states branding wawv general wawv news newscasts channels digital 39 uhf virtual 38 psip subchannels 38.1 abc 38.2 grit 38.3 bounce tv affiliations abc 1973 1995 2011 present owner mission broadcasting mission broadcasting inc. operator nexstar broadcasting group first air date april 3 1973 call letters meaning abc wabash valley sister station s wtwo former callsigns wiil tv 1973 1979 wbak tv 1979 2005 wfxw 2005 2011 former channel number s analog 38 uhf 1973 2009 former affiliations fox 1995 2011 transmitter power 850 kw height 248 m facility id 65247 transmitter coordinates 39 14 36 n 87 23 7 w 39.24333 n 87.38528 w 39.24333 ; 87.38528 licensing authority fcc public license information profile cdbs website mywabashvalley.com wawv tv virtual channel 38 uhf digital channel 39 is an abc affiliated television station located in terre haute indiana united states . the station is owned by mission broadcasting ; the nexstar broadcasting group which owns nbc affiliate wtwo channel 2 operates wawv under joint sales and shared services agreements . the two stations share studio and transmitter facilities located on u.s. 41 and u.s. 150 in unincorporated sullivan county south of farmersburg . on cable wawv tv is available on time warner cable channel 8 in standard definition and in high definition on digital channel 708 . contents 1 history 1.1 first tenure with abc 1.2 as a fox affiliate 1.3 return to abc 2 digital television 2.1 digital channels 2.2 analog to digital conversion 3 programming 4 news operation 5 references 6 external links history edit first tenure with abc edit wbak logo used from 1985 to 1995 . the station first signed on the air on april 3 1973 as wiil tv . originally assigned to broadcast on uhf channel 66 the station eventually gained permission to broadcast on uhf channel 38 . it originally operated as an abc affiliate taking the affiliation from cbs affiliate wthi tv channel 10 and nbc affiliate wtwo channel 2 which had each split the network s programming part time through secondary affiliations . the station was founded by alpha broadcasting which heavily invested in the new operation . however the local market situation immediately sent the station into the red . like many abc affiliates that signed on during this time in medium to small markets wiil was hampered by abc s marginal ratings ; the network would not be on par with cbs and nbc in terms of affiliates and ratings until later in the decade . additionally viewers had strongly entrenched viewing habits with longer established vhf stations wtwo and wthi although wtwo was less than a decade old . it didn t help matters that most of the southern half of the market was able to receive abc programming from wtvw in evansville . indiana s mostly flat terrain allowed wtvw s signal to penetrate further than would have been the case in hilly or mountainous terrain . at one point in 1974 wiil tv nearly ceased operations however it managed to survive . in 1978 charlotte north carolina based broadcaster cy bahakel purchased the station ; the station changed its call letters to wbak tv taken from bahakel s last name on april 20 1979 . faith to live by a short daily devotional program that previously aired on wtwo began airing each weekday morning immediately after wbak signed on the air for the day . despite stronger ownership wbak barely registered as a blip in the ratings in the market . channel 38 s situation grew even more dire when indianapolis longtime nbc affiliate wrtv switched to abc in june 1979 . wrtv s signal covers most of the eastern half of the market including most of terre haute itself . like wtvw wrtv s signal penetrated further into terre haute than would have been the case in more rugged terrain . when cable television franchises arrived in the terre haute market in the late 1970s most cable systems piped in either wrtv wtvw or wand out of decatur illinois in addition to wbak . as a fox affiliate edit first wfxw logo used from july 1 2005 to june 7 2009 similar to that used at the time by evansville sister station wtvw . the station switched its affiliation to fox on january 31 1995 1 and changed its branding to fox 38 citing low ratings from the then glut of stronger rated abc affiliates from outlying markets . the network switch gave the market its first ever fox affiliate . the network had previously only been available in the market on area cable providers via either the now defunct foxnet cable feed or indianapolis affiliate wxin . with only three commercial stations terre haute did not have enough television stations to support full time affiliations from four networks and fox did not want to relegate its programming to secondary clearances on the three existing outlets . this issue aided in the side effect of leaving the terre haute area without an over the air abc affiliate leaving viewers with only fringe access from stations in indianapolis evansville and decatur . these outlying abc affiliates also went through changes in december 1995 wtvw also switched to fox leaving many viewers in the southern half of the market without abc programming . while wtvw s signal decently covered the southern half of the market new evansville abc affiliate weht suffered from a weaker signal on the uhf band . in 2005 wand switched to nbc with the abc affiliation moving to champaign s wicd which replaced wand on cable systems in the illinois part of the terre haute market . over the air viewers actually benefited from this particular switch . wand s tower is located near the geographic center of illinois and most viewers living within the western part of the terre haute market in illinois could only get a clear signal through cable . in contrast wicd