WNWO-TV
WNWO-TV is a television station in Toledo, Ohio, United States, affiliated with NBC. Owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, the station maintains a transmitter facility on Cousino Road in Jerusalem Township. Its studios are located on South Byrne Road in Toledo.
Channel 24 was the only television station built by entrepreneur Daniel H. Overmyer. It signed on May 2, 1966, as WDHO-TV, Toledo's third local station. It had no primary network affiliation until 1969, when it became the area's ABC outlet, though it aired shows from the major networks not already seen in the market and was the local affiliate for the short-lived United Network, which Overmyer helped start, in 1967. For most of its first 20 years in operation, the station was burdened by Overmyer's other troubled businesses. The sale of his other TV station permits led to a congressional investigation, and Overmyer's heavily indebted warehouse interests experienced financial reverses en route to a bankruptcy reorganization filing in 1973. WDHO-TV was involved in two lengthy bankruptcy cases, during which Overmyer committed bankruptcy fraud and the building housing the news department was repossessed by the First National Bank of Boston, which held station stock as collateral. Drained of resources, channel 24 never adequately competed in the area of news, becoming a distant third to the established stations, WTOL and WTVG.
The station was acquired by Toledo Television Investors in 1986 and immediately renamed WNWO-TV. The new owners tried to improve the station's news department, but met by viewer indifference and continued low ratings, the station cut back to one newscast a day in 1990. In October 1995, the station switched affiliations from ABC to NBC after WTVG, previously the NBC affiliate in Toledo, was purchased by Capital Cities/ABC. The affiliation switch did not immediately serve as an impetus to revitalize the news operation. That changed after Malrite Communications Group acquired WNWO-TV in 1996 and launched a comprehensive effort including building expansion and expanded newscasts. With the exception of a brief time under Raycom Media ownership, the newscasts failed to attract significant ratings. After Raycom Media acquired WTOL in 2006 and sold WNWO-TV to Barrington Broadcasting, the news department withstood a round of layoffs and gradual decreases in headcount, remaining the laggard in local TV news in spite of a relaunch effort in 2011. Barrington's stations were purchased by Sinclair Broadcast Group in 2013; shortly after the purchase, Sinclair entered into a seven-month-long retransmission consent dispute with Buckeye CableSystem that saw most Toledo-area cable viewers lose access to WNWO. After the dispute ended, Sinclair attempted another revamp of the news department, to no avail in raising the station's flagging ratings fortunes. In March 2017, presentation of its newscasts was outsourced to South Bend, Indiana, and local news was discontinued altogether in May 2023.
WDHO-TV
A third commercial channel for Toledo
In 1954, at the request of the Detroit-based Woodward Broadcasting Corporation, the Federal Communications Commission allotted an additional commercial television channel, ultra high frequency channel 79, to Toledo. Woodward obtained a construction permit for a station to use the channel two months later, but it was culled in 1960 as part of a wave of cancellations of unused permits for UHF stations.Because Toledo only had two commercial allocations in the very high frequency band, the city continued to only have two commercial stations. In 1962, FCC chairman Newton Minow told the National Press Club that Toledo was one of several cities that could support a third local commercial station but lacked it in large part because the third allocation was a UHF channel. In February 1963, Springfield Television heeded the call and applied for channel 79. Two months later, Producers, Inc. of Evansville, Indiana, and Daniel H. Overmyer of Toledo made competing applications. Springfield suggested the substitution of a lower channel, 17, and consequent shifts in multiple allotments as distant as Mount Pleasant, Michigan, to make room.
In September 1964, Producers and Springfield Telecasting settled with Overmyer, which reimbursed the two firms a total of $17,200 in expenses incurred in their applications. Now unopposed, Overmyer won an initial decision from an FCC hearing examiner in January 1965. At that time, Overmyer Communications, a new division of Overmyer's warehousing operations, began seeking network affiliation and announced its plans to get channel 79 on the air within a year. Later that year, the FCC moved the unbuilt station from channel 79 to channel 24. Overmyer leased office space in Toledo's Commodore Perry Hotel.
After delays due to bad weather, WDHO-TV—named for Daniel Harrison Overmyer—began broadcasting on May 2, 1966. The new station had no primary network affiliation and instead aired shows from all three national networks—ABC, CBS, and NBC—that went unaired in Toledo. These were complemented by some syndicated series and a nightly newscast at 11 p.m. When Overmyer sold his other TV station construction permits—all in major markets—to American Viscose Corporation in 1967, WDHO-TV was not included in the sale. Another Overmyer project, the Overmyer Network, was sold to a 14-person investor syndicate and renamed the United Network weeks before it launched on May 1, 1967; the unbuilt stations and WDHO were originally to have been network-owned stations, but WDHO was an affiliate for the United Network's lone month of existence.
WDHO-TV became an exclusive affiliate of ABC on June 15, 1969, the last network and station to partner after WTOL-TV signed with CBS and WSPD-TV aligned with NBC. While WDHO had local newscasts, a fully-staffed news department was not established until 1972; owing to a lack of space, the news department's offices were located in a garage adjacent to their studio building.
