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Call Letters - KFRC

1

1069_KIFR

Star Participant
I think it is time for CBS to move the call letters KFRC to KCBS-FM, Los Angeles, Jack FM.
Bring the KCBS-FM call letters to 106.9.

CBS would still own the KFRC call letters and they would be on an actual music station.

KFRC would essentially move from the number 4 market to the number 2 market
 
Wouldn't make any difference except to people who have a fixation on call letters.
 
Given that CBS has all of its properties ID with HD suffixes, you're going to get a clunky legal that's rapidly fired within the imaging with or without it.

By the time you're done paying to file the paperwork and paying the administrative costs of updating every piece of paper at headquarters (much less updating the call signs on every piece of paper at the two stations)... remind me again why this is worth the time and effort when it doesn't change your branding, ratings, or revenue?
 
johndavis said:
By the time you're done paying to file the paperwork and paying the administrative costs of updating every piece of paper at headquarters (much less updating the call signs on every piece of paper at the two stations)... remind me again why this is worth the time and effort when it doesn't change your branding, ratings, or revenue?
Click to expand...

(sarcasm mode on)

Because the OP wants it, that's why!

(sarcasm mode off)
 
It will never happened, at all

CBS maybe going to put the KFRC calls on a SF Station not LA

Put KCBS-FM on 106.9
 
No need. As KM says, only call letter freaks would care. "KFRC" means nothing in L.A. And having those calls on KCBS' FM simulcast sure doesn't keep them from having a great top-of-the-hour ID:

http://www.tophour.com/audio/San%20Francisco-San%20Jose%20CA/am0740_2014-12_kcbs_sfybush.mp3

And CBS is doing nice stuff with KFRC HD-2, playing classic hits with an emphasis on stuff that was big on KFRC in the 70s and early 80s with IDs and jingles from back in the day. Driving around San Francisco, it sounds about right...only missing the jocks:

http://player.radio.com/listen/station/kfrccom-classic-hits
 
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michael hagerty said:
No need. As KM says, only call letter freaks would care. "KFRC" means nothing in L.A. And having those calls on KCBS' FM simulcast sure doesn't keep them from having a great top-of-the-hour ID:

http://www.tophour.com/audio/San%20Francisco-San%20Jose%20CA/am0740_2014-12_kcbs_sfybush.mp3

And CBS is doing nice stuff with KFRC HD-2, playing classic hits with an emphasis on stuff that was big on KFRC in the 70s and early 80s with IDs and jingles from back in the day. Driving around San Francisco, it sounds about right...only missing the jocks:

http://player.radio.com/listen/station/kfrccom-classic-hits
Click to expand...

I agree with Michael and KM. I'm not a big KCBS listener (all commercials all the time, with an occasional news segment), but I love that TOH ID. It was a bit disconcerting at first hearing those call letters on a news station, but (sentimentalist that I am), it's still nice having them in the Bay Area.

There was an argument a few years ago on this site about K-F-R-C, which invoke San FRanCisco even though the calls were apparently given in sequence to the Don Lee station at its inception, by the agency that preceded the FCC. I dug up some evidence that stations in that era WERE in fact, given requested call letters on occasion. The first known request was the banker from Des Moines who requested (and was granted) "WHO" in April of 1924. KFRC did not come along until September 1924. But regardless, the KFRC calls have historical meaning, and would be silly to park in Los Angeles...not to mention all the paperwork and FCC fees involved for CBS for no possible gain.

Possible evidence for Don Lee requesting the KFRC call letters - KFRB (Bakersfield) didn't exist until 1948, and KFRE (FREsno) went on the air in 1937. Couldn't find anything on KFRD.

I don't know the reason the KCBS call letters were allowed by CBS to remain in San Francisco, while KNBC was rightfully moved to LA. Growing up in LA it was odd to have KABC (radio and TV), KNBC (TV) and KNX/KNXT. I assume the rationale at the time was that KCBS was locked in a ratings fight with KGO radio, and it made sense to keep them for the status it conveyed, and KNX listeners in LA were used to those historical calls, and there was no point changing. But I'm just speculating.

BTW - Ronald Reagan worked at WHO for 4 years in the 1930s.
 
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LKellerIII said:
I agree with Michael and KM. I'm not a big KCBS listener (all commercials all the time, with an occasional news segment), but I love that TOH ID. It was a bit disconcerting at first hearing those call letters on a news station, but (sentimentalist that I am), it's still nice having them in the Bay Area.
Click to expand...

I listen pretty much every day for at least 25 minutes. That ID is, in my book, as good as most Top 40 TOHs from back in the day. And after 21 months, I still turn up the volume when they begin the tease that leads into it.
 
