WOLO-TV

Channel 25 in Columbia was originally occupied by WCOS-TV, South Carolina's first television station. It signed on the air on May 9, 1953[2] and operated as an ABC affiliate until January 21, 1956 when competitor WNOK-TV bought most of WCOS-TV's assets.[3]

The First Carolina Corporation, a group of local investors, obtained a construction permit from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to build a new station on channel 25 on June 1, 1961, after applying on August 5, 1960.[4] Construction was in full swing by the summer. The former physical plant of WCOS-TV on Shakespeare Road was purchased for use by the new station, and a new 348-foot (106 m) tower was erected on the site.[5] The station signed on for the first time on October 1, 1961 as WCCA-TV, using the former WCOS-TV facilities and downtown sales offices in the Hotel Columbia.[6] The FCC granted First Carolina a license to cover the permit on July 24, 1962.[4]

In 1964, Cy Bahakel bought the station[7] out of bankruptcy[8] and changed its call letters to WOLO-TV, seeking a fresh start.[9] Immediately, work began to add height to the station's tower to increase its coverage area.[10] WOLO announced another upgrade in 1966, with the height going from 522 ft (159 m) to 933 ft (284 m) and an increase in power to 550,000 watts.[11] This ultimately materialized in 1969 as an increase to 904,000 watts,[4] followed up in 1981 by a boost to 3.6 million watts.[12]

The case of WOLO-TV was not unique. Instead of one VHF station in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Bahakel bought three similar UHF stations: WOLO, WKAB-TV in Montgomery, and WCCB in Charlotte—all ABC affiliates at the time, and two of them off the air—in the same year. All three were then upgraded to increase their coverage areas at the same time that the All-Channel Receiver Act meant that all new sets could receive UHF stations; the three stations had become profitable operations by the early 1980s.[8] Cash flow increased fivefold from 1975 to 1979, and the staff tripled in size.[13]

In 2001, WOLO activated a new transmitter tower along I-20 outside Camden, one of the tallest structures in South Carolina at 1,764 feet (537.7 m). Prior to then, the station had long been plagued by a weak signal. Although it decently covered Columbia and most of its inner suburbs in Richland and Lexington counties, it only provided grade B signal coverage of the second-largest city in the market, Sumter, and was all but unviewable in some outlying areas even after the 1981 power increase. The new tower, in contrast, increased WOLO's coverage by 50 percent, providing at least secondary coverage of 24 counties from Charlotte's outer suburbs to the Pee Dee. It also allowed the station to begin digital broadcasts.[14]

In the fall of 2005, WOLO changed its on-air branding from "ABC 25" to "ABC Columbia"; the move coincided with the return of local news production to the city after three years where the anchors were based at WCCB.[15] Beginning in 2014, WOLO began a major expansion of its studio at Main and Gervais. This included the building of a new weather center and an interview set. During the summer of 2015, the station rebuilt the street-side studio set, incorporating multiple monitors and an improved light-control window system. The graphics and music were revamped in October 2015 when John Farley, formerly of WIS, was announced as the chief meteorologist for WOLO-TV.

In 2002, the station became the second commercial television station in the Columbia market to sign on a digital signal. WOLO's broadcasts became digital-only, effective June 12, 2009.[16]

Since at least 1986, WOLO has claimed WCOS-TV's history as its own.[17] However, FCC history cards for WOLO make no mention of WCOS-TV.[4]

• Bob Richards, meteorologist (1978–1979; died in 1994)[19]
• Rick Leventhal (now at Fox News Channel)
• Leslie Mouton (now at KSAT-TV in San Antonio)