WABI-TV

WABI-TV is the CBS-affiliated television station for Central and Eastern Maine licensed to Bangor. It broadcasts a high definition digital signal on VHF channel 13 (or virtual channel 5.1 via PSIP) from a transmitter on Peaked Mountain in Dixmont. The station can also be seen on Time Warner Cable channel 6 and in high definition on digital channel 705. DirecTV and Dish Network also carry the station. As of October 12, 2012, Dish also carries WABI-TV in Franklin, Kennebec, Knox, and Oxford counties, in the Portland market, on channel 6265. It is the flagship station of Diversified Communications, which is owned by the Hildreth family of Bangor. Its studios are located on Hildreth Street in West Bangor. Syndicated programming on WABI includes How I Met Your Mother, The Big Bang Theory, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, and The Dr. Oz Show among others.

Digital channels

History

WABI-TV was the first television station in Maine signing-on January 25, 1953 and aired an analog signal on VHF channel 5. It was owned by former Governor Horace Hildreth along with WABI radio (910 AM, now WAEI, and 97.1 FM now WBFB), and managed in its early years by Murray Carpenter. The station was a primary NBC affiliate, but carried secondary affiliations with the other three major networks of the day. (CBS, ABC, and DuMont). It lost CBS to WTWO (channel 2) in 1955; that station had been founded by Carpenter. It lost DuMont soon afterward when that network shut down. After Carpenter sold WTWO to the Rines-Thompson family in 1959, the new owners changed that station's calls to WLBZ-TV and swapped affiliations with WABI-TV, making channel 5 a primary CBS affiliate. The two outlets then began to share ABC programming, which had previously been exclusive to WABI. This ended when WEMT (now WVII-TV) signed-on in 1965 and took the affiliation. During the late-1950s, WABI was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network.