West Virginia Media Holdings
West Virginia Media Holdings was a media company in West Virginia. It owned television stations in each of the four main media markets in the state, as well as a weekly newspaper.
 | |
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Media |
| Fate | Acquired by Nexstar |
| Successor | Nexstar Media Group |
| Founded | 2001 |
| Founder | Bray Cary |
| Defunct | January 31, 2017 |
| Headquarters | , |
Area served | West Virginia |
Key people | Bray Cary (President & CEO) |
| Products | Broadcast television |
The group owned WOWK-TV in Huntington, WVNS-TV in Lewisburg, and WTRF-TV in Wheeling, West Virginia, which were all affiliated with the CBS network; and WBOY-TV in Clarksburg which is affiliated with NBC. WVNS and WTRF also carried Fox on their digital subchannels, while both subchannels carried MyNetworkTV in addition to Fox as a secondary affiliate. It also owned the State Journal weekly newspaper.
The group was founded in 2001. The idea was to share reporting among the four stations in order to better cover the state. WOWK handles most coverage of state government affairs, while WBOY handles most coverage of West Virginia University sports. The largest private investor in the company was Bray Cary, who served as president and CEO. Cary was formerly an executive with NASCAR, and was responsible for its television contract, and was also involved in syndication of college basketball games.
In August 2008, both WTRF and WBOY began carrying ABC programming on their digital subchannel. Previously, longtime ABC affiliate WTAE-TV in Pittsburgh served both markets as the de facto ABC affiliate and remains on cable in both markets (Fox Ohio Valley replaced WPGH on Comcast systems as the only Fox affiliate on the Comcast channel lineup).
On November 17, 2015, WVMH announced that it would sell its stations to Nexstar Broadcasting Group for $130 million. The company will take over the stations' non-license assets under a time brokerage agreement in December 2015 until the formal completion of the deal, expected in late-2016.[1] The two companies viewed the acquisition as being a complement to Nexstar's WHAG-TV, whose coverage area includes the Eastern Panhandle region. Nexstar CEO Perry A. Sook is an alumnus of WOWK.[2] The sale was completed on January 31, 2017.[3]
The State Journal was not included in the sale. However it was later acquired by NCWV Media in December 2016.[4]
Former WVMH-owned stations
Stations are arranged alphabetically by state and by city of license.
| City of license / Market | Station | Channel TV (RF) |
Years owned | Current ownership status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clarksburg - Fairmont - Morgantown | WBOY-TV | 12 (12) | 2001–2017 | NBC affiliate owned by Nexstar Media Group |
| Huntington - Charleston | WOWK-TV | 13 (13) | 2002–2017 | CBS affiliate owned by Nexstar Media Group |
| Lewisburg - Bluefield - Beckley | WVNS-TV | 59 (8) | 2003–2017 | CBS affiliate owned by Nexstar Media Group |
| Wheeling - Steubenville | WTRF-TV | 7 (7) | 2002–2017 | CBS affiliate owned by Nexstar Media Group |
References
- Brown, Andrew (November 17, 2015). "WV Media Holdings selling 4 TV stations to Texas company". Charleston Gazette-Mail. Retrieved November 24, 2015.
- "Nexstar Buys 4 W.Va. TVs For $130M". TVNewsCheck. Retrieved 19 February 2016.
- Consummation Notice, CDBS Public Access, Federal Communications Commission, Retrieved 1 February 2017.
- The State Journal Becomes Part of NCWV Media, wearewvproud.com, 30 November 2016, Retrieved 1 February, 2017.