miami florida branding local 10 general local 10 news newscasts slogan the one and only channels digital 10 vhf virtual 10 psip translators w47ac big pine key affiliations .1 abc .2 metv .3 movies owner bh media wplg inc. first air date august 2 1957 ; 59 years ago 1957 08 02 current license dates from november 20 1961 call letters meaning phillip leslie graham in memory of the former washington post publisher former callsigns wpst tv 1957 1961 wlbw tv 1961 1970 former channel number s analog 10 vhf 1961 2009 digital 9 vhf 1999 2009 transmitter power 127.7 kw height 309 m 1 014 ft facility id 53113 transmitter coordinates 25 58 0 n 80 12 43 w 25.96667 n 80.21194 w 25.96667 ; 80.21194 licensing authority fcc public license information profile cdbs website www.local10.com wplg channel 10 is an abc affiliated television station located in miami florida united states . wplg s studios are located on west hallandale beach boulevard sr 858 in pembroke park and its transmitter is located in miami gardens . from 1969 through 2014 wplg was owned by post newsweek stations ; in march 2014 the station was sold to berkshire hathaway in exchange for cash and its shares in post newsweek s parent company graham holdings . contents 1 history 1.1 wpst tv 1.2 a new channel 10 1.3 sale to berkshire hathaway 2 digital television 2.1 digital channels 2.2 analog to digital conversion 3 programming 3.1 tape delayed programming 3.2 dr. phil on wplg 4 news operation 4.1 notable current on air staff 4.2 notable former on air staff 5 references 6 external links history edit wpst tv edit the station first signed on the air on august 2 1957 as wpst tv as the second abc affiliate in the miami market ; it was originally owned by public service television inc. the broadcasting subsidiary of national airlines . the station took abc programming from witv channel 17 later occupied by pbs member station wlrn tv which ceased operations shortly after losing the abc affiliation . a congressional investigation of former fcc commissioner richard a. mack in 1958 revealed that a miami attorney named thurman a. whiteside working on behalf of national airlines had bribed the former commissioner to obtain the wpst broadcast license . 1 as a result national airlines was stripped of its license to operate wpst tv . a new channel 10 edit after the fcc revoked national airlines license a group headed by cincinnati area broadcaster l.b. wilson was awarded a construction permit to build a new television station on channel 10 . as part of an fcc supervised deal national airlines sold wpst s assets to wilson s group . wpst signed off for the last time on november 19 1961 . the next day on november 20 channel 10 returned to the air as wlbw tv named after the owner s initials . although it operates under a separate license what is now wplg claimed the national airlines station s history as its own . 2 the new station branded itself as colorvision 10 acknowledging that the station had been broadcasting its programming in color from launch . in 1967 wlbw s operations were moved to a new studio facility located on biscayne boulevard originally known as broadcast house . in 1969 wlbw and cincinnati sister station wcky radio were purchased by the washington post company and became part of its broadcasting subsidiary post newsweek stations . 3 on march 16 1970 the station s call letters were changed to wplg the calls were chosen in honor of philip l. graham husband of washington post publisher katharine graham who committed suicide in 1963 . wplg adopted its current 10 logo which features four stripes of differing colors within the 0 that represent a sunset in 1982 . wplg logo used from 1998 to 2004 . on january 1 1989 the miami fort lauderdale market underwent a three way network affiliation swap that saw longtime cbs affiliate wtvj channel 4 becoming an nbc owned and operated station ; longtime independent station and charter fox affiliate wcix channel 6 becoming a cbs owned and operated station ; and longtime nbc affiliate wsvn channel 7 taking the fox affiliation from wcix . wtvj and wcix later swapped channel positions on september 10 1995 with wcix moving to channel 4 as wfor tv and wtvj moving to channel 6 . neither transaction affected wplg which retained its abc affiliation as well as its channel 10 allocation . as a result it is the only television station in the miami fort lauderdale market that has retained the same network affiliation throughout its history . possibly because of this consistency wplg remains one of the highest rated stations in south florida . in 2004 wplg began branding itself as local 10 under the branding standardization adopted by post newsweek for its stations . from april 2007 to may 2009 wplg was south florida s most watched english language television station according to a.c. nielsen co. ; this can partially be attributed to its availability on comcast s west palm beach system which in turn had a potentially negative effect on the ratings for that market s abc affiliate wpbf . however comcast dropped wplg from its west palm beach area systems on april 13 2011 . after the may 2009 ratings period the station switched to a single anchor format for its evening newscasts ; wplg s total day viewership fell behind cbs owned wfor which took the 1 position among the market s english language stations . however wplg remains at a strong second place in a tie with wsvn . on july 18 2008 post newsweek stations announced that it would purchase wtvj for 205 million . the purchase would have created a duopoly between wtvj and wplg duopolies involving two big three stations ordinarily would be prohibited under the fcc s media ownership rules which do not allow duopolies involving two of a market s four highest rated stations in terms of audience share ; however during the may 2008 nielsen ratings period wplg ranked in first place and wtvj ranked sixth in total day viewership allowing the possibility of a purchase . under the proposal wtvj would have merged its operations with wplg at the studio facility which was under construction at the time on hallandale beach boulevard in pembroke park . 