Fiktiv USA - WDCW-TV

WDCW, virtual channel 50 (UHF digital channel 15), branded on-air as The CW Washington, is a CW-affiliated television station licensed to the American capital city of Washington, District of Columbia. The station is owned by Nexstar Media Group, as part of a duopoly with Hagerstown, Maryland-licensed independent station WDVM-TV (channel 25). WDCW's studios are located on Wisconsin Avenue in the Glover Park section of Washington, and it shares transmitter facilities with Arlington, Virginia-licensed Univision-owned station WFDC-DT (channel 14) in the Tenleytown section of Washington's northwest quadrant.

On cable, WDCW is available on Comcast Xfinity channel 23 in Washington, D.C. and Montgomery County, Maryland, Xfinity channel 11 in Reston, Virginia, and channel 3 on most other systems in the market. The station is carried on JetBlue's LiveTV in-flight entertainment system via DirecTV (the other network stations featured on JetBlue are predominantly from New York City).

Channel 50, Inc. was issued a construction permit for station WGSP-TV in 1967. Plans to commence operation in the summer of 1971 were scuttled by the sudden death of Channel 50's principal owner, former American Forum of the Air host Ted Granik, on September 21, 1970. Granik's will did not leave any funding for WGSP-TV, forcing it to declare bankruptcy. Channel 50, Inc. was then involved in a protracted legal battle over a sale to Washington resident and former WBNB-TV owner Ted Ledbetter – held up by the Federal Communications Commission due to questions about his financial backing – and subsequent permission to become Washington's one allowable subscription television station, which was also sought by WDCA (channel 20).

After both hearings went in Ledbetter's favor in July 1980, channel 50 signed on under the callsign WCQR on April 1, 1981. Beginning on November 1, WCQR aired the subscription television service SuperTV at night and live pictures of Washington, D.C. from above its broadcast tower during the daytime. Early in the day, WCQR also ran some basic computer still images with music called "Morning Muse". The live pictures were soon replaced with programming from the Financial News Network. Hill Broadcasting purchased both Channel 50 and WHLL-TV (now Univision affiliate WUNI) in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1985. On July 1, the call letters were changed to WFTY, in reference to its channel allocation. It then became a full-time independent station in early 1986. Initially, the station ran a lineup of classic off-network sitcoms, dramas, cartoons, movies and some religious programs. WFTY also picked up the ABC soap opera Ryan's Hope after WJLA-TV (channel 7) dropped it in 1986, with Channel 50 running the final years of the program.

The station was airing mostly religious programs, infomercials, low-budget (but copyrighted) movies, and a few off-network dramas by 1988. Ratings were very low, in addition to the programming costs. WFTY did pick up a few cartoons for the weekday 7 to 9 a.m. slot in June 1990 when Fox owned-and-operated station WTTG (channel 5) dropped its children's block in favor of launching a weekday morning newscast. In 1993, the Hill stations were purchased by the Jasas Corporation. In the fall of that year, WFTY added more cartoons, barter sitcoms, some low-priced syndicated shows, and cut back on paid programming.

WFTY joined The WB on February 20, 1995, six weeks after the network started broadcasting. WJAL (channel 68) was nominally The WB's charter Washington affiliate, although it was located 70 miles (113 km) to the northwest in Hagerstown, Maryland and neither viewable over-the-air nor carried on cable in any part of the metropolitan area. Since WB programming consisted of a single block on Wednesdays from 8 to 10 p.m. at the time, WFTY ran WB programs on six consecutive weeknights in order to catch up and begin airing the schedule in pattern on March 1. On September 6, the station's call letters were changed to WBDC-TV to reflect its network status. In 1996, the Tribune Company (which had a minority ownership interest in The WB) began managing the station and purchased the station outright from the Jasas Corporation in 1999.

On January 24, 2006, Time Warner and CBS Corporation announced that The WB and UPN would shut down that September and be replaced by a new network that would include some of the two networks' higher-rated programs called The CW. WBDC was named as the D.C. area's CW affiliate as Tribune signed a 10-year affiliation agreement for 16 of the company's 19 WB stations. On May 1, WBDC's call letters were changed to the current WDCW to reflect the pending switch. On July 20, 2006, the station began to run on-air promotions that featured a new logo and branding as "The CW Washington". WDCW joined The CW when the network launched nationwide on September 18, 2006.

