WEMT

WEMT

Greeneville–Bristol– Johnson City–Kingsport, Tennessee Bristol, Virginia United States
City	Greeneville, Tennessee
Channels	Digital: 28 (UHF) Virtual: 39
Branding	Fox 39 Tri-Cities
Programming
Affiliations	39.1: Fox for others, see § Subchannels
Ownership
Owner	Cunningham Broadcasting (Tri-Cities (WEMT-TV) Licensee, Inc.)
Operator	Sinclair Broadcast Group
Sister stations	WCYB-TV
History
First air date	November 4, 1985 (38 years ago) (1985-11-04)
Former call signs	WETO (1985–1989)
Former channel number(s)	Analog: 39 (UHF, 1985–2009) Digital: 38 (UHF, 2002–2019)
Former affiliations	Independent (1985–1986)
Call sign meaning	East Tennessee and former owner MT Communications, founded by Michael Thompson
Technical information[1]
Licensing authority	FCC
Facility ID	40761
ERP	1,000 kW
HAAT	719.3 m (2,360 ft)
Transmitter coordinates	36°26′58.2″N 82°6′28.7″W / 36.449500°N 82.107972°W / 36.449500; -82.107972
Links
Public license information	Public file LMS

WEMT (channel 39) is a television station licensed to Greeneville, Tennessee, United States, serving as the Fox affiliate for the Tri-Cities area. It is owned by Cunningham Broadcasting, which maintains a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Sinclair Broadcast Group, owner of Bristol, Virginia–licensed dual NBC/CW affiliate WCYB-TV (channel 5), for the provision of certain services. However, Sinclair effectively owns WEMT; the majority of Cunningham's stock is owned by the family of deceased group founder Julian Smith. The two stations share studios on Lee Street on the Virginia side of Bristol (straddling the Virginia–Tennessee line); WEMT's transmitter is located at Rye Patch Knob on Holston Mountain in the Cherokee National Forest.

Channel 39 began in November 1985 as WETO ("East Tennessee's Own"), the market's first independent station, under local ownership and with studios and offices in Greeneville. WETO affiliated with Fox the next year, but the undercapitalized local owners sold the station in 1989 to MT Communications, which changed the call letters to WEMT. The station was sold again in 1992; it moved its studios to Johnson City, Tennessee. In 2006, then-WCYB-TV owner BlueStone Television acquired the station's non-license assets, while another group purchased the license; WCYB-TV has operated WEMT ever since under three different group owners. The WCYB newsroom produces a 10 p.m. newscast for WEMT.