WSPD-TV/WTVG-TV was Storer Broadcasting’s flagship television station in their hometown of Toledo, Ohio.

Unlike Storer’s stations in Detroit, Cleveland, Atlanta, and in Milwaukee being CBS affiliates; Storer’s flagship television station in Toledo, Ohio was an NBC affiliate because Storer had taken the NBC Television affiliation upon the television station’s sign on in 1948, WSPD-AM had long been an NBC Radio affiliate; and this was before Geo Storer had sat on the board of CBS. WTOL-TV (an offshoot of WTOL-AM, the AM station was owned by the family of Frazier Reams until 1996) has long served as the CBS affiliate of Toledo, Ohio.

From it’s inception in 1927 up until the late 1960’s, Storer Broadcasting was headquartered in Toledo, Ohio. Then in the late 1960’s, Storer had moved their headquarters to Miami, Florida.

WSPD-TV/WTVG-TV’s radio parent, WSPD-AM; was Storer’s very first radio station when Geo Storer and his brother-in-law J. Harold Ryan had implemented a cost-cutting way to sell and distribute gasoline with their Speedene Gasoline franchises by building their fuel stations adjacent to the railroad tracks. Geo Storer began to buy time to run commercials on WTAL-AM, had then decided to purchase WTAL-AM outright and change the call letters to WSPD-AM (for SPeeDene Gasoline) upon his purchase of the radio station. It was at this moment when Storer Broadcasting was born, and Geo Storer had eventually decided to exit the oil distribution business and concentrate solely on the broadcast business.

Storer Broadcasting had put WSPD-FM on the air in 1946, strictly simulcasting WSPD-AM (until the FCC began to rule that all FM stations must air separate programming and forge a separate identity from their AM parents beginning in the late 1960’s) until it had taken a Middle-Of-The-Road format programmed by Drake-Chenault utilizing their “Hit Parade” package. Then, as Storer began to sell off all of their radio stations in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s to concentrate strictly on their terrestrial television stations and to also cultivate their entry into the up and coming medium of cable television, and as Storer’s radio stations couldn’t afford to do anything except pay their electrical bills because they were not A-List properties in their markets; WSPD-FM was sold to Susquehanna Broadcasting in 1971.

Storer, however; did hold onto WSPD-AM until 1981, as Storer had felt that as the AM station is the genesis of the birth of their company, and as this AM station is located in their hometown; they could manage to keep this AM station longer than they held onto their other AM and FM stations.

Upon Susquehanna’s purchase of WSPD-FM, the FM station became WLQR with a Beautiful Music format. Susquehanna had sold the FM station to Wood Broadcasting in 1987, and under the ownership of Wood Broadcasting; the FM station became WRVF-FM with the Adult Contemporary format that it has to this day.

Below are videos of WSPD-TV/WTVG-TV’s newscasts from the 1970’s and early 1980’s, featuring the station featuring Storer’s corporate mandate of branding their television stations as TV-number (in the case of WSPD-TV/WTVG-TV: TV-13); the same multi-dimensional animated ID cards that Storer was using for all of their television stations by this time, WTVG-TV using the same Gari Communications “Home Of The Winners” package and slogan as sister station WJW-TV/WJKW-TV in Cleveland; and the “Production of Storer Communications” title card at the end of WSPD-TV/WTVG-TV’s newscasts.