The Top 40 formatted simulcast known as "KF99 KQ105" serving the Union City/Paris, TN area is no more. WWKF 99.3 (Fulton, KY) is now WWGY, and WAKQ 105.5 (Paris, TN) is now WRQR-FM. Formats have changed to Froggy country on WWGY and classic rock on WRQR-FM. The stations are owned by Forever Communications.
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"KF99 KQ105" Union City/Paris, TN
- Thread starter AMFMKYTN
- Start date
Wow, this is the first major format change in the Ken-Tenn area in the last couple of generations! KF-99 had been top 40 for about 37 years, and KQ-105 had been simulcasting with them for about the last 30 or so years. Meanwhile, KYTN has been country for about the last 30+ years, as well.
I wonder where this leaves KYTN. I can't really see TWO country stations in a town with a population of just over 10,000. Look for other changes soon!
I wonder where this leaves KYTN. I can't really see TWO country stations in a town with a population of just over 10,000. Look for other changes soon!
FROGGY is now on 94.3 and 99.3, as WZGY 94.3 in Dyer dropped its simulcast of Classic Country "Willie 94".
Forever purchased Benton-Weatherford Broadcasting and co-owned WHDM Broadcasting’s stations in the Paris area last year.
So, it looks a little like this:
Union City/Dyersburg TN: WENK | WWGY | WZGY
Paris/McKenzie TN: WHNY-AM/FM | WTPR | WHDM | WLZK | WRQR
None of this includes the Jackson stations.
Forever purchased Benton-Weatherford Broadcasting and co-owned WHDM Broadcasting’s stations in the Paris area last year.
So, it looks a little like this:
Union City/Dyersburg TN: WENK | WWGY | WZGY
Paris/McKenzie TN: WHNY-AM/FM | WTPR | WHDM | WLZK | WRQR
None of this includes the Jackson stations.
94.3 had been Froggy one time before in the early 2000's and they simulcasted Froggy 104.1 in Jackson.
About the only stations that I wasn't familiar with on your list were WHNY and WLZK. Then I checked Radio-Locator, and I see that both of them were WMUF at one point. Seems like the Paris-area stations are just recycling station call letters now.
And it looks like between Forever and Thunderbolt, they pretty much own all of northwest TN radio now.
I remember predicting that "Dyer County Country" would do something like this a year or two back. It has taken a while, but now it seems like they have.
And Union City now does NOT have a top-40 radio station for the first time since (I think) 1956! The youth market there must be rapidly shrinking!
Except for WASL 100.1/WTRO 1450/WTNV 97.3 in Dyersburg, owned by Burks Broadcasting (The Dr. Pepper/Pepsi owner - Still absolutely no ads for Coca Cola).
Just another change in 20+ years of simulcasting another area station, only this time from Union City instead of Jackson. The short run as Dyer County Country was the only time they did anything separate from another station.
Well, I said "pretty much." I left some wiggle room there. Does Burks have any holdings outside of Dyersburg?
A Union City/Dyersburg simulcast makes a LITTLE more sense than the Union City/Paris simulcast that Hailey had going for 30 years there. As for 94.3, I have a feeling that they are in too rural of an area to be a truly independent station.
Those 3 are all I know of.
The COL is Dyer and the tower is closer to Yorkville, so you're right.
I remember "back in the day" when 94.3 simulcast Z105.3 in Humboldt, before Boyd sold 94.3 and 105.3 to Forever around 2006. Before Z1053, it was branded as The Vision. WLSZ was 105.3 in Humboldt with WLSQ-FM 94.3 in Dyer, the COL. The 94.3 tower is at Yorkville. Boyd also had 1190 AM in Humboldt, which Forever also got in the deal. Forever didn't keep 1190 long, and I believe they also later sold 105.3.
94.3 was WLSQ-FM (1995-2006), WQGY (2006-2007), WLLI-FM (2007-2008), WTJJ (2008-2016), WDYE (2016-2017), WLLI-FM (2017-2019) and now WZGY.
94.3 was WLSQ-FM (1995-2006), WQGY (2006-2007), WLLI-FM (2007-2008), WTJJ (2008-2016), WDYE (2016-2017), WLLI-FM (2017-2019) and now WZGY.
Thanks for the info. I couldn't remember the exact time frame for the different owners and stations. With the exception of WLSQ being CHR or alternative rock and WTJJ being news/talk (The biggest waste of that frequency) it has been some sort of country format the rest of the time.
I guarantee you that Forever doesn't care that there is no longer a top-40 station in Obion Co. (for the first time in about 65 years!) or that there are now TWO country stations there. Forever thinks regionally, not locally, and their goal is to get that Frog into as many communities as possible. Eventually they will have all the Frogs in Jackson, Dyersburg, Union City, and Murray all simulcasting with each other. And probably with more to come!
It sounds like some of the not so sensible moves they've done in Jackson, especially when they did an overkill of news/talk on FM with the TJ network, which included 94.3 when it was WTJJ.
Was the coverage too Jackson-centric for a station that far north of Jackson?
I don't really know because I didn't listen that much, but they had the news/talk format on 1390, the translator in 94.1 on Jackson (Which are both now Willie 94.1), 105.3, and 94.3 when there was (and still is) another news/talk station on 101.5, and 97.7 in Trenton was also news/talk for a period in the early 2000's as well. I'm not a big fan of news talk anyway, especially on FM, but I thought it was overkill for that many stations in West TN. Even now 93.1, which had been WWGM and carried Southern Gospel has switched to news/talk and picked up the old WTJS call letters of 1390. But two FM news/talk frequencies in the area is better than the five FMs (Three on Forever's TJ Network) plus an AM that was going on a few years back.
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I haven't lived down in west TN for many years, but I am trying to remember if I ever listened to 94.3 when I lived there. As I see on Radio-Locator, they don't list any call letters prior to 1993 so that may explain why I was not familiar with them. I seem to remember listening to 105.3 a few times while I lived there. In their present location, 94.3 seems destined to be a simulcast of at least one other station somewhere, if not satellite-fed or voice-tracked. Yorkville can't exactly be a booming community for an FM station.
It looks like WLSQ-FM 94.3 signed on in February, 1995.
According to Hailey on Facebook:
And according to someone else on Facebook:
So Ace & T.J. can apparently still be heard there, although it may be more of a challenge now.
I was going from Radio-Locator info, which showed call letters dating back to 1993. At any rate, either of those dates came after I moved out of west TN.
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