WEHT

WEHT ("ABC 25") is the ABC-affiliated television station for Tri-State area of Southwestern Indiana, Northwestern Kentucky and Southeastern Illinois that's licensed to Evansville, Indiana. The station broadcasts digitally on VHF channel 7 (the former analog era frequency of Fox affiliate WTVW), but maps to Channel 25 via PSIP virtual channel mapping.

Channel 25 broadcasts from a transmitter at its studios on Marywood Drive in Henderson, Kentucky. Syndicated programming on WEHT includes: Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, Rachael Ray and Live with Regis and Kelly. Since August 1, 2010, the station has aired sports programming on a second digital subchannel.

History
As the Tri-State area's first television station, WEHT went on-the-air on UHF channel 50 on September 27, 1953 as a CBS affiliate with a secondary ABC affiliation. It was owned by the Malco Theater Corporation of Memphis, Tennessee (minority interest was held by several Henderson businessmen for the first year).

Hilberg Packing of Cincinnati bought the station in 1957 and Gilmore bought it in 1964. WEHT dropped ABC in 1956 after WTVW signed-on. With Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approval, the station switched to UHF channel 25 in 1964 soon after Gilmore bought the station.

In mid-1995, the Evansville market's ABC affiliate, WTVW was sold to Petracom Broadcasting and as part of the deal, that station announced that it was switching its affiliation from ABC to Fox. The result brought about a scramble: WEHT signed on with ABC, and WEVV, Evansville's original Fox affiliate, agreed to switch to CBS. The final switch for all three stations was made on December 3, 1995. This is the last station owned by Gilmore as KODE-TV in Joplin, Missouri sold to another company. [1]

[edit] Digital television
WEHT began broadcasting a digital signal on channel 59 (displayed as channel 25.1 and 25.2 through the use of PSIP) in 2002. Following the DTV transition, the station moved to channel 7.

Originally, WEHT's second digital subchannel carried weather, but on August 25, 2008, the station began airing RTV programming. This lasted until July 31, 2010.

[edit] NEWS 25 Sports Channel
On August 1, 2010, WEHT became the third affiliate of the regional sports network Wazoo Sports Network, which launched in late 2009 on WHAS-TV in Louisville and WLEX in Lexington. Wazoo replaced WEHT's former Retro Television Network digital subchannel on WEHT-DT2 at that time. Channel 25 brands it as the NEWS 25 Sports Channel and it has cable carriage on WOW! digital channel 111, Insight digital channel 189 and in Kentucky on Time Warner digital channel 311.

The regional sports television network is dedicated to carrying live coverage of sporting events, as well as classic coverage of past high school and college events. There are also locally-produced shows, the first being "After Further Review," a sports talk show which airs each weeknight at 9:00 PM Central time (10:00 PM Eastern). It is hosted by Mark McVicar and reporter Sean Clark-Weis. This is similar to the arrangement Wazoo Sports has with NBC affiliate WLEX-TV. [2]

[edit] News operation
At one point in the early 2000s, WEHT produced a 9 p.m. newscast for then-WB (now-defunct CW) affiliate WAZE-TV. The program was canceled due to low ratings. In 2007, this station discontinued its midday (11:30 a.m.) show in favor of paid programming leaving the station without a competitor against WFIE's hour-long Midday with Mike and WTVW's Fox 7 (later Local 7) News at Noon. However, there continues to be a midday broadcast on Fridays. WEHT began airing a newscast weekdays at 4:30 on September 10, 2007. Until August 25, 2008, its news programs were simulcast in their normal time-slots on WEHT-DT2 along with a repeat of the 6 o'clock news at 7. However when RTV programming debuted, the newscasts and weather radar loop were eliminated.

Beginning June 10, 2009, WEHT introduced another 9 o'clock newscast, this time on RTV25. It competed head-to-head against then WTVW's 9pm Newscast and, beginning in September 2009, WFIE's 14 News at 9 on "14Xtra." However, with the decision to terminate RTV programming in July 2010, this newscast was canceled.

On September 13, 2010, NEWS 25 will began airing a 4:00 PM newscast, replacing Deal or No Deal, which went out of syndication.

On December 1, 2011, WEHT was merged with (current CW affiliate) WTVW after Nexstar bought the Gilmore owned station which would end the "News 25" era after nearly 20 years. The station was branded to "Eyewitness News" and was known as "WEHT Local" until July 2019 as they were renamed "ABC 25", which they were previously known as between 1996-2004.

[edit] Radio partnership
In April 2009, NEWS 25's weekday morning anchors started voicing radio news updates for Townsquare Media-owned stations WKDQ, WGBF (AM) and WGBF-FM, WJLT, WDKS, and WBKR.[3]

The Townsquare stations also air weather updates from NEWS 25's meteorologists, and are part of the station's "First Warning Doppler Radio Network," which simulcasts the TV station's audio feed whenever severe weather necessitates wall-to-wall coverage.

