KHME also operates a full-power satellite in Lead, South Dakota, KQME (channel 5),[4] which can also be seen over-the-air in Rapid City.

KHME debuted on the air as KOTA-TV, with test operations on June 1, 1955, with regular programming beginning one month later on July 1.

When KRSD-TV, the original channel 7 in Rapid City, signed on in 1958, it took the NBC affiliation, sharing ABC with KOTA-TV.

[5] A year later, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) would yank KRSD-TV's license due to its inadequate technical quality; that station's owner would fight the decision, but finally gave up and ceased operations on February 29, 1976.

After 58 years under family ownership, Bill Duhamel announced on October 31, 2013, that KOTA-TV and its satellites would be sold to Schurz Communications, pending FCC approval.

[17][18] In its original filing with the FCC, Gray said that it would either sell or surrender the license for KOTA-TV, while retaining its three present satellite stations.

[19][20] On October 1, Gray announced that the KOTA-TV license would be acquired by Legacy Broadcasting for $1; while Gray would retain the ABC affiliation and transfer it to KEVN-TV, most of the station's other assets, including its present subchannel affiliations with MeTV and This TV, were transferred to Legacy as part of the deal.

[22] In a subsequent filing with the FCC, Gray disclosed that it now planned to convert KSGW-TV to a semi-satellite of NBC affiliate KCWY-DT in Casper, Wyoming, while KDUH-TV would change its call letters to KNEP following its conversion to a KNOP-TV satellite; Gray also proposed to change KDUH/KNEP's city of license to Sidney, Nebraska (which moved it from the Cheyenne-Scottsbluff market to the Denver market, eliminating an ownership conflict with KSTF in Scottsbluff).

Northpine reported that this was done as Gray Television awaited FCC approval of its Black Hills TV merger.

KHME also operates a fill-in translator on channel 18 that serves the immediate part of the Rapid City area.