It was once owned by NBC, and later by Media General before becoming a Sinclair Broadcast Group station in December 2014. Now, Sinclair Inc. is commemorating the upcoming 75th anniversary of the TV station’s debut, making it Rhode Island’s first television station.
It was on July 10, 1949 that WJAR-TV in Providence signed on the air. For decades it was owned by The Outlet Company, and since Spring 1953 has been at Channel 10.
Say what? Indeed, WJAR’s earliest days were on Channel 11. However, interference issues with WPIX-11 in New York, thanks to Long Island Sound’s conductivity in addition to tropospheric issues, led the FCC to reassign WJAR.
The move proved to be beneficial, as the closest other station on Channel 10 is WTEN-TV in Albany, N.Y. The tower is located in Rehoboth, Mass.
WJAR has been associated with NBC since its start, and in 1996 it took over as the station’s owner — for a short period. In April 2006, after four months on the market, WJAR was sold in a deal involving three other stations. The buyer? Media General.
That ownership tenure would end just over 9 years ago, with LIN Media’s merger with Media General. That transaction put LIN over the limit in Providence, as it already owned CBS affiliate WPRI and operated the FOX affiliate, WNAC-TV, via a shared services agreement. Sinclair agreed to acquire WJAR at that time.
