KOAM-TV


KOAM-TV is a television station licensed to Pittsburg, Kansas, United States, serving the Joplin, Missouri–Pittsburg, Kansas market as an affiliate of CBS. It is owned by Morgan Murphy Media, which provides certain services to dual Fox/CW+ affiliate KFJX under joint sales and shared services agreements with owner SagamoreHill Broadcasting. The two stations share studios and transmitter facilities on US 69 south of Pittsburg, with a secondary studio and news bureau on South Range Line Road in Joplin.

History

KOAM-TV first signed on at 5:22 p.m. on December 13, 1953, under the ownership of MidContinent Broadcasting Company, a joint venture of The Joplin Globe newspaper and E. Victor Baxter and Lester E. Cox, owners of KOAM radio, with Baxter and Cox holding a controlling interest. The Globe would eventually sell its minority stake in the station to Baxter and Cox.
KOAM-TV launched as a primary affiliate of NBC, owing to KOAM radio's long affiliation with NBC Radio, though it also had secondary affiliations with CBS, DuMont and ABC. On September 5, 1982, KOAM swapped affiliations with KTVJ and became a CBS affiliate. Mid-Continent Broadcasting sold the station to Draper Communications, who also owned WBOC-TV in Salisbury, Maryland, in 1984. Draper then sold it to KOAM Ltd. Partnership in 1987.
KOAM's digital signal on channel 13 signed on in 2001 and remained until KOAM turned off its analog signal at 12:38 a.m. on February 17, 2009, following The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, at which time KOAM ceased analog broadcasting and its digital broadcast returned to channel 7. Sister station KFJX, the market's Fox affiliate, moved onto KOAM's former digital channel 13. KFJX's signal is simulcast in high definition on KOAM's digital subchannel 7.2.
In June 2010, the DirecTV satellite system added Joplin locals to its channel lineup. Initially, KOAM and sister station KFJX refused to allow DirecTV to carry their stations. In February 2012, KOAM and KFJX began airing on DirecTV.
On May 10, 2017, Morgan Murphy Media announced that it would acquire Saga Communications' television clusters in Joplin, Missouri, including KOAM-TV, and Victoria, Texas, including KAVU-TV. The sale was completed on September 1.
In 2024, KOAM parent company Morgan Murphy Media reached an agreement to broadcast eight Oklahoma City Thunder games. Games aired on KOAM-TV or sister stations KFJX and KFJX-DT3.

News operation

KOAM presently broadcasts hours of locally produced newscasts each week.

Notable former on-air staff

The station's signal is multiplexed:
ChannelRes.AspectShort nameProgramming
7.11080i16:9KOAM-HDCBS
7.2720p16:9KFJX-HDFox
7.3480i16:9MeTVMeTV
7.4480i16:9H&IHeroes & Icons
7.5480i4:3QVCQVC
7.6480i4:3HSNSpirit TV

In September 2019, KOAM added MeTV to subchannel 7.3 as the Joplin–Pittsburg market did not have a MeTV affiliate.