wkrc am . for the fictional radio station see wkrp in cincinnati . wkrc tv cincinnati ohio united states branding local 12 general local 12 news newscasts cincinnati s cw dt2 slogan the local station channels digital 12 vhf virtual 12 psip subchannels 12.1 cbs 12.2 the cw 12.3 asn affiliations cbs since 1996 ; also from 1949 1961 owner sinclair broadcast group wkrc licensee llc first air date april 4 1949 ; 67 years ago 1949 04 04 call letters meaning we re the kodel radio corporation former owner of former sister am radio station sister station s wstr tv former channel number s analog 11 vhf 1949 1952 12 vhf 1952 2009 digital 31 uhf 2001 2009 former affiliations abc 1961 1996 transmitter power 15.55 kw height 305 m facility id 11289 transmitter coordinates 39 6 59 n 84 30 7 w 39.11639 n 84.50194 w 39.11639 ; 84.50194 licensing authority fcc public license information profile cdbs website local12.com cwcincinnati.com wkrc tv vhf digital channel 12 is a cbs affiliated television station located in cincinnati ohio united states . the station is owned by the sinclair broadcast group which operates mynetworktv affiliate wstr tv channel 64 through a local marketing agreement with its owner deerfield media . wkrc broadcasts from a combined studio transmitter facility on highland avenue in the mount auburn section of cincinnati . contents 1 history 2 digital television 2.1 digital channels 2.2 analog to digital conversion 2.3 the cw cincinnati 2.3.1 history 3 news operation 4 notable alumni 5 references 6 external links history edit wkrc tv first signed on the air on april 4 1949 originally operating as a cbs affiliate on vhf channel 11 ; it is cincinnati s second oldest television station . the station was owned by the ohio based taft family who were active in both politics and in media . the tafts published the cincinnati times star and also owned wkrc radio 550 am and 101.9 fm now wkrq under their broadcasting subsidiary radio cincinnati . in 1958 the tafts sold the times star to the locally based rival e. w. scripps company owner of the the cincinnati post and wcpo am fm tv . the tafts broadcasting interests were then reorganized as taft broadcasting with wkrc am fm tv as the flagship stations . the wkrc stations call letters were derived from the original owner of wkrc radio clarence ogden of the kodel radio company ko for clarence o. and dell for della his wife . 1 following the release of the federal communications commission fcc s sixth report and order wkrc tv moved to channel 12 on october 12 1952 . nine years later in 1961 the station became an abc affiliate switching networks with wcpo tv . 2 this came after that network s founder leonard goldenson persuaded taft s president a longtime friend to switch several of the company s stations to abc . during the late 1950s the station was also briefly affiliated with the nta film network . 3 wkrc s nickname in the 1960s was tall 12 a reference to the station s transmitter tower which was the tallest in cincinnati at the time . like wcpo tv channel 12 used a distinctive jingle id at the top of the hour in the 1960s . the upbeat orchestrated channel 12 jingle was followed by children s show host glenn ryle announcing this is wkrc tv cincinnati . in 1975 it began airing movies on late night saturdays in a program called the past prime playhouse . hosted live by local personality bob shreve the show would air until 1988 . over the years as an abc affiliate wkrc tv preempted moderate amounts of weekday programming and the sunday morning cartoon reruns from abc ; when an abc game show hosted by wkrc tv personality nick clooney the money maze aired from december 1974 to june 1975 wkrc opted to delay that program from the national scheduled time of 4 p.m. to 10 30 a.m. the following day so it would be presented in tandem with their local talk program the nick clooney show at 11 a.m. when abc offered late night programming from 11 30 p.m. to about 2 00 a.m. wkrc like many other affiliates chose not to air it . however it aired nightline once that program began in 1979 as a program on the iran hostage crisis . occasionally wkrc preempted a lower rated primetime program or movie from abc to air either a stronger movie or a locally based special . most programs not shown on wkrc were widely preempted by many affiliates . also most every program not shown on wkrc tv was aired on the abc station in nearby dayton wkef until 1980 and wdtn after 1980 . wkef provided grade b coverage to most of the market while wdtn provided city grade coverage to nearly the entire market . locally wkrc aired news talk shows movies and a few off network sitcoms at some points . beginning in 1992 wkrc tv began preempting portions of abc s saturday morning cartoons in favor of a local saturday morning newscast . 