WBBH-TV (channel 20) is a television station licensed to Fort Myers, Florida, United States, serving as the NBC affiliate for Southwest Florida. It is the flagship television property of locally-based Waterman Broadcasting, which provides certain services to Naples-licensed ABC affiliate WZVN-TV (channel 26) under a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Montclair Communications. Both stations share studios on Central Avenue in Fort Myers, while WBBH-TV's transmitter is located along SR 31 in unincorporated southeastern Charlotte County. Known on-air as NBC 2, the branding is derived from WBBH-TV's primary cable channel in the market on Comcast Xfinity, CenturyLink, and most other cable providers in the area. This practice stems in part from the area's exceptionally high cable penetration rate, which is one of the highest in the United States. History The station first signed on the air on December 18, 1968. Before WBBH's existence, NBC programming in the market was relegated to off-hours clearances through a secondary affiliation with CBS affiliate WINK-TV (channel 11). As the second television station in Southwest Florida (after WINK-TV), WBBH shared ABC programming with that station until WEVU (channel 26, now WZVN-TV) signed on the air on August 21, 1974. Founded by a consortium of local businessmen named Broadcast Telecasting Services, Inc., the station originally transmitted its signal from a tower in Lehigh Acres which increased to in 1983. Waterman Broadcasting purchased the station in 1978. The driving force behind the emergence of WBBH was Joe Buerry, who had worked as a sales manager and a DJ at WMYR radio. When the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) assigned the channel 20 allocation to Fort Myers, Buerry put together a group of investors and filed for the construction permit. The station was granted to Buerry and his partners; he ran the station for seven years taking it through its growth period, and successfully obtained the NBC affiliation with the help of NBC's regional manager Pier Mapes, who eventually became president of the network. WBBH became the ratings leader in the market under Buerry's management; the arrival of cable in Southwest Florida eliminated the disadvantage of being on UHF, allowing WBBH to overtake WINK-TV. While WINK-TV has since regained the lead, WBBH has remained a solid runner-up for most of the last three decades. After seven years, Buerry left WBBH to become general manager at WEVU-TV. At that time, WEVU was losing revenue averaging at $25,000 a month. Buerry, because