WETA; Magazine for Members, Volume 32, Number 7

Arlington, VA: Greater Washington Education Telecommunications Association, 2019. Presumed First Edition, First printing thus. Wraps. Fair. Format is approximately 7 inches by 11 inches. 16 pages, plus covers. Decorative covers. Some moisture rippling, wear and soiling to front cover. Front cover highlights American Experience Chasing the Moon, Special Three-Night Event Marks 50th Anniversary of Moon Landing. Pages 2 and 3 highlight "Summer of Space on WETA TV 26/HD with a discussion of Special Programming Marks Moon Landing Anniversary. There is a list of 14 programming items (not including repeats). In addition to Chasing the Moon: American Experience, there are programs on 8 Days: To the Moon and Back; NOVA: The Planets; Space Men: American Experience; NOVA, Back to the Moon; NOVA: Apollo's Daring Mission; Beyond a Year in Space; and The Frathest--Voyager in Space. There are, of course, the usual monthly WETA content for viewers as well. WETA-TV, virtual channel 26 (UHF digital channel 31), is the primary Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) member television station licensed to the American capital city of Washington, D.C. Owned by the Greater Washington Educational Telecommunications Association, it is a sister station to National Public Radio (NPR) member WETA (90.9 FM). The two outlets share studios in nearby Arlington County, Virginia; WETA-TV's transmitter is located in the Tenleytown neighborhood in Northwest Washington. WETA-TV also effectively, but unofficially serves as one of three flagship stations of PBS, alongside WGBH-TV in Boston and WNET in New York City. Among the programs produced by WETA-TV that are distributed nationally by PBS are the PBS NewsHour, Washington Week, and several cultural and documentary programs, such as the Ken Burns documentaries and A Capitol Fourth. In 1952, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) allocated 242 channels for non-commercial use across the United States; channel 26 was allocated for use in Washington, D.C. In 1953, the Greater Washington Educational Television Association (GWETA) was formed to file for a channel 26 construction permit, joining the D.C. Board of Education. The Board of Education would drop its bid in 1954. GWETA credits Elizabeth Campbell with having founded the organization. In the early days, before it was granted a license for its own channel, GWETA produced educational programming for WMAL-TV and WTTG. GWETA was eventually granted a license by the FCC to activate channel 26; WETA-TV first signed on the air on October 2, 1961, with the first televised class being aired on October 16. In 1967, WETA began producing Washington Week in Review (now simply titled Washington Week), a political discussion program that became the station's first program to be syndicated nationally to other non-commercial educational stations and is now the network's longest-running public affairs program. In 1992, WETA broadcast the first publicized over-the-air high-definition television signal in the United States. In 1995, WETA acquired CapAccess, an interactive computer network. From that acquisition, WETA helped connect public schools, public libraries and local government agencies to the Internet. Seeing a need to educate the public about brain injuries, in 2008 WETA, in partnership with the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center, launched BrainLinedotorg. The site features videos, webcasts, recent research, personal stories, and articles on preventing, treating, and living with traumatic brain injuries.