12 wkrc logo used from 1994 to 2004 with the slogan a new generation of news . in 1987 taft was dissolved in a hostile takeover of its board and all of its stations except wtvn tv in columbus and wghp tv in high point north carolina were absorbed into great american broadcasting which became citicasters in 1993 . wkrc was subsequently acquired by jacor in september 1996 after most of citicasters other television stations were sold to new world communications and fox . the jacor deal reunited channel 12 with its am sister which had been bought by jacor in 1993 during great american broadcasting s bankruptcy reorganization . jacor merged with clear channel communications in 1998 . the station switched affiliations with wcpo on june 3 1996 after wcpo s owner scripps demanded that abc switch its cincinnati affiliation there as a condition of keeping abc programming on its two biggest stations wxyz tv in detroit and wews tv in cleveland . abc actually agreed to scripps demands in 1994 but wkrc s contract with abc was not set to expire for two years . as a cbs affiliate wkrc tv ran the entire schedule except for several hours of the cbs saturday morning cartoon lineup which would soon be pulled back to only a few hours anyway . once that reduction was made wkrc tv was then running the entire cbs schedule with an occasional exception . although owned by clear channel at the time the station changed its branding to local 12 in 2003 . this was inspired by the local mandate a station brand standardization adopted by post newsweek stations for its own television stations . in 1998 the station became the primary home station for most cincinnati bengals games when that network acquired the afc broadcast rights that year . original local 12 logo used from 2004 to september 2009 . in 2006 clear channel ranked wkrc as the top cbs affiliate in the united states . on november 16 of that year the company announced that it would sell its entire television division including wkrc 4 after being bought by private equity firms in order to focus on its radio and event properties . on april 20 2007 clear channel entered into an agreement to sell its stations to providence equity partners . 5 providence equity teamed up with sandy dipasquale to form a new holding company newport television for the station group . concurrently clear channel applied to place wkrc and several other stations to the aloha station trust just in case newport television failed to close on the group . however as a result of newport television closing on the purchase of wkrc and the other stations on march 14 2008 aloha station trust and the would be new owners of clear channel opted not to consummate on the acquisition of the station . as a result newport television became wkrc s fourth owner in just over 20 years . as a result of the sale the citicasters name disappeared from wkrc s license dissolving channel 12 s last link to taft broadcasting ; the citicasters name is still alive as a holding company within the clear channel structure . on june 18 2008 newport announced that it was eliminating 7.5 % of the jobs at its 56 stations attributed the layoffs to a weak economy . as a result wkrc fired 18 staff members . on july 19 2012 newport television reached deals to sell 22 of its 27 stations to three station groups nexstar broadcasting group sinclair broadcast group and cox media group . wkrc tv was among the six sold to sinclair . 6 wstr tv channel 64 was transferred to deerfield media who also received san antonio s cw affiliate kmys in the same deal because the cincinnati market despite being the 35th largest market has only five full power commercial stations which are not enough to legally permit a duopoly . however sinclair retained control of wstr through a shared services agreement . the deal also reunited wkrc tv with wsyx the former wtvn tv another station formerly owned by taft . the sale was completed on december 3 . 7 on january 8 2016 sinclair announced that american sports network would launch as a dedicated digital multicast network under the american sports network name with 10 stations including wkrc on january 11 2016 . 8 digital television edit digital channels edit the station s digital channel is multiplexed channel video aspect psip short name programming 9 12.1 1080i 16 9 wkrc cb main wkrc tv programming cbs 12.2 720p cw the cw cincinnati 12.3 480i asn american sports network with the switch of wcpo tv s digital signal to a uhf frequency channel 22 on december 8 2010 wkrc is the only television station in the cincinnati market that operates its digital signal on the vhf band . analog to digital conversion edit wkrc tv discontinued regular programming on its analog signal over vhf channel 12 on june 12 2009 as part of the federally mandated transition from analog to digital television . 10 11 the station s digital signal relocated from its pre transition uhf channel 31 to vhf channel 12 . 12 the cw cincinnati edit wkrc dt2 is a cw affiliated second digital subchannel of wkrc tv . over the air it broadcasts in high definition on vhf digital channel 12.2 . branded as the cw cincinnati it is available on time warner cable channel 20 in standard definition and digital channel 989 in high definition and cincinnati bell fioptics channel 17 in standard definition and digital channel 517 in high definition . it is the largest subchannel only cw affiliate by market size . history edit on january 24 2006 the warner bros. unit of time warner and cbs corporation announced that the two companies would shut down the wb and upn and combine the networks respective programming to create a new fifth network called the cw . 13 14 wkrc signed a deal to affiliate with the new network on a new second digital subchannel resulting in upn affiliate wbqc ca channel 25 becoming an independent station . meanwhile wb affiliate wstr tv joined another new network news corporation owned mynetworktv now owned by 21st century fox which launched on september 5 . cincinnati cable viewers were concerned that wkrc dt2 would face the same problems as wbqc . for years time warner cable had refused to carry that station full time eventually airing its prime time programming on a low profile channel . however time warner cable was a division of time warner at the time who would be half owner of the cw so it was in the company s best interest to