2006, News Corporation announced it would start up another new broadcast network called MyNetworkTV. This new service, which would be sister to Fox, would be operated by Fox Television Stations and its syndication division Twentieth Television. MyNetworkTV was created in order to give UPN and WB stations, not mentioned as becoming CW affiliates, another option besides becoming Independent. It was also created to compete against The CW.

WJKT declined to affiliate with The CW or MyNetworkTV choosing instead to become a separate station and re-affiliated with Fox on August 21. The area's Ion Television owned-and-operated station, WPXX-TV, began broadcasting MyNetworkTV on September 5. Meanwhile, WLMT began airing The CW on September 18 and became known on-air as "CW 30". On April 20, 2007, Clear Channel entered into an agreement to sell its entire television stations group to Newport Television, a media group controlled by Providence Equity Partners. On March 26, 2007, it began offering Newport's Variety Television Network on a new second digital subchannel. After that service shut down in January 2009, it switched to the Retro Television Network (RTV).

The station picked up WWE Smackdown from MyNetworkTV after WPXX ended its affiliation with the network (by then a programming service) in September 2009 and aired the show Saturday nights at 7. Initially, WLMT did not carry any other shows from MyNetworkTV and the agreement to carry WWE Smackdown ended with the broadcast's October 2010 move to the cable network Syfy. At some point that month, the station did pick up the network on its second digital subchannel. WLMT therefore joined the handful of stations that clear the full CW and MyNetworkTV lineups on separate subchannels (and, from July 2011 to late 2012, was the only station in the country that carried The CW as a primary affiliation and MyNetworkTV as a digital multicast channel). It has been announced that RTV will be replaced with Me-TV on November 14, 2011. Sometime in 2012, MyNetworkTV programming was dropped.

Newport announced on July 19, 2012 that it would sell 12 of its stations, including WLMT and WPTY, to Nexstar Broadcasting Group. The transaction was finalized on December 3.