WBKI-TV (1983–2017)

WBKI-TV (channel 34) was a television station licensed to Campbellsville, Kentucky, United States, which served the Louisville area.

In 2014, all of WBKI-TV's operations were consolidated at WDRB and WMYO's shared studio facility on West Muhammad Ali Boulevard (near Route 150) in downtown Louisville.

In 1980, local businessman William "Billy" Speer, doing business as Green River Broadcasting, applied for a broadcast license to launch a television station in the Campbellsville area in 1980; the construction permit was issued sometime in 1981, and the station became licensed on August 10, 1982, as WGRB.

The station's first studio and transmission facility was located on the Adair–Taylor County line along Kentucky Route 55 near Cane Valley.

Although Louisville's Fox affiliate, WDRB (channel 41), broadcast at the maximum five million watts of power, the station's signal was marginal at best in the southern part of the market.

WGRB dropped Fox in 1997 and joined The WB, bringing that fledgling network's programming to the southern portion of the market.

At the same time, WGRB announced plans to build a new transmitter tower that would be located closer to Louisville and upgrade its analog signal to a full five million watts of power.

It was decided that the station would continue using the WBKI-TV call letters to avoid audience confusion and maintain a reference to its Kentuckiana service area.

Cascade filed for bankruptcy in 2008, resulting in WBKI-TV and W24BW being put up for sale at auction; the winning bid was submitted by Fusion Communications.

Later that year, Fusion moved the station's operations from its longtime facility on Alliant Avenue in St. Matthews to the Wright Tower in downtown Louisville.

Since Fusion had pledged WBKI-TV as collateral, Valley seized control of the station and auctioned off its assets to a local buyer on April 6, 2012.

[18] On February 12, 2018, Block Communications returned the WBKI-TV calls to the air as part of several shuffles which saw what was WMYO become the newly called WBKI-TV, and WBKI's CW schedule become the primary 58.1 channel in order to return carriage of The CW to satellite providers and AT&T U-verse, with WMYO's main MyNetworkTV schedule moving to WBKI-DT3 and that declining service having that same carriage removed as a result.

Under FCC rules at the time, a broadcast station (television or radio)'s transmitter could be no farther than 15 miles (24 km) from its city of license.

To make up for this shortfall in coverage, WBKI-TV set up a Class A translator on channel 28 at the Kentuckiana tower farm northeast of Floyds Knobs shortly after becoming a WB affiliate.

Before Cascade Broadcasting was forced into bankruptcy, the company asked for permission to move WBKI-TV's license to Bardstown, an outer suburb of Louisville.

In 2010, Fusion sold WBKI-CA to religious broadcaster Daystar, which now operates it as an owned-and-operated station of the network;[23] however, it retains the WBKI-LP call letters (which it took after surrendering its Class A status in May 2013).

Part of that overhaul came on July 16, 2012, when WBKI-TV's programming began to be simulcast on WMYO's third digital subchannel (downconverted to 720p HD), finally giving the station full coverage in some form across the entire Louisville market over-the-air.

The station offered a variety of older and a few recent sitcoms, and a few first-run reality shows such as Blind Date and Elimidate.

[31] From 1992 into the early- and mid-2000s, the station broadcast Jefferson Pilot Sports coverage of select Southeastern Conference football[32] and (beginning in 2001) basketball games, including those involving the Kentucky Wildcats.

[33][34] From 2002 to 2006, the station also aired preseason games of the National Football League's Tennessee Titans produced by WKRN-TV of Nashville.

This joint news operation even employed students from Western Kentucky University in varied aspects.

During the late 2000s, WBKI-TV also carried a weeknight 5:30 p.m. newscast titled The CW World Report, a half-hour program that focused on national and international stories; it was produced by Fusion Communications' sister operation Independent News Network and was produced out of INN's studios on Tremont Avenue in Davenport, Iowa.

After Block Communications began operating WBKI-TV under the LMA with WDRB and WMYO, the station chose not to renew the news share agreement with WHAS.

WBKI-TV's logo as "Louisville's WB", used from 2002 to 2006.