WGTO QSL Card

[frankberry]

Does anyone have a 1979-1982 QSL card from WGTO, Cypress Gardens, Florida?
When I was the Chief Engineer for WGTO, I sent a gazillion QSL cards out.
I would love to have a copy of one of the cards.
You can email me at [email protected]

 

[fldxer]

I've got one from 1980 when living in VA. Don't have a scanner- but probably find one close.
Greg
Holiday, FL

 

[frankberry]

That would be great. I didn't save any of the WGTO QSL cards when I left the station.

 

[BobOnTheJob]

Never heard that station up here in Indiana but did visit Cypress Gardens & was able to see what appeared to be a rather antiquated studio in the early 1980's. What can you tell us about the history of how 50KW AM station WGTO (W Gulf To Ocean) ended up with studios in the Cypress Gardens tourist attraction...a most unusual scenario in FL radio history.

 

[frankberry]

Visit www.dizzyrambler.com and find the WGTO information (I wrote some of it).
WGTO was a powerhouse and got huge ratings.

 

[radioman148]

What was the farthest WGTO was heard--day VS night.

 

[frankberry]

I did an overnight test running 50kw. I got letters from every state.
Of course, they were normally only 1kw at night. No DX there.

 

[Tom Wells]

What years was the studio in Cypress Gardens? I was there in '68, and if there was a radio station ANYWHERE on the property,
I think I would have heard about it. I was 7, but already a radio geek.
I do remember the gardens, the Southern Belles sitting around in HUGE pouffy dresses.

I also remember the underwater "mermaid show" at Wiki Wachi. It's long gone like Cypress Gardens.

 

[gr8oldies]

I remember seeing WGTOs building on the Cypress Gardens grounds in 1985. Cypress Gardens had its own zip code so guess its a place to license a station.

 

[radioman148]

I did an overnight test running 50kw. I got letters from every state.
Of course, they were normally only 1kw at night. No DX there.

What was the daytime coverage like? I'm guessing that on 540 it must have been extensive.

 

[frankberry]

I did an overnight test running 50kw. I got letters from every state.
Of course, they were normally only 1kw at night. No DX there.

What was the daytime coverage like? I'm guessing that on 540 it must have been extensive.

Daytime coverage was HUGE. You could hear it from Key West to the Georgia state line.
Their daytime .5mV/m coutour covered about half of the state.

 

[frankberry]

If anyone wants a copy of the WGTO daytime coverage map, please email me and I'll send it to you (in pdf format).

 

[BobOnTheJob]

I did an overnight test running 50kw. I got letters from every state.
Of course, they were normally only 1kw at night. No DX there.

What was the daytime coverage like? I'm guessing that on 540 it must have been extensive.

Daytime coverage was HUGE. You could hear it from Key West to the Georgia state line.
Their daytime .5mV/m coutour covered about half of the state.

I didn't check the Georgia state line direction, but I can vouch for the reception in Key West in the early 80's...and that path was mostly across ground that doesn't have the world's best conductivity. How tall were the sticks?

 

[gr8oldies]

I know I got GTO in Macon when I stayed there once tho it was around sunset.

 

[tanner]

Amazing how cheap channel can destroy something like 540's signal, moving it from where it was to sharing space with 740. Anyone know why is is directional during the day?

 

[gr8oldies]

550 in Orange Park would be one reason. I suppose a null toward Miami would be in order.

 

[gar hi]

I moved down here to Florida in 84. Never heard of this station until now.

Interesting.

 

[gar hi]

Now I can see why I didn't take notice of WGTO back then. I looked up their history and they had a country music format at the time and then went to gospel a couple years later. Not my cup of tea.

Still, I wish I had paid attention to it back then and attempted to hear it from back up north on my visits there.

Seems some station in Michigan now uses their call letters.

 

[frankberry]

WGTO had four towers. The towers were 350' in height.

 

[BobOnTheJob]

WGTO had four towers. The towers were 350' in height.

It put out a whale of a signal for having well less than quarter wave towers...Is the daytime signal over Orlando better now than then? I can understand upgrading the night system, any idea why they did major surgery on the daytime signal?