Agreed - it is a great one. My personal favorites - radio nerd that I am - are the ones whispered at lightening speed when the station's "brand" (if you will) doesn't match the call letters previously granted to the frequency - usually when a brand and format are new For a few months in 1997 (IIRC), Clear Channel had sucked up the AM/FM Corporation, and there were a bunch of frequency swaps, so the the TOH IDs were:

"Kiss-FM" "K-B-G-G, San Francisco"(had been K-Big)

Wild 94.9 - K-S-A-N San Francisco"

"K-San - K-Y-L-D, San Francisco" (107.7 and 94.9 had swapped)
 
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LKellerIII said:
I don't know the reason the KCBS call letters were allowed by CBS to remain in San Francisco, while KNBC was rightfully moved to LA. Growing up in LA it was odd to have KABC (radio and TV), KNBC (TV) and KNX/KNXT. I assume the rationale at the time was that KCBS was locked in a ratings fight with KGO radio, and it made sense to keep them for the status it conveyed, and KNX listeners in LA were used to those historical calls, and there was no point changing. But I'm just speculating.
Click to expand...

Your speculation is close to the mark, Llew. The KCBS calls were as meaningful to San Franciscans as the KNX calls were to Los Angelenos. To move them to L.A. would have created the exact same situation NBC faced when moving the KNBC calls south ... up until the FCC decision to allow calls to exist in different markets (provided they were on no more than one station in each service -- AM/FM/TV -- total) moving KCBS would have required both the AM and FM calls in SF to change. Probably wasn't an issue on FM, but CBS was in a more competitive position on AM than was NBC with KNBC (now KNBR, of course).

They probably looked at it, figured the paperwork and filing fees weren't worth it -- losing them on the AM in SF wasn't worth having them on channel 2 in LA (and you notice KNX still has the same call sign now as then) -- and just left everything alone until the FCC decision let them add KCBS-TV, but in a different market than KCBS and KCBS-FM.

Of course, the -FM call ended up down here eventually as well, when CBS tried to emulate WCBS-FM's format on the former KNX-FM, but that is a different story for another day.
 
I just had a funny thought, re-reading my last post.

If Dr. Don Rose were still alive, he probably would have said "I'm gonna take the KFRC call letters, move to Sacratomato, and set up shop there ... the heck with the rest of ya!"
 
K.M. Richards said:
I just had a funny thought, re-reading my last post.

If Dr. Don Rose were still alive, he probably would have said "I'm gonna take the KFRC call letters, move to Sacratomato, and set up shop there ... the heck with the rest of ya!"
Click to expand...

Why didn't he call it "Sacrapimento"?
 
semoochie said:
Why didn't he call it "Sacrapimento"?
Click to expand...

I've lived here for almost two years now, have been coming here most of my life to visit, and have never heard anyone call it Sacrapimento. Apparently, people do. If you Google "Sacrapimento", it treats it as a mistake first, but if you tell the search engine that's what you really mean, it finds 282 references. "Sacratomato" you get right away, with 36,000 references. It's just the more common nickname for the town.

The funny thing about KM's thought is that if Dr. Don had taken the KFRC calls to Sacratomato, everybody would have known what he was talking about. KFRC not only came in like a local in the glory days (before interference ate the AM dial and when world-class engineers like Phil Lerza, who knew how to maximize an audio chain, were in charge), but it showed up in the ratings fairly regularly. The big Top 40 battles were between KROY and KXOA/KNDE, but both of those stations nervously looked over their shoulder at KFRC, which was absolutely a factor...to the point of having a toll-free Sacramento request line.
 
K.M. Richards said:
I just had a funny thought, re-reading my last post.

If Dr. Don Rose were still alive, he probably would have said "I'm gonna take the KFRC call letters, move to Sacratomato, and set up shop there ... the heck with the rest of ya!"
Click to expand...

Wouldn't he then have had to deal with KLOK?
 
michael hagerty said:
I've lived here for almost two years now, have been coming here most of my life to visit, and have never heard anyone call it Sacrapimento. Apparently, people do. If you Google "Sacrapimento", it treats it as a mistake first, but if you tell the search engine that's what you really mean, it finds 282 references. "Sacratomato" you get right away, with 36,000 references. It's just the more common nickname for the town.

The funny thing about KM's thought is that if Dr. Don had taken the KFRC calls to Sacratomato, everybody would have known what he was talking about. KFRC not only came in like a local in the glory days (before interference ate the AM dial and when world-class engineers like Phil Lerza, who knew how to maximize an audio chain, were in charge), but it showed up in the ratings fairly regularly. The big Top 40 battles were between KROY and KXOA/KNDE, but both of those stations nervously looked over their shoulder at KFRC, which was absolutely a factor...to the point of having a toll-free Sacramento request line.
Click to expand...

OK, this now makes sense: I thought Dr. Don was just playing with words but Sacramento is or at least was well known as a tomato processing area with several such plants. I had no idea and thought "Sacrapimento" was a better fit. I'm sure that all of these "Sacratomato" references exist only because of Dr. Don and any references to "Sacrapimento" are from people like me who jumped to the wrong conclusion without all the facts.
 
semoochie said:
OK, this now makes sense: I thought Dr. Don was just playing with words but Sacramento is or at least was well known as a tomato processing area with several such plants. I had no idea and thought "Sacrapimento" was a better fit. I'm sure that all of these "Sacratomato" references exist only because of Dr. Don and any references to "Sacrapimento" are from people like me who jumped to the wrong conclusion without all the facts.
Click to expand...

Still are. From about 60 miles north of Sac down through the Central Valley, we grow 90 percent of the tomatoes consumed in the U.S. and half of the tomatoes the world eats.
 
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