On December 3, 2018, Irving, Texas-based Nexstar Media Group—which has owned Hagerstown, Maryland-based independent station WDVM-TV (channel 25) since December 2003—announced it would acquire the assets of Tribune Media for $6.4 billion in cash and debt. The sale was approved by the FCC on September 16 and was completed on September 19, 2019, forming a nominal duopoly with WDVM-TV.

In addition to The CW's program schedule, syndicated programming broadcast by WDCW includes The Jerry Springer Show, The Steve Wilkos Show, Maury and 2 Broke Girls, among others.

As an independent station, the station carried a 7:30 p.m. newscast produced by NBC owned-and-operated station WRC-TV, titled 7:30 News Headlines, which launched on January 14, 1991; the newscast suffered low ratings throughout its run and ended almost ten months later on October 25, 1991.

The station began to produce a weekly news program in Washington, D.C. and neighboring parts of Maryland and Virginia known as the "Inner Loop" from 2005 to 2007 in conjunction with George Washington University and Montgomery College. The Inner Loop eventually evolved into Weekend News with Chris Core which was produced at the Tribune National Media Center in Downtown Washington from 2007 to 2010. Since 2010 the station has been broadcasting the Emmy-nominated NewsPlus with Mark Segraves, a half-hour locally produced program that airs Sunday mornings. Hosted by investigative reporter Mark Segraves, the 30-minute program features local investigative reports and interviews with regional and national newsmakers.

On April 16, 2016, WDCW began airing a nightly half-hour 10 p.m. newscast produced by Tribune sister station WTVR-TV, the CBS affiliate for Richmond, Virginia. On September 19, 2019, coinciding with the station's purchase by Nexstar, the WTVR-TV-produced broadcasts were replaced with a simulcast of WDVM-TV's nightly 10 p.m. newscast.

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WDVM-TV, virtual channel 25 (UHF digital channel 23), is an independent television station licensed to Hagerstown, Maryland, United States and serving the northwestern portion of the Washington, D.C. television market. The station is owned by Nexstar Media Group, as part of a duopoly with Washington-licensed CW affiliate WDCW (channel 50). WDVM-TV's studios are located in the Alexander House Hotel on East Washington Street in downtown Hagerstown, and its transmitter is located on Fairview Mountain, west of Clear Spring, Maryland.

The station signed on the air as WHAG-TV on January 3, 1970. It was originally owned by Warren Adler along with WHAG radio in Halfway (AM 1410 and FM 96.7, now WDLD). WHAG-TV's original analog transmitter was to be on top of the Hagerstown Motor Inn (now the Alexander House) but was rejected due to structural incompatibility. A site on Fairview Mountain would become the location of the analog signal on UHF channel 25. The station was an NBC affiliate; network anchors Chet Huntley and David Brinkley welcomed the station to the network during their newscast that night.

Adler Communications sold WHAG-TV to Sheldon and Samuel Magazine of Washington, D.C. in 1973. The Magazine brothers then sold it to local aviation pioneer Richard Henson in 1977. Henson then sold the station to Great Trails Broadcasting in 1981. Great Trails then exited broadcasting and sold WHAG along with 2 of its stations—WFFT-TV in Fort Wayne, Indiana and KSVI in Billings, Montana to Quorum Broadcasting in 1998 for $65 million.

On September 8, 2003, Nexstar Broadcasting Group announced that it would acquire Quorum Broadcasting and its stations (including WHAG-TV) for $230 million. The sale was completed on December 31, 2003.

NBC confirmed to The Herald-Mail that it was declining to renew its affiliation with WHAG on February 19, 2016; the station ceased broadcasting network programming on July 1. A factor in this decision was perceived competition with network-owned WRC-TV. In addition to expanding local news, WHAG-TV also added programs from Heroes & Icons at the time. The last NBC program to air on WHAG was Last Call with Carson Daly.

On July 1, 2017, the station rebranded itself and adopted the call sign WDVM-TV. The change came after the station expanded its coverage area by 1.2 million households, with news director Mark Kraham stating that "we wanted to make it clear that we're not just a Hagerstown station." The callsign had previously been used in the market by what is now WUSA from 1978 through 1986.

On December 3, 2018, Nexstar announced it would acquire the assets of Chicago-based Tribune Media—which has owned Washington-based CW affiliate WDCW (channel 50) since 1999—for $6.4 billion in cash and debt. The sale was approved by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on September 16 and was completed on September 19, 2019, forming a nominal duopoly with WDCW.

