WTXF-TV Branding

WTXF is the Fox O&O for Philadelphia. It signed on the air in 1965 as WIBF-TV owned by… Fox Broadcasting. However, this was a family-owned Fox Broadcasting company (the calls stood for brothers William, Irwin, and Benjamin Fox), and this company quickly sold the station to Taft Broadcasting, which quickly rechristened the station WTAF. (TAF, of course, being the first three letters of the company’s name)

The station quickly became popular and by the 1980s was the most popular independent station in the city. Not surprisingly, it became a charter affiliate of Fox upon its 1986 launch. That same year, WTAF launched a successful 10pm newscast with much fanfare, signing popular KYW sports anchor Howard Eskin in a bold move. However, while the station’s dominance was stable, its ownership was not.

The station went through three successive ownership groups – TVX in 1987, Paramount in 1991, and finally Fox itself in 1995. Fox poured resources into the news department, and the station now features more hours dedicated to news per day than any other Philadelphia broadcast station.

TV29

TVX, Fox, and Paramount

In 1986, two things happened that would crucially impact 29: the first was that Taft was in the middle of a major restructuring as Carl Lindner took control of the company. This involved the sale of its independent stations, including WTAF, to TVX, Inc. The second was Rupert Murdoch’s announcement of his new Fox network, of which WTAF would become an affiliate. The Fox affiliation was ultimately more important to the station’s future than the TVX sale, but both were significant in the direction the station would take. A number of key employees defected from WTAF during this time, as Dudley Taft, the ex-president of Taft Broadcasting, established a new Taft Broadcasting that would take control of WPHL-TV. Key among the defectors was GM Randy Smith, who took the same position at WPHL and reworked that station’s look to more closely resemble WTAF. At 29, though, things got more subdued as far as presentation went, as TVX slashed budgets dramatically. By the end of the decade, the now-renamed WTXF (the WTAF calls were deemed “too associated with Taft” and had to be changed as a result of the sale – TVX just substituted an X for the A) looked very dated compared to its rivals. TVX ran into great financial difficulty after the Taft acquisition, but a white knight came in the form of Paramount Pictures. Paramount took a majority stake in TVX in 1989, and bought TVX outright in 1991. TVX was renamed Paramount Stations Group and would become a key part in Paramount’s plans for a Fox competitor. For Fox 29, the sale initially meant that “A Paramount Station” would be added to their ident, but over the next few years Paramount-produced programming became an integral part of the station.

Uncertainty and Change

As the years wore on, relations between Paramount and Fox got sour, especially as Fox pressured WTXF to drop local sports programming and Paramount planned its own network, UPN. Things got so bad that in 1993, Fox made tentative plans to buy WGBS-57. WTXF distanced itself from its network that fall and began referring to itself as “29” and even its old moniker of “TV29” in promos; some promos even showed WTXF’s logo together with Paramount’s mountain logo. However, with WCAU and KYW switching affiliations, Fox dropped its deal with 57 to go after the more lucrative WCAU, which had a stronger channel position and news department. However, as that deal began to look less likely (NBC, long hungry for an O&O in Philadelphia, simply bid more for 10), Fox went with arguably its third choice and agreed to buy WTXF from Paramount. One of the very first things Fox did upon taking over was change the branding. Gone was Fox 29 and the long-running “29” logo used since the WTAF days – in was “Fox Philadelphia”, as WTXF was not on channel 29 on most cable systems. At the same time, Fox began to put money into the station, particularly the news department. As a new morning show was launched, “Good Day Philadelphia”, promotions and graphics finally were upgraded to be on the level of the competing stations.