WJW (channel 8) is a television station in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside CW station WBNX-TV (channel 55); Nexstar's Tegna subsidiary owns NBC affiliate WKYC (channel 3). WJW and WBNX-TV share studios on Dick Goddard Way (previously South Marginal Road) northeast of downtown Cleveland; WJW's transmitter is located in suburban Parma, Ohio.
WJW signed on as WXEL, Cleveland's third television station, and was the first station built by Herbert Mayer, founder of the Empire Coil Company. WXEL began broadcasting over channel 9 on December 17, 1949, two years to the day of WEWS-TV's sign-on. Initially a DuMont affiliate with select ABC and CBS programs, WXEL placed an emphasis on locally produced programming, originally from their studios and transmitter site in Parma and later from a renovated former movie theatre in Playhouse Square. Mayer's attempt to build UHF stations in Portland, Oregon, and Kansas City succeeded in the former and failed in the latter, prompting the sale of Empire Coil—including WXEL—to Storer Broadcasting in January 1954, weeks after WXEL moved to channel 8. Storer purchased WJW radio later in 1954, then secured the CBS affiliation for WXEL in March 1955. After WXEL's downtown studios were renovated into a colonial-style building for radio and television, WXEL was renamed WJW-TV.
The station was an early career stepping stone for announcer Ernie Anderson and comedian Tim Conway, who co-hosted the late-morning movie in late 1961 until Conway was discovered by Rose Marie. From 1963 to 1966, Anderson portrayed horror host Ghoulardi, which had widespread popularity and has held a lasting cultural influence. After Anderson's departure, Bob "Hoolihan" Wells, "Big Chuck" Schodowski and "Lil' John" Rinaldi continued to host a weekly movie and comedy skit program on channel 8 for a combined 41 years. Doug Adair and Joel Daly co-anchored weeknight newscasts from 1963 to 1967, the first in the industry to market the newscasters, sportscaster and weather presenter as a cohesive on-air team. Dick Goddard became the station's chief meteorologist in 1965; he enjoyed an uninterrupted 51-year tenure recognized as a Guinness World Record upon his retirement. Goddard created the annual Woollybear Festival in Vermilion, Ohio, which the station continues to sponsor, and his on-air advocacy for animal welfare and pet adoption led to improved legislation against animal cruelty in Ohio. Under the direction of Virgil Dominic, channel 8's newscasts became the market leader throughout the 1980s, particularly with the lead anchor team of Tim Taylor, Robin Swoboda, Goddard, and sportscaster Casey Coleman.
WJW-TV became WJKW in 1977 after WJW radio was sold but reclaimed the WJW call sign in 1985. Following Storer's privatization by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts in 1985, WJW has had a succession of owners. After a failed sale to Lorimar-Telepictures, businessman George N. Gillett Jr. bought the Storer chain but lost the stations in a bankruptcy brought on by soured junk bond investments, with WJW mentioned specifically in sale rumors. New World Communications, headed by Ronald Perelman, acquired WJW and the Gillett group amidst a flurry of purchases across the country. New World then announced a group-wide affiliation pact with Fox on May 23, 1994, after the network invested $500 million into the company; WJW was the first of these stations to switch to Fox. While initially struggling to adjust to the new Fox affiliation, WJW's ratings recovered substantially, particularly after the network bought WJW and the other New World stations in late 1996. Since Fox sold the station in 2008, WJW has been owned by Local TV LLC, Tribune Broadcasting and Nexstar. Nexstar purchased WBNX in early 2025, then acquired WKYC parent Tegna the following year.
Signing on as WXEL channel 9 A practicing lawyer in New York City, Herbert Mayer became intrigued by manufacturing and left the legal profession in 1944 to establish the Empire Coil Company in New Rochelle, New York, making coils for the war effort. As World War II ended, the company's factory was converted to manufacture transformers and RF coils for radio sets. Inspired by a keynote address from RCA chairman David Sarnoff extolling the potential of television, Mayer sought to expand into broadcasting. Empire Coil applied with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for a television station on channel 9 in Cleveland on September 27, 1947. Empire's channel 9 application was one of two additional channels proposed for Cleveland, joining Scripps-Howard's WEWS-TV (channel 5) and NBC-owned WNBK (channel 4); five applicants sought the other channel, including the DuMont Television Network and radio stations WHK, WJW and WGAR. The FCC granted the construction permit for Empire on October 30, 1947; land for the station's studios and transmitter site were secured on a knoll on Pleasant Valley Road in Parma, above sea level, thought to be among the highest elevations in Cuyahoga County.
