KAXW

KAXW is a television station licensed to Mandan, North Dakota serving the Bismarck area. KAXW is owned by East Coast Broadcasting Company and transmits on digital channel 25 (PSIP channel 41) from a transmitter near St. Anthony. KAXW broadcasts programming from Escape on it's main channel.

KAXW has always struggled to find a network to affiliate itself with.

History
KAXW signed on for the first time on April 13, 1984. It was owned by Dakota Power Television Associates, LLC of Minot. The Dakota Power name remains as the station's licensee name to this day. It was one of the first stations in the country to target children and teens during the day. Because of this, KAXW aired mostly cartoons during the day and early afternoon for younger kids. In the late afternoon and early evening, it aired family-oriented sitcoms and music videos for teens. At night, it aired various programs aimed towards adults. It was Bismarck's first station to operate 24 hours a day.

KAXW was slated to become Bismarck's Fox affiliate upon that networks launch in 1986. Because of this, the station planned a complete overhaul of their schedule to reflect this change. Plans were also under way to launch a news department.

Almost at the last minute, Fox decided to take their affiliation from KAXW and gave it to KBMR. Because of this move, KAXW did not receive the Fox affiliation and continued on with it's existing schedule for a few more years.

In 1991, the station hit hard times with low ratings and low revenue. Pretty much out of desperation, KAXW completely got rid of it's general children's/family entertainment format and essentially became a public access-styled station. This meant anyone could purchase airtime on KAXW and host their own show or broadcast whatever they wanted for a small per-hour fee. This plan eventually backfired and KAXW affiliated with America's Store (the network's only full-power affiliate) in 1998. KAXW then went with HSN (that network's only full-power affiliate) in 2006, a year before AS dissolved.

KAXW discontinued broadcasting in analog on June 11, 2009. The station's digital signal remained on it's pre-transition channel 25. Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers displated KAXW as channel 41.

On November 15, 2012, KAXW went silent due to persistent financial problems that they couldn't fully shake off for the past 20 years.

In 2013, East Coast Broadcasting Company acquired the station. It remained silent for about another year while ECBC shopped around for a network to affiliate KAXW with.

In 2014, they finally landed an agreement with Katz Broadcasting to affiliate KAXW with Escape. The stations signal officially returned to the air on August 8, 2014. The station aired a countdown to Escape's official launch which wouldn't take place for another 2 days.

On January 2, 2015, the station began airing it's signal in 1080i high definition, even though Escape's native picture format is 480i standard definition.

The station has since added Buzzr, Retro TV, and JUCE TV to its other subchannels

Digital Television
The station's digital signal is multiplexed