WKTC (channel 63) is an independent television station licensed to Sumter, South Carolina, United States, serving the Columbia area and also having a secondary affiliation with MyNetworkTV. The station is locally owned by WBHQ Columbia, LLC, and maintains studios in the Pontiac Business Center complex in Elgin and a transmitter on Rush Road (southeast of I-20) in rural southwestern Kershaw County.
History
The station first signed on the air on November 8, 1997, as WQHB;[1] it originally operated as a primary UPN and secondary WB affiliate, with The WB's prime time programming airing on a one-day delay from 6 to 8 p.m. It also aired select programming from Pax TV (now Ion Television) following that network's 1998 launch. The station's original main transmitter in Sumter was not nearly strong enough to provide a decent over-the-air signal to Columbia; as a result, WQHB began operating a fill-in translator in Columbia, W67DP (channel 67).
In 2001, the station became a primary WB affiliate, shifting UPN prime time programming to the late evening hours from 10 p.m. to midnight, after The WB's prime time schedule. Pax TV programming was dropped altogether at this time. In 2003, the station changed its call letters to WBHQ (reversing the last three letters of its original calls) and moved its transmitter to space on the tower of