WSMV-TV

NBC affiliate in Nashville, Tennessee

WSMV TV (channel 4) is a television station in Nashville, Tennessee, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Gray Television alongside low power Telemundo affiliate WTNX LD (channel 29). The two stations share studios on Knob Road in west Nashville, where WSMV TV's transmitter is also located.

WSMV first signed on the air as WSM TV on September 30, 1950, at 1:10 p. m. CT. It was Nashville's first television station and the second in Tennessee, behind fellow NBC affiliate WMCT (now sister station WMC TV, then also on channel 4) in Memphis. As a result of the WSM TV sign on, WMCT was forced to switch to channel 5 to avoid co channel interference. WSM TV was owned by WSM, Inc., a subsidiary of the locally based National Life and Accident Insurance Company, which also owned WSM radio (650 AM) and the original WSM FM (103.3; shut down in 1951); the AM station is renowned for broadcasts of the country music show The Grand Ole Opry, which has been heard on the station since 1925. The station took its call letters from its parent's slogan, "We Shield Millions". The television station has been an NBC affiliate from its sign on, although it also carried some programming from CBS, DuMont, and ABC. Its secondary affiliation with CBS ended in 1953, when WSIX TV (channel 8, now WKRN TV on channel 2) signed on as a primary CBS affiliate. WSM TV shared ABC programming with WSIX TV for a year until WLAC TV (channel 5, now WTVF) signed on in 1954 as the market's new primary CBS affiliate, leaving WSIX TV to take the ABC affiliation. In the late 1950s, the station also shared a short lived affiliation with the NTA Film Network with WSIX TV by airing one of its programs, Sheriff of Cochise. During the first few years of operation, AT&T would not run telephone lines for WSM TV to receive network programming until there was another TV station in town. This problem was solved by the station running a private microwave relay transmission from fellow NBC affiliate and now sister station WAVE TV in Louisville, Kentucky; this was the longest privately operated microwave relay link at the time. WSM TV's studios were originally located at 15th Avenue South and Compton Avenue in south Nashville, near the present Belmont University. In 1957, the station attempted to a build a larger tower in west Nashville, near Charlotte Avenue. During the construction process, the new tower's supporting wires failed. This caused the tower to collapse, which took the lives of several people. Afterward, WSM TV purchased its present property on Knob Road (farther west than the previous site, and allowable since WMCT in Memphis had switched to channel 5 from channel 4) and built a tower there in a forested section away from potential damage to life and property.

WSM TV shared its broadcast facilities with non commercial station WDCN TV (channel 2, now WNPT on channel 8) when that station signed on in 1962. In 1963, National Life and Accident Insurance built new studios for WSM AM TV adjacent to the transmission tower on Knob Road. This left WDCN TV as the sole occupant of the south Nashville building, where that station remained until 1976. WSM TV was the first station in Nashville to begin broadcasting in color in 1965. In 1974, NL&AI reorganized itself as a holding company, NLT Corporation, with the WSM stations (by then including a new WSM FM at 95.5) as a major subsidiary.

Beginning in 1980, Houston based insurer American General–which owned the WLAC stations until 1975–began purchasing blocks of NLT stock, eventually becoming NLT's largest shareholder and setting the stage for an outright takeover. However, American General was not interested in NLT's non insurance businesses. It opted to sell off the broadcasting interests, the Grand Ole Opry, the then decrepit Ryman Auditorium, and the now defunct Opryland USA. Gillett Broadcasting (operated by George N. Gillett Jr.) bought WSM TV on November 3, 1981, and changed the station's callsign to WSMV on the same day (officially modified to WSMV TV on July 15, 1982). The new callsign allowed channel 4 to continue trading on the well known WSM calls while at the same time separating it from its former radio sisters. The change was brought on due to an FCC rule in place at that time forbidding TV and radio stations in the same city but with different owners from sharing the same call letters. However, channel 4 would later engage in news department cross promotions with WSM AM FM. Gaylord Entertainment Company purchased the remainder of WSM, Inc. nearly two years later, in 1983. Soon afterward, the radio stations moved out of the Knob Road facility into new studios on the Opryland Hotel campus. WSMV TV was sold on June 8, 1989, to Cook Inlet Television Partners, an Alaska based company which was a subsidiary of Cook Inlet Region, Inc., an Alaska Native Regional Corporation.

