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WLOX - Biloxi, Mississippi
WLOX-TV
has been The Station for South Mississippi since signing on the air for
the first time in the fall of 1962. Our area was sure a lot different
back then. If you were hungry you could visit the Friendship House on
the beach in Biloxi where the current Olive Garden is and order a T-bone
steak for a $1.75. After dinner you might cruise down to the Gulf Coast
Drive-In and see Jerry Lewis in Cinderfella . If you didn't
have a car, you could register to win one at the Bayview Plaza Delchamps
on Pass Road in Biloxi. Bayview Plaza is now Popps Ferry West Plaza -
the shopping center where Office Depot is. Delchamps was giving away a
shiny 1963 Ford Fairlane 500 sedan for its grand opening in October,
1962.
Mississippi Power declared
October to be "Dryer Month." Ads from the time urged you to "take the
worry out of wash day" with a dependable washer-dryer which you could
conveniently buy at your nearest Mississippi Power Company.
October, 1962 was also the time WLOX became affiliated with the
American Broadcasting Company
(ABC). If you watched WLOX the first week we started carrying ABC
programming you would have seen the debut of ABC' s new wartime action
series
COMBAT!. You would have also entered the world of gangland crime and
drama with The Untouchables. And you would have seen
Father Knows Best make its debut on ABC after switching from CBS.
Of
course, if you wanted to watch those shows on WLOX you needed a
television set. There were plenty of new models available in October,
1962. You could go to a Firestone tire store on 35th
Avenue in Gulfport at the time and buy a "Miss America" model Philco
"Vivid Vision" TV set for three dollars a week on the installment plan.
Advertisements from the time proclaim it had exclusive "beam booster"
circuitry! That meant you could see WLOX in "startling lifelike realism"
with "no more premature gray pictures." Ah, the glory days of black and
white! A few years later WLOX started beaming color signals into your
home.
When
WLOX began broadcasting in the fall of 1962, our studios were located in
the Buena Vista Hotel on the beach in Biloxi. The hotel is no longer
there, but it stood to the east of the I-110 loop across from where the
mammoth Beau Rivage Casino and hotel stand now.
Anyway, we broadcast local news and entertainment programs there until
August, 1969. The previous month, Neil Armstrong had walked on the moon
and the country was becoming more and more polarized on the Vietnam
issue. The day the Woodstock Music Festival in New York was coming to an
end, people here in South Mississippi were bracing for the worst storm
to hit our area in recorded history:
Hurricane Camille. It pretty much blew away everything and flooded
everything else including our Buena Vista studios. But WLOX stayed on
the air as long as we could to warn people of the coming danger.
After
Camille we moved to the Werlein Building on Jackson Street in downtown
Biloxi. The building is still there to this day. In April, 1971 WLOX
moved to its present location on DeBuys road in Biloxi. DeBuys road is
the dividing line between Biloxi and Gulfport.
From
the very first days of WLOX, local news has been important to us. In the
1970's and '80's we built our news gathering organization and
converted from shooting stories on film to video tape. Now WLOX News is the largest TV
news organization in Mississippi and reporters, producers, and
photojournalists use the latest computer technology to write stories and
digitally edit them for you to see every day. We have a satellite truck
and two remote trucks so we can bring you breaking news live. We also
have news bureaus in Jackson County, Hancock County, and the state
capitol, Jackson. The bureaus are staffed by reporters who live in those
areas. It's part of our commitment to bring you The News For South
Mississippi.
Remember the days when TV weather people would draw the weather systems
on a map with a marker? These days our staff of meteorologists uses
Mississippi Power Doppler, the most advanced technology available,
to make sure you know exactly what's happening with local weather.
WLOX
is the largest television station in the state and produces more than 24
hours of local programming a week. And thanks to you, WLOX is often the
nation's number one ABC affiliate based on the share of viewers who
watch us.
There
have been several famous faces to come from the ranks of WLOX-TV. One of
WLOX News' first anchors was
Chuck Scarborough. He's now with NBC in New York. You insomniacs may
be familiar with Mark Mullen. He was with WLOX News in the 80's.
After that he anchored ABC's often wacky overnight news show World
News Now. These days he's an anchor with KRON in San Francisco,
California. And former WLOX News sports anchor Robin Roberts is now seen on ESPN, and she also
hosts ABC's Wide World of Sports.
From
its inception until 1995, WLOX was owned locally by the Love family. The
leadership of the Love Family made WLOX the broadcasting machine it is
today. In March of that year the family sold WLOX to the Liberty
Corporation.
It's
been an exciting journey for WLOX, and we still strive to be The Station
for South Mississippi just as we did in the early days when we were
starting out at the Buena Vista Hotel. You can see our latest efforts
the next time you turn on WLOX-TV. We do it for you!
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