FCC investigations
The sale of Overmyer's construction permits to AVC, along with the Overmyer Network, came as the warehouse chain was in the midst of a cash crunch. The lead contractor for the warehouses owed $18 million to shareholders early in 1967, placing that company in financial distress and resulting in liens on multiple unfinished buildings. The warehouse company's overhead, particularly with $80,000 in monthly airfare from the financial development team, became equally burdensome. Overmyer agreed to guarantee a debt from the contractor, which restricted company funds even further. Overmyer also sold off both the Toledo Monitor and Progress National Bank during this time; both sales were later attributed to this fiscal crisis. The AVC sale was handled as a merger with WPHL-TV in Philadelphia, as AVC created a brand new company in exchange for a $3 million loan to Overmyer; in approving the deal, the FCC waived a proposed rule that limited station group ownership in the top fifty markets.The FCC's deference on the deal resulted in a lengthy investigation by the House Investigations Subcommittee between December 1967 and August 1968. The commissioners, Overmyer, AVC president Dr. Frank H. Reichel, and five FCC staffers were named as witnesses during the second round of hearings, mainly focusing on the FCC's overall competence and Overmyer's financial qualifications. The Subcommittee's report admonished the FCC for granting Overmyer the construction permits in the first place, suggesting that he failed to supply needed financial information and paperwork and violated the FCC's out-of-pocket expense policy by effectively disguising a $3 million stock payment as a loan. This prompted the FCC to conduct a hearing on the AVC sale to determine if fraud had been committed and to defer WDHO's license renewal.
Administrative law judge Herbert Sharfman, in his initial decision on April 20, 1973, found Overmyer had overstated his total out-of-pocket expenses by $227,000 but ruled there was no direct evidence of maliciousness or fraud. AVC had already sold off the stations purchased from Overmyer after taking almost all of them dark. WXIX-TV in Cincinnati, which was also sold, was the only AVC station to remain on-air continuously. Due to this and Overmyer having paid off the loan in full, the ruling only affected the deferred renewal of WDHO's license. The Broadcast Bureau disagreed with Sharfman's ruling, regarding the financial misrepresentation as a possible character qualification issue as Overmyer still owned WDHO; the FCC review board remanded the case in January 1974 by Overmyer's request, sending it back to Sharfman. Overmyer was cleared by judge Sharfman of the misrepresentation charges in his May 13, 1974, supplemental initial decision, stating there was "a complete failure of the record to inculpate Mr. Overmyer personally, directly or by implication". The FCC Review Board affirmed Sharfman's ruling on August 21, 1975.
Bankruptcy and seizure by FNBB
In 1971, Overmyer pledged the stock of the subsidiary that held WDHO-TV's license to the First National Bank of Boston as security for a $6 million loan. This and other tactics by Overmyer failed to stabilize his financial position, and he held more than $25 million in debt by 1973. Overmyer's warehouse companies entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the Southern District of New York on November 29, 1973. FNBB then sued Overmyer on May 7, 1974; it sought control of 249 shares in WDHO-TV stock, claiming to hold all 500 shares as collateral for the now-defaulted loans that totaled $10.5 million. Overmyer countersued for $200 million, claiming he was forced into insolvency by FNBB. WDHO-TV filed for bankruptcy in January 1976 when FNBB set up an auction for the station's assets, with the station placed under a debtor in possession arrangement. During this time, the news department operated out of a leased double-wide trailer parked next to the studio building, which continued for three years. It was stated at the time the trailer's use was discontinued and that it was a station decision to end the lease, but later accounts indicated that FNBB repossessed or nearly repossessed the trailer.The first bankruptcy proceeding for WDHO was dismissed in 1980. On February 6, 1981, the SDNY denied an appeal by Overmyer; WDHO filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy again, this time in Cleveland, Ohio. FNBB was awarded control of WDHO on March 25, 1981, by the Cleveland court, despite Overmyer's objection that the order violated FCC rules on ownership transfers for licenses. Overmyer was indebted by as much as $22.4 million to FNBB, which regarded the takeover as proper. Prior to the second bankruptcy, WDHO's license was renewed by the FCC after ten years of deferrals; the commission rejected a request by the Broadcast Bureau to review the 1975 Review Board report, noting the antiquity of the AVC sale controversy and Overmyer's status as an "inactive station owner". WDHO staffers reportedly cheered after learning of the takeover by FNBB, as their paychecks under Overmyer often bounced.
Cleveland bankruptcy court judge John Ray, Jr., ruled against Overmyer on September 24, 1982, determining that he and an associate, attorney Edmund M. Connery, engaged in fraud against FNBB. Hadar Leasing Company, an Overmyer subsidiary, purchased broadcast equipment for WDHO and leased it back to the station at falsified rates that benefited Overmyer; leases included spare parts and roof repairs. Hadar also filed a proof of claim of $859,481.80 during the WDHO bankruptcy that was also found to be fraudulent. WDHO staff also agreed to payroll deductions to benefit the United Way in 1980 and 1981, but the money collected was never donated until after FNBB took over. Comparing the fraud to Twyne's Case of 1601, Judge Ray ordered a constructive trust to dispose of all assets belonging to Overmyer, including WDHO, and FNBB seized outright control of the station. FNBB also seized control of a subsidiary nominally in Overmyer's daughters' name that was applying to construct a new television station in Yuma, Arizona. The bank immediately desired to sell WDHO-TV.