WTNH



1948–1953	1953–1955	1955–1960	1960–1961	1961–1967	1967–1971


1971–1976	1976–1989	1989–1994	1994–1996	1996–2010	2010–present

WNHC-TV[]

1948–1953[]

WTNH first went on the air on June 15, 1948 as WNHC-TV (for New Haven, Connecticut; the stations' city of license), originally broadcasting on channel 6. It is the first television station in Connecticut, and the 28th of the United States. The station was founded by the Elm City Broadcasting Corporation, owners of WNHC radio (1340 AM, now WYBC; and 99.1 FM, now WPLR). It was originally an affiliate of the DuMont Television Network, and claims to have been the first full-time affiliate of that short-lived network. The station originally broadcast from WNHC radio's building on Chapel Street in downtown New Haven. However, with no studio facilities of its own, it could not produce local programming. For a time, WNHC-TV simply rebroadcast the signal of DuMont's New York City flagship, WABD (now Fox flagship WNYW). In October 1948, the station added CBS programming to its schedule, and additional secondary affiliations with NBC and ABC followed a year later.

1953–1955[]

WNHC-TV changed frequencies and moved to channel 8 in December 1953 due to the FCC's Sixth Report and Order issued one year earlier, which TV stations must recognize channel allocations to alleviate interference issues. In this case, only this station and the future WFSB would be the VHF channels in the Hartford–New Haven Market, for the reason that New York City and Boston TV stations; plus WRGB and later WTEN in the Capital District of New York, and WJAR-TV (and future stations WPRO-TV and WTEV) in Province, Rhode Island cover nearby Connecticut.

1955–1960[]

In 1956, the WNHC stations were purchased by Philadelphia-based Triangle Publications. Also that same year, WNHC-TV lost its CBS affiliation when that network purchased WGTH-TV in Hartford (channel 18, later WHCT and now Univision affiliate WUVN). This left channel 8 as a sole ABC affiliate, although it shared ABC programming with WATR-TV (channel 20, now WCCT-TV) in nearby Waterbury until 1966.

1960–1961[]

1961–1967[]

1967–1971[]

The "8" logo was similar to KPTS-TV, WFLA-TV, WGAL-TV and WOOD-TV.

WTNH (-TV)[]

1971–1976[]

WNHC-TV changed its call letters to the current WTNH-TV (for Television New Haven) in April 1971, not long after Capital Cities officially took over (the station dropped the -TV suffix from its calls in 1985, but continued to call itself "WTNH-TV" on-air well into the 1990s).

1976–1989[]

On March 19, 1985, Capital Cities announced its intention to buy ABC in a deal that would stun the broadcast industry. As part of the deal, Capital Cities was required to sell WTNH due to a significant signal overlap with ABC's New York flagship station, WABC-TV. At the time, the FCC normally did not allow common ownership of two stations with overlapping coverage areas, and would not even consider granting a waiver for a city-grade overlap. As a result, WTNH was sold to Cook Inlet Television Partners, a subsidiary of Cook Inlet Region, Inc. (an Alaska Native Regional Corporation); the deal was eventually completed in January 1986.

1989–1996[]

1989–1994[]

1994–1996[]

Cook Inlet sold WTNH to LIN Television in 1994. When a new UHF station in New Haven, WTVU (channel 59, now WCTX) signed on in April 1995 as a WB affiliate, WTNH began operating the station through a local marketing agreement (LMA); prior to WTVU's launch, WTNH held a temporary secondary WB affiliation, airing its programming (which at the time consisted solely of a Wednesday prime time lineup) Saturdays in late night. In 2001, LIN TV bought WCTX outright.

1996–2010[]

This design is similar to WKBT's logo, which was used from 1998 to 2004.

2010–present[]

Designer:

Giant Octopus, LIN Media Design Team, Linear Drift

Typography:

Helvetica Neue

Launched:

April 26, 2010

On April 26, 2010, WTNH re-branded from NewsChannel 8 to News 8. In addition, WTNH began broadcasting its newscasts in 16:9 widescreen enhanced definition, with WCTX's newscasts and Connecticut Style being included in the upgrade. On October 4, 2010, WTNH became the third station in the market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. WCTX's newscasts also made the transition, while Connecticut Style made the transition in 2015.