Cook Inlet sold WSMV on January 5, 1995, to the Meredith Corporation. WSMV was not part of the affiliation deal between several Meredith stations and CBS (which included Meredith's only other NBC affiliate at the time, WNEM TV in Bay City, Michigan) because the purchase was announced after the affiliation deal had been finalized. As a result, WSMV became the only NBC affiliate in Meredith's portfolio until their 2021 sale. In early March 2009, it was announced that WSMV's master control operations would be hubbed at Meredith owned sister station WGCL TV (now WANF) in Atlanta. The new hub operation launched in summer 2009. On September 8, 2015, Media General announced that it would acquire Meredith for $2.4 billion, with the combined group to be renamed Meredith Media General. Because Media General owned WKRN TV, and the two stations rank among the four highest rated stations in the Nashville market in total day viewership, the companies would have been required to sell either WSMV TV or WKRN to comply with FCC ownership rules as well as recent changes to those rules regarding same market television stations that restrict sharing agreements. On January 27, 2016, Nexstar Broadcasting Group announced that it had reached an agreement to acquire Media General. This resulted in the termination of the acquisition of Meredith by Media General.

On May 3, 2021, Gray Television announced its intent to purchase the Meredith Local Media division for $2.7 billion. The sale was completed on December 1. Gray also immediately changed the station's positioning from "News 4" to "WSMV 4" and implemented a new graphics scheme, resulting in the 4 logo switching from primarily black to primarily white. In 2022, the station launched a heavily localized imaging campaign, reviving the "Nashville's Station" nickname, and inviting viewers to "Come On Back" after years of ratings losses. In December 2023, the NBC Peacock was removed from WSMV's logo as part of a company wide initiative within Gray to strip network marks from station logos.

The WSM stations' close ties to Nashville's country music business has meant that the Knob Road facility and/or its personnel was, from time to time, used for the recording of network and syndicated programs featuring Nashville based performers. This was especially the case during the 1960s and 1970s. Most if not all of these shows were packaged by Show Biz, Inc., headquartered in Nashville and a subsidiary of Holiday Inn. Show Biz, Inc. produced The Porter Wagoner Show, That Nashville Music, The Bill Anderson Show, Dolly! and several other programs seen throughout the United States, especially on stations in the South and rural Midwest. The company dissolved in the late 1970s when its president, Jane Grams, became vice president and general manager of WTVC TV in Chattanooga, Tennessee. However, the Show Biz programs were seen on some stations well into the early 1980s.

Since 2006, channel 4 airs any Sunday Night Football games that involve the market's NFL team, the Tennessee Titans. The station also aired Nashville Predators games via NBC's broadcast contract with the NHL that lasted until 2021; this includes the team's appearance in the 2017 Stanley Cup Finals. From 1987 until March 2002, WSMV TV was the primary Nashville home to syndicated Southeastern Conference football and men's basketball games originating from Jefferson Pilot Sports, but sharing some broadcasts with WZTV (channel 17) from 1987 to 1990, and WXMT (channel 30, now MyNetworkTV affiliate WUXP) from 1990 onward. All of those games moved to WUXP in 2002, and stayed with that station until 2009, when Raycom Sports lost the syndication rights to ESPN Regional Television. WUXP carried ESPN Plus oriented SEC TV until 2014, when the SEC Network was launched.

In 1982, WSMV dropped the Tonight Show to air sitcom reruns such as Three's Company, Alice, Barney Miller, Family Ties, and Rosie. NBC was able to get the show on in Nashville on then independent station (now Fox affiliate) WZTV. WSMV re added The Tonight Show in January 1989. In early 2006, WSMV attracted some attention by becoming the largest NBC affiliate in terms of market size to refuse to carry the controversial NBC show The Book of Daniel on its schedule, after the premiere episode. This action, along with that of several smaller affiliates in the Midwest and South, as well as low ratings, prompted NBC to cancel the series after only three episodes. On October 26, 2014, WSMV accidentally preempted parts of the first half of the Manchester United–Chelsea Premier League match and instead aired Poppy Cat from the NBC Kids block. This triggered negative responses from social media.