The FCC implemented a "freeze" on issuing any additional television licenses in September 1948 that consequently delayed WXEL's launch by several months. While it was hoped WXEL could transmit test patterns by May 1949, the channel number and thus frequency was now in doubt: Cleveland was originally allocated channels on 2, 4, 5, 7 and 9, but earlier in 1948, FCC and Canadian regulators had proposed moving channel 7 to Akron in exchange for channel 11, and moving channel 9 to Canton, Ohio. By April 1949, this was altered to have channel 9 moved to Canada. WXEL thus was unable to complete installation of equipment. The FCC revised the allotment table by July 1949, adding two additional UHF channels to Cleveland; WXEL remained on channel 9.WXEL initially had not decided on a primary affiliation and considered having links to multiple networks, similar to how WEWS carried shows from DuMont, CBS and ABC. Russell F. Spiers, one of Herbert Mayer's former professors at Colgate University, was hired as WXEL's program director and had living quarters at the station's Parma facilities. By October, WXEL set a tentative launch date for December 17 and signed up as a primary DuMont affiliate along with ABC and CBS shows WEWS did not carry and shows from the Paramount Television Network. Regular programming actually began during the station's testing phase on November 28, 1949, when engineers screened DuMont's Captain Video and His Video Rangers on a nightly basis at 7 p.m. The first night of programming on December 17, 1949, was mostly impromptu with DuMont star Morey Amsterdam serving as emcee; during his remarks, Amsterdam repeatedly transposed the call sign by accident as "WEXL".
Howard Hoffman, formerly with WHK and a onetime singer for the Texaco Star Theater, joined WXEL prior to sign-on as an announcer and weather forecaster. John FitzGerald joined five months after sign-on as an announcer and nightly sportscaster; FitzGerald remained with the station until the booth announcer position was eliminated in 1982, while Hoffman stayed until his 1986 retirement. Alice Weston joined WXEL in November 1950 from WEWS, hosting a daily home economics and cooking show that WSPD-TV in Toledo simulcast. Soupy Sales, then known as Soupy Hines, hosted a daily show on WXEL from 1951 to 1953; it was at WXEL that Sales first used the pie in the face gag that became a staple of his comedy routine.
The station quickly established itself in sports, signing up to carry both Cleveland Indians baseball called by Jimmy Dudley and Jack Graney, and Cleveland Browns football called by Bob Neal. WXEL's Browns coverage was carried over the DuMont network as part of their NFL coverage. Horse racing was telecast live from Ascot Park and Cranwood Park, along with International Boxing Association matches from Cleveland Arena. Indians baseball remained on WXEL until 1955, when the team moved to WEWS. Warren Guthrie, head of the speech department at Western Reserve University, became WXEL's first newscaster with the nightly Your Sohio Reporter, which debuted on May 7, 1951, and aired nightly at 11 p.m. Guthrie's newscast was regionally syndicated to a network of stations across Ohio. For a short time in 1952, Paul Newman did live commercial reads for National City, which sponsored a nightly news analysis program that directly followed Your Sohio Reporter.
A phased expansion of WXEL's facilities was launched under Empire in 1951: the Pleasant Valley Road studio/transmitter building was first quadrupled in size, and the company signed a long-term lease of the former Esquire Theatre on Euclid Avenue. The Esquire, a movie theater in the city's Playhouse Square district, had closed earlier in the year due to competition from television. While the renovated Esquire was regarded as "Studio D", this facility became WXEL's main studio, supplanting the Parma plant. Mayer additionally created a mascot for WXEL, Little Ajax the Elephant, and wrote a children's book based on the character.
Changing to channel 8, Storer, CBS and WJW-TV
In the span of , every aspect of the station—the channel number, ownership, network affiliation and the call sign—changed. The first change occurred at midnight on December 10, 1953, when WXEL moved from channel 9 to 8. The switchover was dictated by the FCC in their 1952 Sixth Report and Order, which included several allocation revisions; this also affected WNBK, which needed to move to channel 3. WXEL's move was necessary for WSTV-TV in Steubenville, Ohio, to sign on on channel 9 and enabled WXEL to construct a taller tower with an increase in power.
Empire began to expand after the FCC's "freeze" was lifted. KPTV (channel 27) in Portland, Oregon, debuted in 1952 as the first commercial UHF station authorized by the agency. An additional station, KCTY (channel 25) in Kansas City, Missouri, signed on the following year, and Empire sought UHF permits in Indianapolis and Denver. KCTY's existence was short as two VHF competitors took to the air several months later, leaving KCTY as a sole DuMont affiliate. This, plus a reluctance by the Kansas City market to purchase UHF converters, resulted in a nearly $750,000 loss (equivalent to $ in ) for Empire. On December 31, 1953, Empire sold KCTY to DuMont for $1: the low sale price reflected Mayer's wishes to dispose of the station but reluctance to take it dark. Days later, Empire Coil was sold to Storer Broadcasting for $8.5 million (equivalent to $ in ), including WXEL, KPTV and the New Rochelle factory; the sale was attributed to KCTY's financial failure and a decline in Empire's coil manufacturing business.
Approval was contingent on Storer selling off KGBS and KGBS-TV in San Antonio, along with the FCC revising ownership limits so a company could own seven television stations, five on VHF; the latter took place in late September. Prior to consummation, Storer purchased WJW for $330,000 on October 8, 1954. This paired WJW with a television station. After the FCC removed Cleveland's fourth VHF allocation, WJW had filed for a UHF license on channel 19 but withdrew after determining it was not economically viable. Company president George B. Storer regarded Cleveland as "such a swell market" when explaining the two purchases, but family ties to the city also existed: a street in the city was named after his great-grandfather, and an ancestor was the first child born in the Connecticut Western Reserve. Storer previously served as a vice-president for Republic Steel and the company was originally founded to operate gas stations in Cleveland and Toledo before venturing into broadcasting.