George must have loved the bragging rights of 50kw, regardless of how directional the signal was. I recall years ago some major market station used the number of towers their Ancient Modulation station had as a selling advantage over a single stick competitor. Guess who had better market coverage? But they figured a ditzy media buyer wouldn't see through the smoke screen and might place a buy.
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710 WGBS HISTORY
- Thread starter thebeach33445
- Start date
George's first stations were not 50 kw operations... ones like WSPD in Toledo and WMMN in Fairmont, WV, were regionals capped at 5 kw. When he acquired WWVA in Wheeling, he seemed to have become fascinated with high power operations since the night time country broadcasts and the WWVA Jamboree got mail from up and down the Atlantic Seaboard and even the Maritimes.
I always enjoyed hearing them ID as "The friendly voice from out of the hills of West Viginia".
I heard long ago that he tried to engineer WJW in Cleveland for 50 kw, but apparently overlap with Toledo made it difficult to engineer; a later owner managed to do it.
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At one time WGBS used to brag it was Florida's only full time 50KW station (the others reducing power at night). David, is this still true?
I think we all know power isn't everything.
I think we all know power isn't everything.
WYGM 740 has 50 kw night, and WFLF is 46 kw at night.
And both use 250w FM translators, so guess that 50kw on Ancient Modulation aint worth what it was when George B owned WGBS.
I remember traveling through Florida by train and WGBS has a great signal in the daytime in the middle of the state.
710 was a power house. WINZ AM also daytime back in the day. When I was on WGBS at night I would always get calls from South America and truckers from all over the USA. Same thing when I was on WDAE in Tampa. Both were DX/Trucker Stations in those years at night.
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In the mid to late 60's I used to hear WGBS regularly at night on my car radio... in Quito, Ecuador.
10-4 on that David. I was amazed at the reach of WGBS at night. But this signal talk reminds me of the last week that Miami's FUN 79 was on the air as we had to sign off at midnight on the last week. Few of those last nights I kept FUN on all night anyway but one of those nights at 3am I got a Hot line call from our PD who was in the Virgin Islands and heard me in a taxi and called to have me shut down. So even WFUN reached into to DX land at times and I'm still glad I did it.
www.WFUNTribute.com
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Were you at FUN in the Dick Starr era?
No he pasted away before I was there. Many of my friends did work with him and loved him.
He was WFUN's youngest PD ever and a WFUN legend. We have pics of him on the WFUN Tribute site. I was there in the last few years of FUN, I came from WINZ and after FUN I went to sister station WDAE and then came back to Miami to LOVE 94, Y100 and K102. Then left Miami and went into TV at HBO for 8 years. Last 20 years into online radio as you know. www.InternetRadio.us
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And the WFUN call letters live on today at 970 AM in Ashtabula, Ohio with an ESPN sports format. [On the FM side, the WFUN call letters belong to a rhythmic oldies station in Bethalto, Illinois]
When I moved from the Tampa Bay area to NE Ohio I spent my evenings trying to dial in the stations I used to listen to. Only ones I was able to pick up was WSUN and it was fighting it out with WTMJ from Milwaukee. Was able to pick them up pretty good until a station in Knoxville, TN increased their power and forever ended me be able to pick them up. Can't recall the other one offhand. Never was able to pick up any stations further south of the Tampa Bay area.
When I moved from the Tampa Bay area to NE Ohio I spent my evenings trying to dial in the stations I used to listen to. Only ones I was able to pick up was WSUN and it was fighting it out with WTMJ from Milwaukee. Was able to pick them up pretty good until a station in Knoxville, TN increased their power and forever ended me be able to pick them up. Can't recall the other one offhand. Never was able to pick up any stations further south of the Tampa Bay area.
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I was in a group of stations that exchanged promotional ideas and Dick Starr handled the WDUN participation. The group was (and still is) called the International Broadcasters Idea Bank and was limited to one station in any market. I can't even guess how many great ideas I got from Dick, and I visited him several times when I came up to Miami to buy parts and equipment. I was the youngest PD in my market, so we enjoyed corresponding.
Much of what I knew about Top 40 radio I learned in Miami!
I was with Metroplex /Y-100 from 1980 and had a good friend at WDAE, former WOWO PD Chris Rathaus.
I must have just missed you at Y100 as I left in 79 for K102. Now I know how you know so much about radio as you knew the likes of Dick Starr and go back that far. Very cool.
I worked with Spender Danes after he left WGBS. He had great respect for the station.
The FCC database is showing WAQI with 50K day and night from the old location. Does anyone know why the move apparently never took place?
It did take place and is in operation with the lower power levels.
Radio Locator hasn't updated since the change. Here's the FCC link you're looking for: https://fccdata.org/?appid=1784537&facid=37254 Program Test Authority has been granted.
For the same reason that WRHC has been transmitting with these four invisible towers for well over a decade...LOL
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