4 however the sale was cancelled on december 23 2008 with nbcuniversal and the washington post company citing poor economic conditions and the lack of approval by the fcc . 5 on march 28 2009 wplg relocated its studio facilities from 3900 biscayne boulevard to the new pembroke park facility . as a result of this relocation all of the south florida market s big three network stations are based outside of the miami city limits . 6 7 sale to berkshire hathaway edit on march 12 2014 graham holdings announced that it would sell wplg to the bh media subsidiary of berkshire hathaway in a cash and stock deal . berkshire hathaway and its chairman warren buffett had been longtime stockholders in graham holdings ; the sale of wplg included a large majority of berkshire hathaway s shares in graham holdings . 8 to maintain continuity following the consummation of the purchase bh media entered into transitional agreements with post newsweek stations renamed graham media group in july 2014 to continue providing the station with access to its centralized digital media design and traffic services for up to two years after the sale s completion . 9 the sale was finalized on june 30 . 10 11 digital television edit digital channels edit channel video aspect psip short name programming 12 10.1 720p 16 9 wplg main wplg programming abc 10.2 480i 4 3 me tv metv 10.3 movies movies wplg previously carried latv on its second digital subchannel ; the spanish language network was replaced by metv on april 24 2012 . 13 on january 24 2013 post newsweek stations entered into an affiliation agreement to carry the live well network on digital subchannels of wplg and orlando sister station wkmg tv ; both stations added the network in april 2013 . 14 analog to digital conversion edit wplg terminated its analog signal on vhf channel 10 on june 12 2009 as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television . 15 the station s digital signal relocated from its pre transition vhf channel 9 to channel 10 for post transition operations . 16 three other local stations wsvn wpxm tv and wltv dt also moved their digital signals to their former analog channel allocation requiring viewers to rescan their digital tuners . wplg and wsvn are the only miami stations that continue to broadcast on the vhf band . programming edit syndicated programming seen on wplg includes wheel of fortune jeopardy live with kelly rachael ray and right this minute 17 tape delayed programming edit wplg carries the entire abc programming schedule including the abc station exclusive saturday morning syndicated block litton s weekend adventure . however until the network dropped the program on august 28 2010 following saban entertainment s repurchase of the franchise from abc s corporate parent the walt disney company the station ran the abc kids airings of power rangers on a week delayed basis airing it on saturdays from 5 00 to 6 00 a.m. due to the station s three hour weekend morning newscast which at the time had aired from 7 00 to 10 00 a.m. . around the same time it also aired the 9 00 10 00 a.m. hour of the abc kids block from 12 00 to 1 00 p.m. then abc s recommended timeslot to air power rangers . the latter scheduling continues in use even after the network replaced abc kids with litton s weekend adventure in september 2011 . dr. phil on wplg edit in 2004 wplg announced it had won a bidding war to air dr. phil and judge judy starting in 2006 . 18 however the station could not air dr. phil at 4 p.m. because the oprah winfrey show was airing at 4 p.m. on wfor at the time and since both shows were being produced by harpo productions they could not be put in the same time slot competing against each other . this meant wplg s only option was to air the show at 5 p.m. which meant it had to cancel its 5 p.m. newscast and put judge judy at 4 p.m. which the station ended up deciding to do . initially slow out of the gate the change ended up being successful as wplg ranked 1 in the 5 p.m. time slot beating out its competitors 5 p.m. newscasts and was able to lure viewers into its 6 p.m. newscast . 19 this change was so successful that other local stations in the miami or palm beach started airing syndicated in the place of local newscast such as wptv wtvj and wpbf . but by 2011 dr. phil s ratings had slipped and wplg announced that the show would move back to wfor replacing oprah which had just ended its 25 year run . 20 news operation edit this section needs expansion with further information on local 10 news department . you can help by adding to it . may 2010 local 10 news former newscast open . wplg presently broadcasts 37 hours of locally produced newscasts each week with 5 hours on weekdays and five hours each on saturdays and sundays . in addition the station produces the hour long political discussion program this week in south florida which debuted in 1990 ; airing sunday mornings at 11 30 a.m. the program is hosted by senior political reporter michael putney . in 1979 wplg deployed the first helicopter in the miami market used for newsgathering known as sky