WSCV

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WSCV
Fort Lauderdale / Miami, Florida
Branding	Telemundo 51 / T51
Slogan	En El Que Usted Confia / The One You Trust
Channels	51 (UHF) analog, 52 (UHF) digital
Affiliations	Telemundo
Owner	NBC Universal
Founded	August 31, 1968
Call letters meaning	W eSe (C)Se Ve / That is seen
Former callsigns	WSMS-TV (1968-1970) WKID-TV (1972-1984)
Former affiliations	Independent (1968-1987)
Transmitter Power	5000 kW (analog) 500 kW (digital)
Website	www.telemundo51.com/

WSCV Telemundo 51 is the Telemundo O&O that serves the Miami - Fort Lauderdale area and licensed to Fort Lauderdale. The transmitter is located in Miramar. The station is owned by NBC Universal along with NBC O&O WTVJ channel 6. Its call letters, when pronounced in Spanish read "Doble-V Ese Se Ve" which means "That is seen" in English.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Newscasts 2 Strong Ratings 3 External links

[edit] History

Channel 51 began on December 6, 1968 as WSMS-TV, under the ownership of Gold Coast Telecasting; it would go dark August 10, 1970.

Another company acquired the station in January 1972 and returned it to air February 14, 1972 as WKID-TV. The format was a part-English, part-Spanish format. It would later be acquired by an investment group headed by William F. Johns and Alvin Koenig in 1976, after WKID's previous owners went bankrupt.

During the late-1970s, WKID aired Spanish programming during the day and a slate of old English-language films and sitcoms during the overnight hours. With all other Miami-area stations off the air overnights, WKID's late-night programming was a cult hit among South Florida night owls. Dubbed The All Night Show, WKID's late-night block mixed films, TV series, music videos and old cartoons together, along with special guests. It was said that WKID's All Night Show provided the inspiration for USA Network's similar late-night block, Night Flight. [1] During this era, cable systems that carried WCIX outside of the Miami market (especially Tampa Bay and Orlando) carried WKID late-nights, after WCIX signed off for the night.

In 1980, the group sold WKID to Oak Industries, a cable television equipment manufacturer and operator of "On TV", a subscription television service, which was offered in the evenings for a monthly subscription fee, required set-top decoder box, and outside antenna. Programming during the day consisted of Business news from the Financial News Network (FNN, absorbed in the 1990s by CNBC), a horse racing show hosted by Bob Savage in the early evening, followed by a brief "ON-TV" promo and announcement that "WKID TV-51 [would enter] Scramble Mode", thus beginning that evening's encoded ON-TV broadcast. With the expansion of cable TV, ON-TV proved an ill fated venture, and the station was sold and signed off for the last time with those call letters.

Blair Broadcasting (under their BlairSpan subsidiary) acquired WKID from Oak and changed the station's callsign to WSCV; New Spanish language programming commenced in the Spring of 1985, and WSCV positioned its' programming as a local, Independent Miami-targeted alternative to Spanish International Network affiliate WLTV.

In 1986, The Reliance Group acquired WSCV and Blair's other Spanish-language stations including WNJU in New York, KVEA in Los Angeles and WKAQ-TV in San Juan, Puerto Rico and used them to launch the new Telemundo network in 1987; at this point, WSCV became a ratings contender against long-time Spanish-language station, WLTV. In 2001, WSCV and Telemundo was purchased by NBC.

[edit] Newscasts

The fledging station's news identity began with Noticiero 51 a las 6 anchored by Cuban Lucy Pereda and Eduardo Arango. Pereda left a year later to anchor for Univision's first morning show, Mundo Latino, co-anchored by Frank Moro, a Cuban soap star who left to go back to soaps in Mexico. He was substituted by Jorge Ramos, now Univision's main news anchor. The station limped along with a succession of anchors, which included Isabel de Quezada, dropped later on to make room for Maria Montoya, a former actress who had arrived in Miami as part of the Mariel boatlift of 1980. Ambrosio Hernandez who had worked at several stations in Chicago was hired to complement the team which included weathercaster Angel Martin. Rene Giraldo did the sports segments

In 1988 it was announced that Univision's local reporting star Alina Mayo Azze, would join the WSCV staff. Her heralded arrival was dimmed when the station manager, Alfredo Duran, Jr. also announced the hire of WLTV's main anchor Leticia Callava to also co-anchor the news program. Callava was fired by the WLTV management at the time when Duran defected to Telemundo. Callava and Duran were then a couple and this was triggered a series of events that would change the Latin television landscape in Miami. Several news reporters and both Montoya and Hernandez bolted to WLTV as the station tried to reinvent itself.

Noticiero 51 was revamped as Noticentro 51 with both Azze and Callava, the first time that two women anchored a news program together in Miami.

Two years later it was announced that Mayo-Azze was to leave the station. Within months she was anchoring again, but now across town for WLTV. Callava stayed with Channel 51 anchoring by herself, until Ambrosio Hernandez decided to make a comeback to Telemundo 51.

The backstage drama was more intriguing than what viewers saw on the nightcast. Callava and Hernandez did not hit it off in spite of chemestry between the two of them. It was rumored that each would count the stories assigned to them to be on even ground.

In 2001, Noticiero 51 began to expand their news presence in the mornings and on weekends as part of Telemundo's strategic plans. In addition to Miami, Chicago, New York and Los Angeles also added newscasts to their programming. In Miami, Montoya was rehired again by Channel 51 to anchor the morning show.

Two years later Hernandez would be welcoming Montoya back to the 6 and 11 o'clock newscasts as they had done in the late 1980s. Callava was dumped. Helped by Telemundo programming, the newscast finally was able to compete as well as to beat its formidable arch-rival in the years that followed.

Callava is now a spokesperson for a healthcare chain in Miami.

[edit] Strong Ratings

For the first time on its history, WSCV Telemundo 51 ranked as the #1 news station at 11 'o clock Monday to Friday, beating of the other newscasts and beating main Spanish language rival WLTV Univision 23; numbers as a result of the so called "book" (sweeps)on May 2006.

[edit] External links

• WSCV website
• Query the FCC's TV station database for WSCV