WNIN (channel 9) is a PBS member television station in Evansville, Indiana, United States. Owned by WNIN Tri-State Public Media, it is sister to NPR member station WNIN-FM (88.3 MHz). The two outlets share studios at the WNIN Public Media Center on Two Main Street near Riverside Drive in downtown Evansville and transmitter facilities near Pelzer, Indiana.
Background
WNIN signed on for the first time on March 5, 1970, licensed to the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation (EVSC). After a few months as a member of National Educational Television (NET), it joined PBS in October.
Despite having the advantage of being on one of two VHF frequencies in the Tri-State, EVSC soon found itself in over its head running a full-service public television station. Within a year, WNIN was $59,000 in the red. Unable to raise enough money to close the gap, it took WNIN off the air in 1972. A year later, a group of Tri-State citizens formed Southwest Indiana Public Television (later known as Tri-State Public Teleplex and now known as Tri-State Public Media) and returned the station to the air. They bought the Carpenter House in 1986 and retired the mortgage on that building three years later with the help of a capital campaign.
WNIN also programs and transmits two local cable channels: WNIN Learn (Cable 12) and WNIN Create (Cable 13). WNIN Learn airs local Government-access television (GATV) for Vanderburgh County and Evansville City government meetings produced off-site inside the Carpenter House via remote-controlled cameras located in the Vanderburgh County Civic Center. WNIN Learn also airs repeats of some