Posted on 03/15/2012 11:39:16 PM PDT by raccoonradio
It's no April fool joke...starting April first, you'll be able to hear newstalk 1190 WOWO on the FM dial. WOWO programming will be simulcast on 92.3 FM. Programs like Fort Wayne's morning news, The Pat Miller Program and Rush Limbaugh will all be available to you on the FM dial. WOWO will continue to be available at 1190AM.
FEDERATED MEDIA today announced a new milestone in the history of Heritage News Talk Radio Station 1190AM WOWO in Fort Wayne, IN. Beginning in April 2012, Fort Wayne’s most listened to radio station will become available on FM at 92.3. This will be a full simulcast carrying the entire programming line up currently heard at 1190AM.
Federated Chief Operating Officer, Mark Deprez stated “The move to FM is a natural enhancement for the WOWO brand that is synonymous with Fort Wayne. WOWO is, and has always been, the one radio outlet that northeast Indiana can count on for breaking news, weather, traffic, information. WOWO’s strong service commitment to our community, along with the entertaining and engaging personalities, has solidified WOWO in the hearts of many of our local residents. The move to 92.3 FM will re-introduce WOWO to listeners that have migrated over the years to FM and also open WOWO’s brand to new and younger audience.”
Since 1925 in its humble beginnings atop the Main Street Auto building in downtown Fort Wayne, 1190 WOWO has been a beacon for our community. From its mighty 50,000 transmitter at 1190AM, people in northeast Indiana, along with the entire eastern seaboard have experienced the news of war, the dawn of Rock and Roll, the end of oppression and sound of victory! Federated Media looks forward to this new chapter in this storied radio station’s history that is uniquely WOWO!
I believe a classic rock station will die out to make this happen.
http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20120315/BIZ/120319627
>>On April 1, WOWO, 1190 AM, will start simulcasting at 92.3 FM, the station’s program director, Gregg Henson, said Thursday.
The classic rock station that is currently using the frequency, WFWI-FM, The Fort, will cease to exist, Henson said.
Both stations are owned by Federated Media, which also owns WQHK-FM (K-105), WBYR-FM 98.9 9 (The Bear), WMEE-FM 97.3 and the AM station ESPN 1380, Henson said.
Henson said the decision to simulcast WOWO on FM was an economic one. “It’s the No. 1 station in Fort Wayne,” he said. “It’s the biggest brand in news, sports, weather and traffic. We wanted to go where the audience is.”
Henson said the radio audience in 1979 was evenly divided between AM and FM.
“Now it’s 80/20 in FM’s favor,” he said. “We need to go where the audience is and extend our brand. There are probably people who have never been exposed to WOWO on the AM dial.”
Henson said WOWO will continue to be available on AM “to serve the audience that’s there.”
At present, The Fort is home to popular local DJ Billy Elvis and popular national duo Bob and Tom.
Efforts are being made, Henson said, to shift Bob and Tom over to one of Federated Media’s other stations, although he could not say which one.
Henson said he believes The Fort was established in the late ’80s, although some online sources suggest the year was 1993.
Henson does not anticipate much protest from The Fort’s listenership.
“The classic rock audience can still get that music elsewhere,” he said.
They are dumping a Classic Rock station for talk? That seem highly unusual. What town doesn’t have a Classic Rock station? Seems odd to me.
BTW, I really hope they don’t say the call letters as a word for station ID’s. That would just be weird. WhooWhoo.
Woah-woah radio has been around for a LONG TIME....
It used to be one of the original 50,000 watt blowtorch AM stations. I used to listen to it in California, late at night,, when the atmospherics were right.
At night, that pattern is much larger. I can remember listening to Fort Wayne Komets games here in Delaware.
I found some old aircheck jingles and music from WOWO. Sounds like a great top 40 station back in the good old days. 1974.
http://historyofwowo.com/audio/WOWO_05-01-1974_5am.mp3
http://historyofwowo.com/audio/audio-jingles/WOWO-TM_Propellants.mp3
Sat radio (Deep tracks on Sirius/XM) and Pandora and the like on the Internet beat the heck out of commercial-laden broadcast radio for anything, classic rock in particular.
LOL. Brother, I drive a stable full of 30 and 40 year old cars with the stock AM/FM Delcos in them. Satellite isn’t in my lexicon. When the talkers bore me, I listen to this weird Canadian oldies station, 740 AM in Toronto. When that bores me, the factory 8-track players get used. I came home excited the other day because I threw a dead beat tenant out of one of my units and he left behind a box of old rock 8-tracks with Jethro Tull and Deep Purple type stuff. My wife called me a nit wit for being excited for that. She is probably right.
WOWO was a great rock n roll station. Used to pick it up also late at night in Wilkes Barre Pa during the 60’s. Remember how it sounded when it used to fade in and out.
LOL! on that last.
Speaking of Jethro Tull, they’re touring doing a straight through performance of Thick as a Brick. I really should get tickets.
I used to regularly listen to Woah-Woah after midnight (when the locals shut down) in the early 60’s while in northern Vermont.
I love those old airchecks - reminds me of the nights spent twirling the dial of my old Hallicrafters SW while I was in high school (I didn’t date much until I was a senior). I still have a QSL card from WOWO, dated 1973.
Not to far off WIBC 93.1
Yep I remember the days of being back east, and hearing out of town stations at night, such as WOWO. They were a big rock and roll radio station back in the old days.
Not anymore. Years back a black station out of New York City bought WOWO, moved the 50,000 watt full time license for 1190 to NYC then sold the smoldering ruins.
Well the map I put up was for the new FM home; the AM does well at night of course due to groundwave where many in diff. states can hear such AM stations
Indeed, the change means recep. mentioned above in the past won’t apply. Wiki.:
>>Because WOWO’s Nighttime Skywave Service caused WLIB, also 1190 kHz, in New York City to cease broadcasting at sunset each day and resume broadcasting at sunrise, Inner City Broadcasting bought WOWO in 1994 so that they could transfer WOWO’s FCC clear-channel license to WLIB, owned by Inner City Broadcasting. This reduced WOWO’s potential audience—referred to as WOWOland—from much of the eastern United States to a much smaller local region in northern Indiana, northwestern Ohio, and south-central Michigan. Before the power reduction, when WLIB signed off at night, WOWO’s air signal came booming through the speakers into the WLIB air studio.
Oddly, that station was WLIB, also on 1190, but restricted to daytime-only operation due to WOWO’s nighttime signal to the east.
So Inner City Broadcasting (WLIB) bought WOWO, essentially to gain possession of its nighttime signal into New York. They downgraded WOWO’s nighttime signal to about 10 KW directional, with a protective null towards NYC. This enabled WLIB to go fulltime.
The daytime situation was unaffected, however; both stations could operate as before, because the distance was large enough that there was little interfence between the groundwave signals up at 1190 Kc.
(The greatest daytime reach is achieved by the nation’s principal clear channels, from about 900 Kc down to 600 Kc, where their ground wave, the principal mode of daytime propagation, carries quite a distance, given a power of 50 KW.)
The current owners of WOWO are seeking a slight upgrade of their nighttime service, including a more complex directional pattern and an upgrade to 15KW.
The simulcasting of an AM talker over an FM channel seems to be a trend, particularly with AM stations that have iffy coverage at night due to lowered power and goofy directional patterns.
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