s tower is located near the illinois indiana border and provides a stronger signal . channel 38 and present day sister station wtvw were two of three original abc affiliates in indiana to have switched to fox the other being wsjv in south bend which switched to fox in august 1995 . on paper the switch should have put wbak in even more trouble . while it had languished as an abc affiliate it now faced having to purchase an additional 16 hours of programming per day . fox had only expanded its primetime schedule to seven nights a week two years earlier but did not produce any daytime programming outside of the network s children s block fox kids which already aired monday through saturdays before the expansion of primetime programming . however the switch rejuvenated the station . after years of languishing as an abc affiliate a few years wbak was one of the strongest small market fox affiliates in the united states . second logo as wfxw used from june 7 2009 to august 31 2011 . bahakel sold wbak to mission broadcasting in 2003 which then entered into a joint sales agreement with the nexstar broadcasting group . the station integrated its operations with wtwo at that station s facility near farmersburg . the station s call letters were changed to wfxw for fox wabash valley on june 1 2005 . on april 16 2008 a transmission line failure at wfxw s analog transmitter facility that occurred approximately ten minutes into fox s telecast of american idol s results show left the station off the air for 3 weeks ; the station s analog signal remained dark until may 9 . however its digital signal was fed to area cable system headends and to dish network to restore service . the american idol performance and result shows during the week of april 21 aired on sister station wtwo . return to abc edit on june 28 2011 nexstar signed a long term deal with abc to renew the affiliations of the company s existing affiliate in nine other markets ; the deal also included an affiliation agreement with wfxw which would disaffiliate from fox and rejoin abc beginning september 1 in a reversal of its 1995 affiliation switch . nexstar also announced that channel 38 would change its call letters to wawv tv standing for abc for the wabash valley at that time . the move came after sister stations wtvw in evansville wfft tv in fort wayne and ksfx tv now kozl tv in springfield missouri were stripped of their fox affiliations following a dispute involving nexstar and the network over a planned payment increase of its affiliates retransmission consent fees to fox . 2 3 on august 25 2011 lin media signed an agreement with fox to move its programming to wthi s second digital subchannel which would also add sister programming service mynetworktv as a secondary affiliation . this made terre haute one of the only u.s. television markets where all three historical commercial broadcast networks abc cbs and nbc maintained primary affiliations the fox and mynetworktv affiliations were relegated to a digital subchannel and the cw which is currently available in the market on cable through cw plus affiliate wbi and indianapolis affiliate wish tv lacked an over the air affiliate . 4 the last fox program to air on wfxw was an episode of buried treasure on august 31 2011 which ended at 10 00 p.m. eastern time 9 00 p.m. central on the illinois side of the market . all fox programming moved to wthi dt2 starting at 5 00 a.m. the following day . the rebranded station also adopted the brand wawv abc removing all references to its channel 38 allocation along with a new logo . digital television edit digital channels edit channel video aspect psip short name programming 5 38.1 720p 16 9 wawv dt main wawv tv programming abc 38.2 480i 4 3 grit 38.3 bounce tv on june 15 2016 nexstar announced that it has entered into an affiliation agreement with katz broadcasting for the escape laff grit and bounce tv networks the last one of which is owned by bounce media llc whose coo jonathan katz is president ceo of katz broadcasting bringing the four networks to 81 stations owned and or operated by nexstar including wawv tv and wtwo . 6 analog to digital conversion edit wawv tv as wfxw discontinued regular programming on its analog signal over uhf channel 38 on june 12 2009 the official date in which full power television stations in the united states transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate . the station s digital signal remained on its pre transition uhf channel 39 7 using psip to display the station s virtual channel as its former uhf analog channel 38 . programming edit syndicated programs broadcast on wawv tv include two and a half men the queen latifah show family guy the simpsons and judge judy . when it joined abc wawv tv preempted the network s saturday morning block litton s weekend adventure which debuted two days after the switch in favor of running e i compliant children s programs acquired from the syndication market ; the station also preempted world news now in favor of airing syndicated programs and infomericals during the overnight hours . both the block and the news program respectively began airing on the station in september 2012 and september 2013 when the acquired programs were dropped from the schedule once contract commitments with syndication distributors ended . news operation edit wtwo presently produces 7 hours of locally produced newscasts each week for wawv tv with 1 hours on weekdays ; unlike most abc affiliates in the eastern time zone the station does not broadcast any local newscasts in the morning 6 00 and 11 00 p.m. timeslots nor does it air newscasts on saturdays and sundays . in addition the station airs the business discussion program