Callsign: | WELF-TV |
City: | Dalton, Georgia |
Digital: | 28 (UHF) |
Virtual: | 23 |
Country: | United States |
Founded: | October 2, 1989 |
Callsign Meaning: | "With Everlasting Faith" |
Former Callsigns: | WELF (1994–2003) |
Owner: | Trinity Broadcasting Network |
Licensee: | Trinity Broadcasting of Texas, Inc. |
Erp: | 475 kW |
Haat: | 4130NaN0 |
Facility Id: | 60825 |
Licensing Authority: | FCC |
WELF-TV (channel 23) is a television station licensed to Dalton, Georgia, United States, serving the Chattanooga, Tennessee, area as an owned-and-operated station of the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN). The station's transmitter is located on SR 157 in unincorporated west-central Walker County.
The station began operations on May 10, 1994. It was built and signed on by Sonlight Broadcasting Systems, a broadcast ministry based in Mobile, Alabama, and co-founded by television producer Paul Crouch Jr. and attorney and broadcaster Jay Sekulow. All of Sonlight's stations were affiliated with TBN, which was co-founded by Paul Crouch Jr.'s parents Paul Sr. and Jan. As a TBN affiliate, WELF carried most of the network's schedule while opting out at times to air alternate programming.
In 1997, WELF was sold, along with the rest of Sonlight's stations, to All American TV (not to be confused with an unrelated television syndication company of a similar name), a minority-owned firm with close ties to TBN;[1] the sale to All American made the station a full-fledged affiliate of the network. WELF became a TBN owned-and-operated station in 2000, when TBN purchased all of All American's stations.[2]