For much of the 2000s, it waged a spirited battle with WBTV for second place behind WSOC-TV, though it has recently returned to a distant third place in most timeslots.

WCNC has a higher percentage of college-educated viewers than WSOC and WBTV.

WCCB has carried most Panthers regular season games since then, and has since added preseason games, which had previously been on WBTV.

WBTV has had a number of affiliated production houses that have co-produced many of their shows with WBTV.

In 1968, the television station was sold to Jefferson Pilot Broadcasting, owner of WBT, WBT-FM, and WBTV in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the call signs were changed to WWBT ( Raycom Media has since purchased the television station ).

Even Westinghouse's own productions were not guaranteed an audience on the station ; Group W's nationally popular PM Magazine had been seen on WBTV since before Westinghouse's purchase of WPCQ, while Hour Magazine moved to WBTV after being canceled due to low ratings on WPCQ.

) Sonja Gantt, formerly of WBTV, was lured back to her hometown from Chicago, where she had been working at WGN-TV.

In 1960, WBTV turned its attentions to the younger viewer, for one program, anyway, as they brought Bugs Bunny and the other WB cartoon characters to prime-time, with The Bugs Bunny Show, which featured cartoons released after July 31, 1948 ( which had not been sold to a. a. p.

It was Charlotte's third television station, after WBTV and WAYS-TV, which broadcast on channel 36 from 1954 to 1955.

It is the third-oldest surviving station in North Carolina, behind Charlotte's WBTV and Greensboro's WFMY-TV.

It is the fourth-oldest continuously operating television station in North Carolina ( behind Charlotte's WBTV, Greensboro's WFMY-TV, and Winston-Salem's WXII-TV ) and the oldest station in the eastern part of the state.

Jefferson Standard signed on Charlotte's first television station, WBTV, as well as two FM stations.

It sold its three television stations, including WBTV, to Raycom Media -- thus breaking up Charlotte's last heritage radio / television cluster.

WCNC is most successful in Mecklenburg County ( home to Charlotte itself ), and it actually leads WSOC and WBTV in higher income neighborhoods in Charlotte ( as opposed to the outlying suburbs and rural counties ).

On July 15, 1949, WBTV, the CBS affiliate for the Charlotte area, broadcast the first commercial television signal in the Carolinas from its transmitter on Spencer Mountain.

WBTV signed on for the first time on July 15, 1949.

On November 12, 2007, Lincoln Financial announced its intention to sell WBTV, sister stations WWBT in Richmond and WCSC-TV in Charleston, South Carolina and Lincoln Financial Sports, to Raycom Media for $ 583 million.

However, WBTV and WWBT retain their Jefferson-Pilot / Lincoln Financial-era logos and branding for the time being.

At first, WPCQ scheduled its early-evening newscast for 5: 30 p. m., knowing at the time that it couldn't compete with WBTV and WSOC-TV at 6 p. m. After a few fits and starts, it turned out to be the first truly successful attempt to program a drive-time newscast in the Charlotte market.

This forced WCCB to settle for a secondary affiliation with all three networks, airing most of the network programs that WBTV and WSOC turned down.

The success of Cheyenne led WBTV to produce many series for ABC such as Westerns ( Maverick, Lawman, Colt. 45, Bronco that was a spin off of Cheyenne, Sugarfoot, and The Alaskans ), crime dramas ( 77 Sunset Strip, Hawaiian Eye, Bourbon Street Beat, and Surfside 6 ), and other shows such as The Gallant Men and The Roaring Twenties using stock footage from WB war films and gangster films respectively.

WBTV exclusively produced shows for the ABC network until 1963, when Temple Houston premiered on NBC.

In 1964, WBTV once again tried to turn a classic film comedy of its own into a sitcom, with No Time for Sergeants.

In 2006, WBTV made its vast library of programs available for free viewing on the Internet ( through sister company AOL's IN2TV service ), with Welcome Back, Kotter as its marquee offering.

On November 12, 2007, Lincoln Financial Media entered into an agreement to sell WCSC and the company's two other television stations ( WBTV in Charlotte, North Carolina and WWBT in Richmond, Virginia ) and Lincoln Financial Sports to Raycom Media for $ 583 million.

After an internship working for Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, Cosby found work as an anchor / reporter at KERO-TV in Bakersfield, California, and WBTV in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Then, in 1988, Lori worked as a reporter and weekend anchor for WBTV in Charlotte, North Carolina.

WJZY also occasionally airs Atlantic Coast Conference ( ACC ) football and basketball games that CBS affiliate WBTV does not carry.

When WAGA-TV in Atlanta ( which signed on four months before WBTV ) switched to Fox in 1994, WBTV became the longest-tenured CBS affiliate south of Washington, D. C. WFMY-TV in Greensboro, the second-oldest station in the Carolinas ( which signed on three months after WBTV ), is also second in this category.

Spencer Mountain, which is located in central Gaston County, is the site of the old WBTV television transmitter.

It was from this site that the first commercial television signal in North Carolina was broadcast, when WBTV signed on the air in 1949.

CBS only owns American syndication rights ; ancillary rights are controlled by HBO and Warner Bros. Television ( WBTV distributes the series outside the US in conjunction with HBO ; while HBO Home Entertainment and Warner Home Video own DVD rights worldwide ).

WBTV, channel 3 ( digital 23 ), is the CBS affiliate in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Syndicated programming on WBTV includes Rachael Ray, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, and Without a Trace.

Shortly before the TV station went on the air, its call letters were modified from WBT-TV to WBTV.

WBTV received one of the last construction permits issued before the Federal Communications Commission's " freeze " on new television licenses, which lasted until the Commission released its Sixth Report and Order in 1952.

In 1955, WBT and WBTV moved to a then state-of-the-art facility on a hill atop Morehead Street.

However, channel 36's signal was painfully weak, and NBC continued to allow WBTV to cherry-pick its stronger programming.

Channel 36 returned to the air in 1964 as WCCB ( moving to channel 18 in 1965 ), picking up whatever CBS shows WBTV turned down to carry ABC programming.

Two years later, after KPIX in San Francisco became a CBS owned and operated station ( due to owner Westinghouse Electric Corporation's merger with CBS ), WBTV became the second longest-tenured affiliate not owned by the network, behind only Washington's WUSA.

Over the years, Jefferson Standard / Jefferson-Pilot acquired several other radio and television stations across the country, with WBTV as the flagship station.

WBTV remained the flagship station.