WSMV TV broadcasts 53 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with nine hours each weekday and four hours each on Saturdays and Sundays); in regards to the number of hours devoted to news programming, it is the highest local newscast output among all broadcast television stations in the Nashville market. WSM TV's news department was the first in the United States to receive satellite photographs when it first used them in 1964. Beginning in the mid 1970s, WSM TV developed a strong news division that, in the 1980s through the 1990s, won numerous regional and national awards (Peabody Awards among them) for in depth and investigative reporting. Mike Kettenring was the news director for much of that period along with Alan Griggs and Al Tompkins. For most of the last two decades, WSMV has been a solid runner up to WTVF in the Nashville ratings. Generally speaking, the station takes a softer approach to news than WTVF. The reverse was true in the 1980s, as WSMV earned awards for hard hitting investigative stories, while WTVF took a more cautious approach. While WTVF usually leads the way in the city of Nashville itself, WSMV generally leads in Nashville's more conservative suburbs, as well as outlying rural parts of the market, many of whose residents recall readily the station's past association with WSM AM. In recent years, however, ABC affiliate WKRN has steadily increased its ratings, particularly in the evening and late newscasts. In the November 2017 sweeps, WKRN passed WSMV as runner up in the 5 p. m. and 6 p. m. newscasts, and tied WSMV for second place in the 10 p. m. newscast. On March 5, 1973, the Vanderbilt Television News Archive recorded off the air of WSM TV a special broadcast of Today aimed toward veterans of the Vietnam War returning home to the U. S. Two months later, on May 1, another broadcast of Today was recorded concerning the Watergate scandal. On both of these broadcasts, Pat Sajak, who had recently joined the WSM radio and TV staff, anchored the five minute cut in local newscasts. As it was not the general policy of the Archive to record special programs such as these or local Nashville programming, these probably represent the only known broadcasts of WSM TV news before 1980 or so available for public viewing, prior to the widespread popularity of consumer level video cassette recorders in the late 1970s. The only other ones were local cut ins to NBC coverage of national elections. Because of the equipment at the time, though, the broadcasts were recorded in black and white. The Archive, prior to the advent of satellite technology in the 1980s, taped all NBC News broadcasts from the airwaves of WSM(V). In September 1973, WSM TV decided to fill the 6:30–7 p. m. time slot opened up by the Prime Time Access Rule in 1971 by expanding its 6 p. m. newscast to one hour. This has proven so successful that to this day WSMV programs a newscast from 6 to 7 p. m. (although it is now broken up into two 30 minute segments). Upon the success of the expanded 6 p. m. newscast on channel 4 (and after years of low rated syndicated offerings in the 6:30 slot), WTVF followed suit in 1989 by expanding its 6 p. m. newscast to one hour. WSMV and WTVF are among the few stations in the Central Time Zone to run newscasts at 6:30 (stations elsewhere have attempted it since the 1970s with varying degrees of success). WKRN is the only traditional network affiliate in the Nashville market to run only a half hour of news at 6 p. m., with Wheel of Fortune (hosted by former WSM personality Pat Sajak) airing at 6:30. In the early 1980s, WSMV introduced the Snowbird character, a scarf and earmuff wearing anthropomorphic penguin, as a brand for its weather related school closing reports. Snowbird appears on air in both animated and puppet form. Snowbird reports are shown on the station primarily in the winter, but the branding is also used for unexpected school closings caused by other natural and man made events, not necessarily limited to snow and ice. Due to the character's popularity, Snowbird serves as a year round mascot for the station, with a 6 feet (2 m) tall costumed version making appearances at community events and station promotions. The station has also engaged in giving away Snowbird themed apparel and tchotchkes as prizes during sweeps promotions. The Snowbird character has since been licensed to television stations in other markets, including WMC TV in Memphis, WRCB in Chattanooga, WBOY TV in Clarksburg, West Virginia, and WTOV TV in Steubenville, Ohio, all NBC affiliates. During the May sweeps period that began on April 26, 2007, WSMV debuted its own news helicopter known as Air 4, becoming the second station in Nashville to do so (WTVF's news helicopter Sky 5 debuted a year earlier, in 2006). On September 15, 2008, beginning with the 5 p. m. newscast, WSMV became the second television station in Nashville (after WTVF) to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. On May 26, 2011, WSMV debuted an hour long 4 p. m. newscast, serving as a replacement for The Oprah Winfrey Show, which ended its 25 year run the day before; this came on the heels of the expansion of other non news local programming such as More at Midday and Better Nashville, indicating a decreased reliance on syndicated programming. On January 25, 2014, WSMV was the first station to expand its weekend morning newscast to 5 a. m. in the Nashville TV market. On July 17, 2017, WSMV changed its newscast branding from Channel 4 News to News 4. In January 2018, the station's news graphics and music were updated. On August 18, 2022, it was reported that WSMV would drop all syndicated programming and air expanded newscasts and locally produced programming outside of network hours. On September 5, 2022, WSMV became the first station in Nashville to offer local news at 3 p. m., while also expanding its midday newscast to two hours, and moving Today in Nashville to 2 p. m., replacing the canceled Wendy Williams Show.

