21 Facts About WCVB

WCVB-TV is a television station in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, affiliated with ABC and owned by Hearst Television.

WCVB is one of six Boston television stations that are carried by satellite provider Bell Satellite TV and fiber optic television provider Bell Fibe TV in Canada.

WCVB used an old International Harvester dealership in Needham to serve as its studio facility, which the station continues to operate from to this day.

WCVB's logo was similar to the letter "G" in WGN-TV's 2003 logo.

Since the mid-1990s, WCVB has carried ABC's entire programming schedule, although it occasionally preempts network programming in favor of locally produced specials and movies.

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On October 30,2014, WCVB preempted ABC's broadcast of the Halloween special It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown to air a Steve Harvey special.

WCVB was originally in the running to become the Massachusetts State Lottery's host station in late 1986, when WBZ-TV relinquished the rights.

Langhart was reportedly angered by the proposition, accusing WCVB of trying to minimize her from the role of respected journalist and talk show host, and inferring a racial motivation behind the offer .

Ultimately, WCVB lost its bid for the lottery rights to WNEV-TV, which began broadcasting the drawings and all other related broadcast property in August 1987.

From March 7,1994, to May 19,1998, WCVB was the official station for Lottery Live, the weeknight broadcasts of the Massachusetts State Lottery drawings.

Frequent substitute hosts for Hayes on WCVB were Kristen Daly and Nancy O'Neil, wife of former Red Sox pitcher Dennis Eckersley.

WCVB was the official station of Boston College Eagles football during Doug Flutie's historic 1984 season, that of which culminated with Flutie winning the Heisman Trophy.

On June 22,2022, the BAA announced that the marathon would return to WCVB beginning with the 2023 race, in a partnership with ESPN, which will carry the event nationally.

WCVB is believed to be the only local station permitted to use the SportsCenter name, owned by ESPN, for its sportscasts, owing to its ownership by Hearst and affiliation with ABC, along with its use predating ESPN's 1979 existence.

Since then, WCVB has been known for exceptional news coverage and has consistently been at the top of the news ratings since the early 1980s.

In mid-October 2001, WCVB launched its weather radar, "StormTrak 5 Live Doppler", currently known as "Storm Team 5 HD Doppler", becoming the first station in the market to operate its own radar.

February 2007 sweeps ratings period, WCVB placed first in every local news timeslot it competed in.

On May 14,2007, starting with the 5 p m newscast, WCVB began broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition, although the majority of the field reports remained in 4:3 standard definition for a few months.

WCVB is one of a handful of ABC-affiliated stations and one of several Hearst-owned ABC affiliates that broadcast their high-definition signals in 1080i rather than the 720p format of most other ABC stations.

WCVB-TV terminated regular programming, over VHF channel 5, on June 12,2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate.

In 2019, WCVB shifted from physical channel 20 to 33 because of the spectrum incentive auction, though it does not broadcast between channels 38 to 51 which were removed from the television bandplan, repacking stations into channels 2 to 36.