WITI (TV)

WITI, virtual channel 6 (UHF digital channel 33), is a Fox-affiliated television station located in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States. The station is owned by the Tribune Broadcasting subsidiary of Tribune Media. WITI maintains studio facilities located on North Green Bay Road (WIS 57) in Brown Deer (though the studios carry a Milwaukee postal address), and its transmitter is located on East Capitol Drive (just north of Highway 190) in Shorewood.

History

Early history

The station first signed on the air on May 21, 1956, operating as an independent station; it was originally owned by Independent Television, Inc., to whom the channel 6 license was granted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on June 11, 1955. The station was originally licensed to the North Shore village of Whitefish Bay on a technicality in order to address short-spacing concerns with Davenport, Iowa station WOC-TV (now KWQC-TV, which also broadcast on channel 6) before the FCC fully finessed spacing among television station signals in different markets. In October 1956, the station affiliated with the NTA Film Network, which provided the station with 52 films from the 20th Century Fox library and syndicated programs. Among the programs aired by WITI were The Passerby, Man Without a Gun and This is Alice.