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Alabama Public Television is a network of educational television stations serving the US state of Alabama. The stations are licensed by the Alabama Educational Television Commission which was created by the Alabama state legislature in 1953. The broadcast signals of the nine stations combine to provide complete geographic coverage of the state.
The network produces its own news and public affairs programming and broadcasts content produced by the state's universities for online education and course credit as well. All nine stations are affiliates of PBS.
History
The network's first station, with the transmitter atop Mount Cheaha, began broadcasting in January 1955 as WTIQ (now WCIQ) for Talladega, though the city of license was Munford. When flagship WBIQ in Birmingham came online in April, Alabama Educational Television became the first operational educational TV network in the United States. It made its first broadcast as a network shortly after WBIQ signed on. Twenty-five other states have started public television networks, all based on Alabama's model.
WAIQ in Andalusia (now WDIQ in Dozier) went on the air in August 1956, bringing APT to south Alabama for the first time before being reassigned to Montgomery in December 1962. WAIQ was the first APT station to broadcast a digital signal as Channel 14 in 2003, but it was later changed to Channel 27 on account of Montgomery station WSFA. Mobile television station WALA donated its former transmitter in Spanish Fort to APT in 1964, allowing WEIQ to bring the network to Mobile and Baldwin counties in November. WEIQ's power was increased during the 1980s.
In 1976, the FCC revoked AETC's licenses for not airing programs pertaining to the Vietnam War or the African-American community, but the licenses were reinstated shortly thereafter. APT management feared that airing these types of programs would have put the network's future in jeopardy, due to potential losses of appropriations from offended or outraged public officials. Therefore, APT followed orders by state officials not to air certain programming during the 1960s and 1970s. Although APT still faces threats of censorship due to Alabama's conservative predilections, it has maintained a more independent stance from state government in the past 30 years. In fact, since the 1980s, it has aired a weeknight news program, "For the Record", that takes a quite aggressive approach to covering state government.
In August 2004, APT began datacasting on its digital broadcast signals to distribute digital multimedia content to ten elementary and secondary schools in a pilot program.
Stations
Alabama Public Television has 9 affiliates. Each callsign ends with the letters "IQ" meaning "intelligence quotient". The current number of affiliates have been in operation since 1971.
| Station | Analog Channel | Digital Channel | City | 2nd Letter Meaning | Founded | Signal Reach |
| WAIQ | 26 | 27 | Montgomery | Alabama | 12/18/62 | the southern portion of the geographical center of the state. |
| WBIQ | 10 | 53 | Birmingham | Birmingham | 4/28/55 | the northern portion of the geographical center of Alabama and the west central counties of the state including the city of Tuscaloosa to the Mississippi state line |
| WCIQ | 7 | 56 | Mt. Cheaha | Cheaha | 1/7/55 | the east central portion of the state to the Georgia state line |
| WDIQ | 2 | 11 | Dozier | Dozier | 8/18/56 | the south central portion of the state to the Florida state line |
| WEIQ | 42 | 41 | Mobile | Educational | 11/6/64 | Mobile and Baldwin counties along Alabama's Gulf Coast and several counties to the north as well as parts of southeastern Mississippi and northwestern Florida |
| WFIQ | 36 | 22 | Florence | Florence | 8/16/67 | the northwestern portion of the state and some counties in southern central Tennessee and northeastern Mississippi |
| WGIQ | 43 | 44 | Louisville | Greater Alabama | 9/9/68 | most of the southeastern portion of the state and some parts of southwestern Georgia |
| WHIQ | 25 | 24 | Huntsville | Huntsville | 11/8/65 | most of the north central and northeastern portion of the state as well as some counties in southern central Tennessee |
| WIIQ | 41 | 19 | Demopolis | Informational | 9/13/71 | much of southwestern Alabama in the region known as the "Black Belt" |
On all stations, HDTV is on subchannel 1, and SDTV is on subchannel 2. The date the station commenced broadcasting is in parentheses.
The network's offices and Network Operations Center are located in Birmingham, but APT also operates a studio in Montgomery for pledge drives and the weeknight broadcasts of the newscast and public-affairs interview program "For the Record". The AETC also operates a public radio station, WLRH-FM 89.3 FM in Huntsville, Alabama.
See also
External link
"Alabama Public Television"