Grant Broadcasting System II
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Based in Roanoke, Virginia, Grant Broadcasting System II (also known as "Grant Broadcasting") is an owner of various TV stations in the US, mainly Fox affiliates in the midwest.
Grant Broadcasting was founded in 1990 by Milton Grant, who, in addition to being President of Grant Broadcasting, also serves as President and General Manager for many of his stations.
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[edit] History
Milton Grant was originally a radio announcer and host in the Washington, DC area, whose program in the 1950s was heard simultaneously on many of the capitol's radio stations. Later in the 1950s, he hosted a popular dance program for WTTG, The Milt Grant Show.
Grant's first foray into station ownership first came in 1966, when his new company, the Capitol Broadcasting Corporation, established WDCA. That station was sold off to the Superior Tube Company in 1969. (WDCA is currently owned by Fox, as a MyNetworkTV affiliate.)
In 1980, Grant was part of an investment group who established KTXA in Dallas and KTXH in Houston, both sold off to Gulf Broadcasting in 1985. (KTXA is now owned by CBS Corporation and is independent, while Fox owns KTXH, a MyNetworkTV affiliate.)
In 1984, while preparing for the sale of KTXA and KTXH, Grant established the original Grant Broadcasting System, starting with WBFS in Miami, then later expanding to the acquisitions of WGBO in Chicago and WGBS in Philadelphia. However, in 1987, this first incarnation of Grant Broadcasting went bankrupt, after overpaying for syndicated programming, while its competitors took the best barter programming. It was even worse in Chicago, where all of WGBO's competitors took all the bartered shows available to them, leaving WGBO with holding the bag.
In 1989, Grant's stations were repossessed by its creditors after Grant failed to meet the bankruptcy agreements. The creditors used these stations to form "Combined Broadcasting" (no relation to the earlier "Combined Communications", which was sold in the early-1980s to Gannett). Today, CBS owns WGBS (now CW affiliate WPSG) and MyNetworkTV affiliate WBFS, while WGBO became a station owned and operated by and affiliated with Univision.
In 1990, Grant started to rebuild is broadcasting empire, under the name "Grant Communications", later renamed "Grant Broadcasting System II" (the "II" representing his second try to build a chain). His first station was Huntsville, Alabama's WZDX, which he acquired in March 1990.
Today, Grant owns five TV stations. He was also a former owner of Buffalo's WB affiliate, WNYO-TV (now affiliated with MyNetworkTV), which he acquired in 1996, but sold off to Sinclair in 2001.
Grant Broadcasting stations share a logo style: even the original 3 Grant stations used this style. It consists of a colored channel number with white extensions around it mimicking the edges of the channel number.
[edit] Stations
| Current DMA# | Market | Station | Current Affiliation |
| 68. | Roanoke, Virginia | WFXR-TV 27 | Fox |
| Lynchburg, Virginia | WWCW 21 | Fox (satellite of WFXR-TV) | |
| "WCW5" (WFXR-DT2 17-2/ WWCW-DT2 20-2) |
CW | ||
| 84. | Huntsville, Alabama | WZDX 54 | Fox |
| "WAMY" (WZDX-DT2 41-2) |
MyNetworkTV | ||
| 96. | Davenport, Iowa | KLJB-TV 18 | Fox |
| Burlington, Iowa | KGCW-TV 26 | CW | |
| 127. | La Crosse, Wisconsin | WLAX 25 | Fox |
| Eau Claire, Wisconsin | WEUX 48 | Fox (satellite of WLAX) |
[edit] Former Grant stations
| Current DMA# | Market | Station | Years Owned | Current Affiliation |
| 3. | Chicago, Illinois | WGBO-TV 66 | 1985-1989 | Univision owned-and-operated (O&O) |
| 4. | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | WGBS-TV 57 (now WPSG) |
1985-1989 | CW affiliate owned by CBS |
| 6. | Dallas, Texas | KTXA 21 | 1981-1984 | Independent owned by CBS |
| 8. | Washington, DC | WDCA 20 | 1966-1969 | MyNetworkTV affiliate owned by Fox |
| 10. | Houston, Texas | KTXH 20 | 1982-1984 | MyNetworkTV affiliate owned by Fox |
| 16. | Miami, Florida | WBFS-TV 33 | 1984-1989 | MyNetworkTV affiliate owned by CBS |
| 49. | Buffalo, New York | WNYO-TV 49 | 1996-2001 | MyNetworkTV affiliate owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group |
