WJFW-TV

WJFW-TV

Rhinelander–Wausau, Wisconsin United States
City	Rhinelander, Wisconsin
Channels	Digital: 16 (UHF) Virtual: 12
Branding	NBC 12; NewsWatch 12
Programming
Affiliations	12.1: NBC for others, see § Subchannels
Ownership
Owner	Rockfleet Broadcasting (Northland Television, LLC)
History
First air date	October 20, 1966 (58 years ago) (1966-10-20)
Former call signs	WAEO-TV (1966–1986)
Former channel number(s)	Analog: 12 (VHF, 1966–2009)
Call sign meaning	Jasper F. Williams (former owner)
Technical information[1]
Licensing authority	FCC
Facility ID	49699
ERP	269 kW
HAAT	362 m (1,188 ft)
Transmitter coordinates	45°40′3″N 89°12′29″W / 45.66750°N 89.20806°W / 45.66750; -89.20806
Translator(s)	W27AU-D Wausau
Links
Public license information	Public file LMS
Website	www.wjfw.com

WJFW-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Rhinelander, Wisconsin, United States, serving the Wausau area as an affiliate of NBC. The station is owned by Rockfleet Broadcasting and maintains studios on County Road G (along WIS 17) in Rhinelander. WJFW-TV is broadcast from a primary transmitter in Starks, Wisconsin, and translator W27AU-D on Mosinee Hill, serving the immediate Wausau area.

Channel 12 went on the air as WAEO-TV on October 20, 1966. It was built by and named for Alvin E. O'Konski, a United States congressman and broadcaster. The station was off the air for nearly 10 months, from November 1968 to September 1969, after a small plane crashed into its tower at Starks, collapsing onto the studio building below; it rebuilt its studios in Rhinelander.

In 1979, WAEO-TV was sold to Seaway Communications in a "distress sale" to end a proceeding that challenged the station's broadcast license. It was the first such distress sale—in which a station facing an FCC proceeding was sold at less than market value to a minority-controlled buyer—and made WAEO-TV the first fully minority-owned network affiliate on the VHF band. The station's call letters were changed to WJFW-TV in 1986, a year after Seaway Communications principal Jasper F. Williams died in a plane crash. In the late 1980s, the station began a push to increase its presence in the Wausau area by opening a news bureau and the Mosinee Hill translator, though it continues to be perceived as a Northern Wisconsin station and lags well behind the two Wausau-based stations, WSAW-TV and WAOW, in local news ratings. Rockfleet Broadcasting acquired Seaway in 1998.