WGBA-TV
WLRE, which stood for station co-founder Lyle R. Evans, sought to be operational as early as December 1977. It delayed so that it could put its transmission tower on Scray's Hill near De Pere, the location of other Green Bay market transmitter towers. Ultimately the location was approved, but it meant ground was not broken on the studio and antenna location until June 1980. The station signed on the air on December 31, 1980, broadcasting an analog signal on UHF channel 26. It was the Green Bay market's second independent station, after the short-lived KFIZ-TV (channel 34) in Fond du Lac from 1968 to 1972. It was also the first new commercial station to sign-on in Green Bay itself since WFRV-TV (channel 5) signed on in May 1955. On November 12, 1982, WLRE was able to power up a new transmitter and had plans for further antenna power boosts.
WAGA-TV
WAGA-TV first began operations on March 8, 1949. The station was originally owned by Toledo, Ohio-based Fort Industry Company, which also operated WAGA radio (AM 590, now WDWD; and WAGA-FM 103.3, now WVEE), all colloquially called "Wagga". (The "-TV" suffix was dropped from the WAGA callsign on July 12, 1998, before being reinstated on July 1, 2009.) Fort Industry would later be renamed Storer Broadcasting after the company's founder, George B. Storer. Channel 5 is Atlanta's second-oldest television station, signing on seven months after WSB-TV (then on channel 8). Originally a CBS affiliate, channel 5 also carried a secondary affiliation with the DuMont Television Network from 1949 to 1956. It also shared the ABC affiliation with WSB-TV (which moved to channel 2 in 1950) until WLTV (a then-new channel 8 station) signed on in September 1951. During the late 1950s, the station was also briefly affiliated with the NTA Film Network. Storer sold the WAGA radio stations in 1959; however, channel 5 retained the "-TV" suffix before dropping it in 1998, only to pick it up again in 2009.