WDEF-TV


WDEF-TV, virtual channel 12, is a CBS-affiliated television station licensed to Chattanooga, Tennessee, United States. The station is owned by Morris Multimedia. WDEF-TV's studios are located on Broad Street in Chattanooga, and its transmitter is located in nearby Signal Mountain. On cable, the station is available on Comcast Xfinity channels 13 and 433, and on EPB Fiber Optics channels 12 and 312 in the Chattanooga area. Although parts of the Chattanooga market are in the Central Time Zone, all schedules are listed in Eastern Time.

History

The station signed on the air on April 25, 1954, carrying programming from all four networks, though it has always been a primary CBS affiliate. It was owned by Joe Engel, who owned the Chattanooga Lookouts minor league baseball team as well as WDEF radio and WDEF-FM. It took the CBS affiliation from WROM-TV. It lost NBC to WRGP-TV in 1956, and lost ABC to WTVC in 1958. During the late 1950s, the station was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network.
Roy H. Park bought the WDEF stations in 1963. His media interests eventually became known as Park Communications, which was bought by Media General in 1997. In 2006, Media General sold the station to Morris Multimedia.

Digital television

Digital channels

The station's digital signal is multiplexed:
ChannelVideoAspectPSIP Short NameProgramming
12.11080iWDEF-DTMain WDEF-TV programming / CBS
12.2480iBounceBounce TV
12.3480iEscapeCourt TV Mystery
12.4480iGritGrit
12.5480iBlankQuest

Analog-to-digital conversion

WDEF-TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 12, on February 17, 2009, the original target date in which full-power television stations in the United States were to transition from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal relocated from its pre-transition UHF channel 47 to VHF channel 12 for post-transition operations. Immediately before the shutdown, anchor Joe Legge gave a brief retrospective of the station's history as well as the farewell message for all analog viewers. The message ended with images of the past newscasts.

Programming

programming on WDEF includes Judge Judy and The Andy Griffith Show.
In its early years, WDEF was locally oriented, offering a mix of children's shows, talk and variety programs, including Point of View, one of the longest–running local public affairs programs in the United States.
WDEF has been the local home of Tennessee Titans games since 1998. This comes with its CBS affiliation, as CBS carries all National Football League games played in the afternoon that feature a road team from the American Football Conference, which the Titans play in.

News operation

On April 4, 2009 beginning with the station's 11 p.m. newscast, WDEF-TV became the first station in the Chattanooga market to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition.