WOFL - History

History

Channel 35 in Orlando is in its second incarnation. On March 31, 1974, Channel 35 signed on as WSWB, Central Florida's first independent station. Owned by Sun World Broadcasting, it was based in the east Orlando building that use to houses PBS station WMFE-TV. WSWB produced children's programing (Uncle Hubie's Penthouse Barnyard), aired re-runs of such shows as Batman, Bugs Bunny, Popeye, Green Acres, Mister Ed, and Lost In Space. The 1970s recession impacted the station's operations; Sun World encountered financial difficulties and was forced to file for bankruptcy in January 1976. The station signed off the air in 1977.

Then-unknown media mogul Ted Turner tried to buy the station; however, the attempt failed because of ensuing legal actions. In fact, the station’s 44-acre (180,000 m2) transmission site was briefly owned by Turner while the tower and broadcasting equipment were tied up in a judgment claim held by Pat Robertson, owner of the Christian Broadcasting Network. As a result, channel 35 remained off the air until the license was granted to a group of investors known as The Omega Group, with the Meredith Corporation owning a non-voting interest. Meredith would be consultants for the station, holding an option to eventually buy out the other partners. The station signed back on the air in 1979 under its current calls, WOFL. The WSWB call sign is now used by the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre affiliate of the CW.

Like its predecessor, WOFL was a typical independent station, carrying cartoons such as Bugs Bunny, Tom and Jerry, Scooby Doo, Woody Woodpecker, and the Flintstones; sitcoms such as Bewitched, I Dream Of Jeannie, Leave It To Beaver, I Love Lucy, Green Acres, Petticoat Junction, Andy Griffith, and, by 1984, Alice, the Jeffersons, Welcome Back Kotter, and Barney Miller. During prime time, the station offered drama shows such as Hawaii Five-O, Cannon, Charlie's Angels, and The Dukes Of Hazzard. Older movies aired after 1 a.m. and on weekends.

Meredith Corporation exercised its full purchase option from Omega in 1982, and the station moved to a new studio building in Lake Mary in 1986, a major change from the prior studios that were located in a converted bank building in Orlando's adult-entertainment district centered on South Orange Blossom Trail. As the 1980s progressed, WOFL acquired more recent sitcoms, cartoons, and movies.

WOFL became one of he Fox Broadcasting Company's charter affiliates at the network's inception in 1986. The station was frequently ranked as one of the country's leading Fox affiliates during the network's early years, achieving a number one ranking on several occasions through the early 1990s. It was also the most profitable station in Meredith's multi-station group, despite being its only UHF "independent" station at that time. As the 1990s progressed, WOFL offered fewer movies and older shows and more talk, reality and court shows. As with most Fox affiliates and stations, WOFL carried children's programming including that from the network itself. Despite having competiting independents, WOFL was one of the last remaining Fox affiliates in a major market to retain broadcasting rights to most cartoons syndicated by Disney throughout the 1990s; while this left Orlando without an official The Disney Afternoon lineup (due to Fox Kids competing for those same timeframes in most markets) the station still aired all of the lineup still, though out of pattern in other timeslots. News would not be added till later in the decade. In the mid-1990s, WOFL took over the operations of Gainesville's Fox affiliate, Ocala-based WOGX channel 51. WOFL began expanded news operations in March 1998, as Fox encouraged its affiliates to offer news. The newscasts were simulcast on WOGX. It launched its digital TV signal on channel 22 in January 2000, and began broadcasting in widescreen format in January 2002.

WOFL, along with KVVU in Las Vegas, were excluded from the 1994 affiliation deal between Meredith and CBS. They were at the time two of Fox's strongest affiliates, despite WOFL broadcasting on the UHF band. At the same time, CBS's existing Orlando station, WCPX-TV (now WKMG-TV), was one of that network's weaker affiliates, and Fox did not want to move from a UHF outlet to a lower-rated VHF outlet. Meredith briefly owned WCPX for one day in September 1997, following a merger with that station's owner, First Media.

In 2002, Meredith traded WOFL and WOGX to News Corporation's Fox Television Stations Group, and, in return, Meredith received KPTV in Portland, Oregon. This made WOFL a Fox owned-and-operated station (O&O), and sister station to UPN affiliate WRBW. Fox had acquired WRBW and KPTV several months earlier, when it acquired the stations of the United Television group. This trade protected WOFL as the Fox affiliate. After the trade was finalized, WRBW's operations were integrated with those of WOFL. WOFL was the only network O&O in the Orlando/Daytona Beach market until UPN and the WB were incorporated into the CW, broadcasting on WKCF. In response, Fox formed My Network TV, which airs on former Fox-owned UPN stations, including WRBW. WOFL began airing fewer cartoons in the late 1990s and, in 2002, dropped them altogether when Fox ended its children's programming. WOFL is one of a Fox-owned triplet of stations in Central Florida operated from Fox 35's Lake Mary studios, the other two being WRBW and WOGX. Most of WOFL's programming, including Fox programming, was originally seen in Citrus County on W49AI in the 1980s. The station did nor air WOFL's late-night programming, however, as it signed off at midnight. This arrangement continued until WOGX became a Fox affiliate in 1991.

On April 23, 2007, WOFL launched a new logo, modeled after that of sister station WTVT in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area. Coincidentally, the channel number font resembles that of the WOFL logo from the mid-1980s. WOFL then updated its news set, introduced a new musical theme for its news, and changed its slogan from "First on Fox" to "The Most Powerful Name in Local News", reflecting the national Fox News slogan. The current news set premiered in January 2005.

WOFL simulcasts WTVT's Tampa Bay Buccaneers pregame show Chip Carter's Tailgate Sunday.