WNYW

WNYW, channel 5, is the flagship television station of the Fox Broadcasting Company, in New York City. WNYW is owned by the Fox Television Stations subsidiary of 21st Century Fox, and operates as part of a duopoly with Secaucus, New Jersey-based MyNetworkTV flagship station WWOR-TV (channel 9). The two stations maintain studio facilities at the Fox Television Center in the Yorkville section of Manhattan, and its transmitter atop the Empire State Building.

The station is available on satellite to DirecTV subscribers in the few areas of the Eastern United States that do not have an over-the-air Fox affiliate and on Dish Network as part of All American Direct's distant network package; DirecTV also carries WNYW on its Latin American service, and on JetBlue's LiveTV inflight entertainment system. WNYW is also available on cable providers in the Caribbean.

History

DuMont origins

The station traces its history to 1938, when television set and equipment manufacturer Allen B. DuMont founded experimental station W2XVT in Passaic, New Jersey (whose callsign was later changed to W2XWV when it moved to Manhattan in 1940). On May 2, 1944, the station received its commercial license – the third in New York City – on VHF channel 4 as WABD, its callsign named after DuMont's initials. It was one of the few television stations that continued to broadcast during World War II, making it the fourth-oldest continuously broadcasting commercial station in the United States. The station originally broadcast from the DuMont Building at 515 Madison Avenue with a transmission tower atop the building (the original tower, long abandoned by the station, still remains). On December 17, 1945, WABD moved to channel 5. WNBT (now WNBC) took over Channel 4, moving from Channel 1, which the FCC announced that it was deleting.

WNYW (shortwave)

WNYW (Radio New York Worldwide) was a shortwave radio station that broadcast from Scituate, Massachusetts, in the United States. On October 20, 1973, Family Stations, Inc., acquired the station to be part of its Family Radio network and changed the call letters to WYFR. Family Stations eventually progressively moved the transmitters to their current site in Okeechobee, Florida. The transmitter site in Scituate continued to operate until November 16, 1979 when it was switched off for the last time.

History

On October 15, 1927, Walter Lemmon, a radio inventor, was granted the first shortwave radio license in the United States and began experimental shortwave station W1XAL in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1935, the station began transmitting non-commercial, educational, and cultural programs. Supported by charitable institutions it was a not run for profit.