WJFW-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Rhinelander, Wisconsin, United States, serving the Wausau area as an affiliate of NBC.

It was the first such distress sale—in which a station facing an FCC proceeding was sold at less than market value to a minority-controlled buyer—and made WAEO-TV the first fully minority-owned network affiliate on the VHF band.

The station's call letters were changed to WJFW-TV in 1986, a year after Seaway Communications principal Jasper F. Williams died in a plane crash.

In 1963, Alvin E. O'Konski, a United States congressman, received a construction permit to build a new station at Hurley, Wisconsin, using channel 12, then allotted to Ironwood, Michigan.

O'Konski claimed that resorts in the region were seeing declining bookings due to lack of local TV service and said that a station would stimulate the economically depressed Rhinelander area.

[7] Instead of simply shifting the Hurley construction permit to Rhinelander, in December 1964, the FCC moved the channel and instructed O'Konski to refile for it, which also allowed others to apply.

[13] On November 17, 1968, three Michigan deer hunters were flying home from a hunt in light snowfall when their small aircraft struck a guy wire of the WAEO-TV tower at Starks.

Most of the mast collapsed on the studios at the site, virtually destroying the building; a station engineer working inside broke his arm when the roof caved in.

[14] More people could have been killed had a touring German boys' choir not canceled its plans to tape a program due to the weather or had O'Konski not been in Green Bay for a speaking engagement.

[2] In the wake of the collapse, state aviation officials called on federal authorities to expedite projects to improve the visibility of broadcasting towers.

[15] O'Konski promised the station would be rebuilt, in a best-case scenario, within four months, depending on negotiations with the city to utilize the Memorial Building as well as insurance payouts.

[26] In 1977, the FCC designated WAEO-TV's broadcast license for hearing over a series of issues including possible fraudulent billing and misrepresentations in program logs and reports.

[26] The proceeding came at a time when O'Konski was attempting to sell the station to George N. Gillett Jr.; the commission ordered him to resolve the issue before moving forward with the deal.

[27] The proceeding ended under the first use of a new FCC policy, known as the "distress sale", which permitted stations facing hearings to be sold to qualified minority-owned groups at discount prices.

Seaway Communications, Inc., a Chicago-based firm whose principals were Black, acquired WAEO-TV for $912,000 in a transaction approved in April 1979; an appraiser had assessed the station's fair market value at $1.5 million.

The 1,000-watt repeater served to improve the station's signal in Wausau and extend it to areas south of the city that previously were unserved by channel 12 from its more northerly location.

Rockfleet was set up by two men from New York state, Joseph Fuchs and Robert Farrow, as an investment vehicle to buy TV stations.

WFXS soon signed on, taking with it the rights; its signal did not cover far northern Wisconsin, leaving fans without the ability to watch the Green Bay Packers.

[44] WJFW-TV ceased analog broadcasting late on February 16, 2009, a day before the original digital transition date for full-service TV stations.

[47] During the lawsuit, the affiliate groups of each of the Big Four networks, the Radio Television Digital News Association, and the Society of Professional Journalists filed briefs in support of WJFW.