Newscast titles

 * 25 Alive News
 * TV-25 News (?-1978/79)
 * NewsCenter 25 (1978/79?–1980s)
 * NewsFirst 25 (1980s–1994)
 * News 25 (1994–2011)
 * Eyewitness News (2011–present)

Station slogans

 * "First at Home" (1990-1994)
 * "This is CBS, on 25" (1992-1994, local version of CBS ad campaign)
 * "I am 25 People" (1994-1995, local version of CBS ad campaign)
 * "You're on 25" (September-December 1995, last local version of CBS ad campaign before switching to ABC)
 * "Watched by More Evansville, 25, ABC" (1995-1996; first local version of ABC ad campaign)
 * "News 25, Where News Comes First" (1994-2001)
 * "Always Tracking. Always Watching. Always Alerting." (2006-2011, primary slogan)
 * "News 25 Gets Answers" (2009-2011, secondary slogan)
 * "Eyewitness News, Everywhere You Are" (2013-Present)

News team
Anchors


 * Brad Byrd - weeknights at 5, 6 and 10pm (Since 1979) (Also Served as WTVW's 9PM Anchor from 2011-2019)
 * Brandon Bartlett- 6:30 and 9PM Evening Anchor (Since 2019)
 * Shelley Kirk (Since 1990) (Left in 2012), Returned in 2015 as anchor for "Eyewitness News Daybreak", now current anchor at 4, 5, 6, and 10pm.

Eyewitness News First Warning Doppler Weather
 * Wayne Hart (Certified Broadcast Meteorologist) - Chief meteorologist; weekdays at 4 & weeknights at 5, 5:30, 6 & 10pm (Since 1993)
 * Ron Rhodes (NWA seal of approval) - meteorologist; weekday mornings Eyewitness News Daybreak (5-7am) (Previously Served as WTVW's Evening Chief Meteorologist from 1995-2011)

Sports


 * Randall Parmley- sports anchor; fill-in, also sports reporter (Since 2004, Current sports director)

Reporters
 * Mike Pickett (Owensboro Newsroom Reporter)

Notable former staff

 * Bill Riales - former WKRG anchor/investigative reporter
 * Jacqui Jeras - CNN meteorologist
 * Allison Hatcher - spokesperson for Allstate Insurance
 * Bruce Kopp - weekday morning anchor at WTHR
 * Mike Maguire - Chief Meteorologist from the 1980s until 1993
 * Peggy Mitchell - The Peggy Mitchell Show host from 1961 to 1986; died on April 28, 2009 after suffering from Lou Gehrig's disease.
 * Jonathan Weaver - Vanderburgh County, Indiana Assessor
 * Bill Weber - NBC Sports
 * Nischelle Turner - Fox Sports NFL sideline reporter
 * Paul Emmick - The Weather Channel, WRTV, WDRB
 * Michelle Boss - fill-in meteorologist for KREM-TV
 * Corey Allan - Owensboro Newsroom photographer
 * Matt Barbour - weekday mornings
 * Sean Clark-Weis - also co-host of "After Further Review" on NEWS 25 Sports Channel
 * Kimberly Barbour
 * Kelley Ashford
 * David Heckard (AMS Certified Broadcast Meteorologist Seal of approval) - meteorologist; weekends and also Wednesday-Friday morning reporter (Previously Served as WEHT's Weekend Meteorologist from 2006-2011) (Now at Spectrum News 13 in Tampa FL)
 * Drew Gardner- weather anchor; fill-in, also weekday morning reporter and fill-in news anchor (Previously Served as WTVW's Weekend Meteorologist from 2009-2011) (Now at WLKY-TV)
 * Whitney Ray (Former Evening Anchor from 2012-13) (Previously served as WEHT's Daybreak Anchor from 2009-2011)
 * Lindsay Merwin (Former weekend evening anchor) (Previously Served as WTVW's Weekend Evening Anchor from 2011-13)
 * Juile Dolan (Former Eyewitness News Daybreak Anchor (5-7am) (Originally Served as WTVW's weeknight Anchor from 2009-2011) (Now at WLKY-TV)
 * Shalah Sasse- weekend evenings also weeknight reporter (Previously Served as WTVW's Weekend Evening Anchor from 2009-2011, later Weeknight anchor from 2013-2015)
 * Randy Moore (Former Eyewitness News Daybreak (5-7am) also reporter (Previously Served as WTVW's Evening anchor from 1990-2011) (Now at WFIE-TV)
 * Drew Amman- sports anchor; weeknights at 6 & 10 p.m. (Previously Served as Sports anchor for WEHT from 2004-2009, Later at WTVW as Sports director from 2009-2011) (Now at WXIX Fox 19 in Cincinnati, OH)
 * Noah Alatza (Weekend Evening Anchor 2020-2021)
 * Jake Bosewell (Morning Anchor 2017-2021)
 * Lance Wilkerson (Sports anchor 1993-2010)