WFTC

WFTC, channel 29, is a television station broadcasting to the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area, serving Minnesota and western Wisconsin. WFTC is also rebroadcasted on KFTC 26 in Bemidji, Minnesota. It is a UPN affiliate offering first-run shows from UPN along with such syndicated shows as off-network sitcoms, talk and reality shows, court shows, cartoons and movies. WFTC will become an owned-and-operated My Network TV station after UPN is folded into The CW in the Fall of 2006.

History

The station signed on air on September 13, 1982 as WFBT (for "Family Bible Television"). It was a Christian station offering a family-oriented lineup consisting of classic reruns and religious programming. The station was sold to Nationwide Broadcasting in 1984 and became KITN (known colloquially as Kitten).

The station ran the traditional blend of cartoons, sitcoms, old movies and dramas. It then picked up the Fox affiliation from KMSP in 1988 and became known as FOX29. The station again changed its call sign to WFTC in 1994 (for "We're Fox Twin Cities"), with the additional change using the more cosmoploitan-sounding W identifier over the more rural-sounding K, allowed for by its transmitter location on the eastern side of the Mississippi River.

The station had been owned by Clear Channel Communications (it was infact the flagship station of Clear Channel Television) from 1994 to 2001 after Nationwide got out of television (interestingly, Clear Channel currently owns many of the radio stations once owned by Nationwide). It was then traded to the Fox Television Stations Group for San Antonio station WOAI-TV and Salt Lake City station KTVX after FTSG purchased Chris-Craft TV Industries which previously owned the latter two stations. Now Fox already had assumed ownership of KMSP shortly before, so this gave the market a duopoly. WFTC then traded the Fox affiliation to KMSP (which was a VHF station as opposed to WFTC's UHF signal, making KMSP more desirable as a Fox affiliate-especially since the network gained the rights to NFC football in 1994) and became the market's UPN affiliate.

WFTC will lose its affiliation with UPN in the fall of 2006, after the January 24, 2006 announcement that it and The WB will close down and combine into one network called "The CW" network, which will make its debut on September 4, 2006. The next day, it was initially announced that Fox would make WFTC and its other UPN sisters independent stations after UPN ceases operations. 5 stations would lose UPN by default due to WB minority owner Tribune Broadcasting-owned WB affiliates in those markets, and Fox retaliated by announcing that their other 3 UPN affiliates would not join the CW. Then, on February 22, 2006, Fox announced that WFTC will be part of a new primetime network called My Network TV to launch September 5, 2006. My Network TV will be operated by Fox Television Stations, Inc. and Twentieth Television. Eventually, on May 2, 2006, it was announced that WUCW (the former KMWB) will become the Twin Cities' CW station.

The station dropped all mention of UPN outside of the network's air time (including the station logo) and changed its branding to WFTC 29, and it was also speculated that channel 29 may go back to its old KITN-TV call letters, since similar modifications were made on the other Fox-owned UPN affiliates, but since future My Network TV is owned by Fox, they may keep the WFTC calls (with the "F" meaning "Fox") after all.

In the Spring of 2006, WFTC rebranded itself as My29 WFTC.

Notable Events

A commercial informing people of the switch (2002).

*1988-KITN joins the FOX Network after KMSP-TV disaffiliates from the network. They also rebrand themselves as FOX29.
*1994-Channel 29 changes its call sign to WFTC to match their new slogan: We're Fox Twin Cities.
*2001-FOX29 starts a news cast called "FOX29 News @ Nine" which is anchored by Chris Conlanga & Jordana Green. Today it is called "The 10:00 News"
*2002-News Corporation purchases WFTC and KMSP, and swaps the 2 stations' affiliations: WFTC becomes an affiliate of UPN, while KMSP rejoins FOX. WFTC is then rebranded UPN29.
*June 2006- WFTC29 chooses to pull the plug on "The 10:00 News" due to low ratings.
*2006-WFTC29 becomes My29 WFTC after UPN gets taken off the air by The CW
*June 30, 2006- The final episode of the 10:00 News is broadcasted

Logos

Image:Kitn29.png|KITN Logo before Fox29Image:Kitn fox29.png|Previous KITN FOX29 logo, used from 1988 to 1994.Image:wftc29.jpg|Previous FOX29 logo, used from 1998 to September 2002.Image:C_Fox29.gif|Previous UPN29 logo, used from September 2002 to October 2004.Image:WFTC.jpg|Previous UPN29 logo, used from November 2004 to January 2006.Image:WFTCmin.PNG|Previous 29WFTC logo, used from January 2006 to June 2006.Image:My29.png| The present my29 logo, used since June 2006

The 10:00 News

The 10:00 News was a nightly newscast on WFTC. It ran from 2001-2006 This was their only newscast of the day. It was 30 minutes long (10:00-10:30pm). They were best known for the Top Stories and Total Weather in the first 5 minutes.

WFTC pulled the plug on their newscast on June 30th 2006 and put on its sister station KMSP later in the summer. It is unknown who will anchor the KMSP 10:00 newscast, but the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that the 9:00 team of Passolt, Robinson and Peterson will not anchor it, nor will WFTC's team of Conangla, Green, Roux and Henk, as they left the station on June 30, after a "Bitter-Sweet" final broadcast.

The Final 10:00 News

During the final 10:00 News on 29, The anchors paid homage to everyone involved in the newscast's 5 year run. The news was set aside the last 10 minutes for the anchors to reflect on their memories.

Former Anchors & Personalities

*Karl Spring (Chief Meteorologist)
*Chris Shaffer (Weekend Weather)
*Tim Seymour (Reporter)
*Camie Melton (Reporter/Weekend Anchor)
*Chris Conangla(10:00 News Weeknights)
*Jordana Green (10:00 News Weeknights)
*Bill Keller (10:00 News Weekends)
*Lara Yamada (10:00 News Weekends)
*Brandon Roux (Weeknight Weather)
*Ron Trenda (Weekend Weather)
*John Henk (Weeknight Sports)
*Liz Brummond (Reporter)
*Sharon Lawson (Reporter)

10:00 News Logos

Image:10oclocknews.png|2004Image:10oclocknewsupn29.png|2004-2006Image:10oclocknewswftc29.png|2006

Syndicated programming

Sitcoms

King of the Hill
Yes, Dear
Home Improvement
Malcolm in the Middle
That '70s Show
The Simpsons
Everybody Loves Raymond
The Drew Carey Show
The Brady Bunch

Other shows

Cops
Judge Hatchett
Divorce Court
Family Feud
Fear Factor
Access Hollywood (coming this fall)

Broadcasting facilities

WFTC's transmitter is co-located on the KMSP Tower in Shoreview, Minnesota; its programming can also be seen on KFTC channel 26 in Bemidji, and on a network of translators to other regions of the state:

{
*K48DV 48 Alexandria
*K58EO 58 Appleton
*K27FI 27 Frost
*K24CS 24 Granite Falls
*K16GL 16 Jackson
*K45FR 45 Olivia
*K17BV 17 Redwood Falls
*K27CW 27 Rochester
*K64BG 64 Starbuck
*K50HZ 50 Willmar