The company's headquarters and production facility is located at 4802 Fifth Avenue in Pittsburgh's Oakland neighborhood. From 1970 to 2009, the company also owned and published Pittsburgh Magazine.
History
WQED went on the air on April 1, 1954, as the first community-sponsored educational television station in the U.S.
In 1959, WQEX-TV was launched for the purpose of classroom instructional content. The network provided specialized educational television starting in 1963, through WQEX. It was the first time that a station used management training and vocational education in Pittsburgh. Stations in South Carolina, Maine, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Virginia and the District of Columbia soon put these methods into practice
In 1973, Classical WQED-FM 89.3 was launched, making it the region's only 24-hour classical music radio station.
WQED has partnered with local community organizations to improve arts, education, culture, community health, economics and local issues through civic journalism. WQED's mission is to create an educated and informed viewer.
Air content
WQED's schedule includes seven locally-produced television programs that air Mondays-Saturday evenings:
Fred Rogers of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood hosted his namesake show, that was taped in at WQED in Pittsburgh, for over three decades on PBS, teaching lifelong lessons to children using storytelling and teaching them to use their imagination. Fred McFeeley Rogers was born in Latrobe, Pennsylvania in 1928, Rogers was an ordained Presbyterian minister, songwriter and pianist. After graduating from Rollins College in Florida in 1951, Rogers moved to New York City to pursue a career with NBC as a Floor Manager. He then returned to Pittsburgh in 1953 and started his work with WQED. Rogers created "The Children's Corner" for WQED, which then led to the development of a 15-min version of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood for television in Canada, but he soon returned to Pittsburgh. In 1968, Mister Rogers' Television debuted on National Educational Television and ran until 2001 . The program reached over 8 million households on over 300 PBS stations. Roger's pioneering program was one of the first to encourage children's self-esteem, self-control, cooperation, ability to confront and deal with problems, appreciate diversity and other critical life values and behaviors. In 1987, Rogers took a trip to the former Soviet Union to appear on a children's television program with Daniel Striped Tiger, one of Roger's most well-known puppets. Rogers has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Rogers won awards including a handful of Emmys and a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2002. He retired in 2001 and died in 2003. Rogers was married to Joanna, with whom he had two sons, James and Joseph, and a grandson Alexander.
WQEX sale
In 1996, WQED tried to sell another PBS affiliate in Pittsburgh, WQEX-TV. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission denied WQED's request. The network pleaded financial hardship, and eventually the sale was authorized. After the sale, WQEX-TV became WINP-TV.
Antenna tower
WQED Multimedia's antenna tower is located in Pittsburgh's Oakland neighborhood, bordering the University of Pittsburgh's upper campus. It supports not only WQED Multimedia's own full-power stations WQED and WQED-FM, but also full-power Ion Television station WINP-TV, a broadcast translator of ABC affiliate WTAE-TV, and most of Pittsburgh's low-power stations, including WEPA-CD, WPDN-LD, WOSC-CD, WNNB-CD, WIIC-LD, WBYD-CD and WPTG-CD. The central location of the antenna tower facilitates antenna aiming, which is often critical especially for reception of low-power stations in Pittsburgh's hilly terrain. The antenna tower has a distinctive "candelabrum" shape above the Oakland skyline, with the two "candles" supporting respectively the WQED and WINP-TV antennas, and the remaining antennas mounted lower on the structure. Because of the FCC broadcast incentive auction, WEPA-CD and WNNB-CD closed on 10/25/2017; WINP-TV will move to WEPA-CD's UHF channel 16 and WBYD-CD to WNNB-CD's UHF channel 30 in Phase 4 of the spectrum repack. WQED will move to VHF channel 2 in Phase 9 of the repack.
More references
"Educational TV in Organization and Individual Development," Donald V. Taverner. Training & Development Journal, August 1, 1966.
"FCC Denies WQED's Plans to sell WQEX, Doug Halonen. Electronic Media, July 29, 1996.
"A Rose for Fred," Margaret Mary Kimmel. Children & Libraries: The Journal of the Association for Library Services to Children, Summer/Fall 2003.
"Fred McFeeley Rogers," Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th Edition.