WSMV TV shut down its analog signal, over VHF channel 4, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre transition VHF channel 10, using virtual channel 4.

For its first 50 years on the air, WSMV had been the default NBC affiliate of record for the Bowling Green media market in south central Kentucky, since it did not have an NBC affiliate of its own, especially after Arbitron first assigned Bowling Green into its own media market in 1977 following the success and growth of that area's ABC affiliate (and now sister station) WBKO, which, until 1989, was the only commercial television station in the Bowling Green area at the time. The station, as WSM TV, once applied to set up a low powered translator on the campus of Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green in 1968 as part of an arrangement with the University; it lasted a short time in the 1970s. WSMV's historical monopoly in providing NBC programming for that area over the air and on local cable systems ended on March 27, 2001, when WKNT (channel 40, now WNKY) was forced to drop its Fox network affiliation due to that station's violation of the terms in its affiliation agreement. Immediately after losing Fox, that station became an NBC affiliate as it was renamed as WNKY, causing many Bowling Green area cable systems to drop WSMV. However, even after WNKY switched to NBC in 2001, WSMV remains on Mediacom cable systems serving the Morgantown (Butler County) and Brownsville (Edmonson County) areas. The Glasgow Electric Plant Board also still carried WSMV and its associated subchannels on their lineup until WNKY claimed market exclusivity on that system in terms of NBC and CBS affiliates in late 2017. Mediacom also carries WSMV on its systems in Hart and Metcalfe Counties (including Munfordville and Edmonton, respectively).

In addition to the station's cable coverage in south central Kentucky, WSMV TV, and the other two "Big Three" stations are also carried in Murray, Kentucky, in the Paducah, Kentucky–Cape Girardeau, Missouri–Harrisburg, Illinois media market, via Murray Electric Systems. WK&T Cable also carries both WSMV and WTVF on its cable lineup for its customers in Calloway County. WSMV, along with WTVF, are also available to Mediacom's customers in Caldwell and Crittenden counties, respectively including the communities of Princeton and Marion, along with the village of Fredonia. All of those areas are also within the Paducah/Cape Girardeau market, which is the home market to fellow NBC affiliate WPSD TV. WSMV was also previously available in some southern areas of the Evansville, Indiana, media market, mainly including northwestern Kentucky towns such as Madisonville, Central City, Beaver Dam, and Owensboro and their corresponding counties. The Owensboro Messenger Inquirer still lists WSMV on its TV listings page. Cable systems in those areas have since dropped the station making Evansville NBC affiliate and sister station WFIE the sole NBC affiliate on cable and over the air in those areas.

WSMV, along with WMC TV in Memphis, was historically carried on cable systems in the Jackson, Tennessee, market on the Jackson Energy Authority's EPlus Broadband system. In November 2014, WSMV was dropped from that cable system when WNBJ LD (channel 39) signed on as that area's own NBC affiliate. WNBJ replaced WSMV on JEA channel 4, with WMC TV being left intact. In spite of the existence of WNBJ LD in Jackson, WSMV remains on WK&T Telecom's cable system in Gibson County, in the northernmost area of the Jackson market. WSMV is also still available on cable in Carroll County as well.

At sometime from 1957 until the 1980s, cable television systems in northern Alabama, including Knology (now Wide Open West) and TelePrompTer (later Group W Cable, now Comcast Xfinity), carried all of Nashville's Big Three stations, only to be dropped from those systems in the 1980s amid the gradual increase of the launches of new national cable channels. The Nashville stations were once seen as far south as Decatur.