Description
WWJ-TV (channel 62), branded on-air as CBS Detroit, is a television station in Detroit, Michigan, United States, owned and operated by the CBS television network. It is owned by the network's CBS News and Stations group alongside WKBD-TV, an independent station; the stations share studios on Eleven Mile Road in the Detroit suburb of Southfield. WWJ-TV's transmitter is located in Oak Park.
Founded as WGPR-TV in 1975 by Dr. William V. Banks and the International Free and Accepted Modern Masons as an extension of WGPR (107.5 FM), channel 62 in Detroit holds the distinction of being the first Black-owned television station in the continental United States. Though its ambitious early programming plans catering to the Black community did not fully pan out, the station still produced several locally notable shows and housed a fully-staffed news department. WGPR-TV helped launch the careers of multiple local and national Black television hosts and executives, with Pat Harvey, Shaun Robinson, Sharon Dahlonega Bush, and Amyre Makupson among the most notable alumni. The original studios for WGPR-TV, still in use by the radio station, have been preserved as a museum and recognized as a cultural landmark, with inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places.
In 1994, when a major affiliation switch threatened to leave CBS without an affiliate in the Detroit market after multiple failures to secure a more successful station, the network bought WGPR-TV and dropped all existing programming in favor of CBS and syndicated programs, later changing the call letters to WWJ-TV. The station has made multiple unsuccessful attempts at producing local newscasts in its more than 25 years under CBS ownership. From assuming the affiliation in 1994 until 2001, from 2002 to 2009 and again from 2012 until 2023, WWJ-TV held a dubious distinction as the only station directly owned by any of the "Big Three" networks not to have any significant local news presence. A full news department, known as CBS News Detroit, began operation in January 2023 as an extension of CBS News's streaming service.