On July 1, 2019, all Heroes & Icons programming was dropped in favor of additional syndicated programming. Nexstar began repositioning WDVM-TV as a news-intensive independent station focused on the Washington market, first combining the operations of their two stations by bringing WDCW and WDVM-TV under the same management in February 2020. Later in the year, WDVM-TV added rebroadcasts of syndicated programming seen on WDCW, while that station added a standard-definition simulcast to allow over-the-air coverage of WDVM-TV to the entire market along with expanded cable and satellite carriage. Nexstar then applied to the FCC to move WDVM-TV's transmitter site to a tower at Raven Rocks in Jefferson County, West Virginia, along with a power increase to 1,000 kW; upon approval by the FCC, the move would greatly increase over-the-air coverage of Washington and suburban northern Virginia while preserving the required service to Hagerstown.

WDVM-TV broadcasts 45½ hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 7½ hours each weekday and four hours each on Saturdays and Sundays). In addition, the station produces an hour-long public affairs program, 4 State in Focus, which airs Saturdays at 8:00 a.m. and the half-hour sports highlight program WDVM Sports Connection, which airs Sunday evenings after the 10:00 p.m. newscast.

Right from the start (January 3, 1970), WHAG began offering local newscasts with The Valley News which aired weeknights at 6, 7, and 11. The original anchors were Bob Witt with news, Glenn Presgraves with sports, and Bill Wolfinger forecasting the weather. Bill Wolfinger also did a Saturday night horror movie show where he would be in costume similar to Lon Chaney. The news department expanded in 1972 to include weekend evening broadcasts at 11 that totaled six hours of local news per week. By the year 2000, news content increased to over 22 hours of broadcasts per week. In 1997, WHAG added a microwave truck allowing the transmitting of live breaking news from the viewing area. On February 12, 2010, WHAG dropped the "NBC 25" branding for "WHAG" and switched its news branding from NBC 25 News to WHAG News.

Outside of a few senior staffers, the station's news department mainly acts as a "farm team" operation that features new journalists and behind the scenes staff who have graduated from their schools looking for experience at a small-market television station and serve as "one man band" personnel that shoot, write, and edit their own stories, and eventually move on to further opportunities in larger markets. The station operates a bureau on East Patrick Street (MD 144) in Frederick.

On August 30, 2010, WHAG added a half hour to its weekday noon and 5 p.m. newscasts. Until this point unlike most NBC affiliates in the Eastern Time Zone, the station had not aired a broadcast weeknights at 5:30. It still does not offer a full two-hour weekday morning show. There is now a half hour broadcast seen Monday through Saturday nights at 7. On weekends, an hour-long morning show at 6 as well as a half hour Sunday morning broadcast at 9 were added. In addition, a Northern Virginia Bureau covering Leesburg, Berryville, and Winchester was opened. Although not a full news department, this is now the second local news operation established in those areas after TV3 Winchester launched back on March 5, 2007. All of the preceding changes required the expansion of WHAG's personnel. On October 21, 2013, WHAG began broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition.

Nexstar undertook a major expansion of WDVM-TV's news operation that launched on July 1, 2016, the same day the station lost its NBC affiliation. While it broadcasts standard newscasts at 5:30 a.m., 6 a.m., noon, 5 p.m., 6 p.m., and 10 p.m., the 7 a.m., 7 p.m., and 11 p.m. hours are also set aside for Maryland (I-270 News) and Northern Virginia-specific (Nova News) coverage. WDVM-TV also simulcasts Nexstar-owned WOWK-TV's West Virginia Tonight at 5:30 p.m.

Recently, it has been added to the Dish Network lineup of local offerings and is available to subscribers that currently receive the Washington, D.C. market locals. WDVM-TV had also been seen on Dish as the default NBC affiliate for the Salisbury television market, as that market did not have an NBC affiliate of its own until June 2014, when WRDE-LD in nearby Rehoboth Beach, Delaware switched its affiliation to NBC. It is also viewed in widescreen standard definition on Verizon FiOS in Montgomery County, Maryland.

On February 26, 2020, WDVM-TV was added to DirecTV's lineup of local offerings and, like with rival Dish, is also available to subscribers that currently receive the Washington, D.C. market locals. It is seen on channel 25 and only in high definition.