1360 Oldies

[RadioFreak965]

I seem to remember picking up AM1360 WCHL from Chapel Hill sometime in 2001 and they were playing Oldies and Classic Country. I was wondering when they flipped to Talk and why?
Thanks

 

[RadioDaze]

They flipped to locally-focused talk in November of 2002, when the station was moved back to Chapel Hill and was LMAed by former owner Vilcom, which eventually bought back their former property from Curtis Media last year. Vilcom, formerly The Village Companies, had programmed a news/talk format on WCHL that was focused on Chapel Hill, Carrboro and Orange County. This approach was pretty much scrapped with the station's sale in late 1997. The "hall of fame" music format, similar to what Don Curtis airs on his Sunday night WPTF program and best described as either MOR or broad-based oldies, came online at that time after Curtis Media bought the station from Vilcom and moved it in with WDNC in Downtown Durham. A morning show was simulcast on both stations. WDNC, already a N/T outlet, continued in that direction, and I believe picked up some of WCHL's syndicated talk shows. Outside of mornings and UNC Sports, though, WCHL was all-music, which was locally automated, and it showed. The songs would just cut off cold towards the end. I remember hearing voice tracks that would frequently not match what song just aired. In their last year in Durham, the morning shows separated and Fox Sports Radio was added afternoons and overnights.

> I seem to remember picking up AM1360 WCHL from Chapel Hill
> sometime in 2001 and they were playing Oldies and Classic
> Country. I was wondering when they flipped to Talk and why?
>
> Thanks
>