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AM Frequency of the week: 1380

cyberdad

cyberdad

40-ish miles northwest of downtown Chicago....

Days: WBEL from Beloit, WI. 5kw ND from about 40 miles west-northwest of me. Fair signal.

Nights: WBEL aims their marble-shooter north and disappears completely. What's left is jumble of stations, sounds almost like a graveyard channel. Saint Louis is the most likely 1380 to rise to the surface, but they're a long way from being a regular. I've also heard Fort Wayne, Indiana, and a couple of times KOTA from Rapid City, SD. Presumably on day pattern.

Retro: In the 1960s Saint Louis...as KWK...WAS a regular. But they haven't fit that description here for years. I'm not quite sure why, because on paper, their night pattern favors the Chicago srea.
Other Locaton: As I've posted previously, during my junior year of high school, I lived in Honolulu. About three blocks from KPOI's studio and transmitter. I walked by it every day on my way to catch the bus for school. A couple of the jocks (the "Poi Boys") lived in our apartment complex. Most notably evening jock, Steve Nicolet. So every so often I got to hang out at the station. Something that really sparked my already budding interest in radio and DX. As also has been posted on these boards, KPOI was an excellent top-40 station during my time in Hawaii, with the legendary Tom Rounds ("TR") as program director and morning drive guy.

Needless to say the 5kw signal that close was a monster, with harmonics all over on the SW bands of my Hallicrafters S-120 receiver. Especially on the lower frequencies, but IIRC all the way up to about 10mhz. More importantly, 5kw and multiple salt water paths was more than enough for KPOI to effectively cover most of the islands with a listenable signal 24/7.
 
In the near north Chicago suburbs during the day WBEL is weak, but readable. At night It's a mess of stations. I also used to hear KWK at night, but haven't heard St Louis in quite awhile.

Retro: Cyberdad--didn't Ron Jacobs also work at KPOI around the time Tom Rounds did? I know Jacobs was at several other stations in Honolulu before and after his California success.
 
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Here in Wood Dale, IL in the near NW suburb of Chicago:

Daytime: weak WBEL
Nightime: nothing really stands out at night. KXFN St. Louis most likely catch

DX/RETRO: Not the most productive frequency for me. Besides WBEL and KXFN catches include WQHK (Ft. Wayne, IN), WAOK (Atlanta, GA), WFCL (Clintonville, Wi), KOTA (Rapid City, SD), CKLC (Kingston, ON)
 
radioman148 said:
Retro: Cyberdad--didn't Ron Jacobs also work at KPOI around the time Tom Rounds did? I know Jacobs was at several other stations in Honolulu before and after his California success.
Click to expand...

Ron Jacobs and Tom Rounds indeed did work together at K-POI, and but Jacobs had moved on shortly before my arrival. The two them built the station into juggernaut that it was, and, among other things, launched American Top 40 after they reunited in California. You probably already know that. Anyway, K-POI'S main competitor, KORL was a very good station in its own right. But K-POI set the bar VERY high. I don't think KORL ever beat them, despite having a better signal and dial position (10KW at 650). Although K-POI's audio processing was better.

I liked KORL. Ted Sachs (later "Sax"), a Honolulu radio fixture of sorts, was the PD and they were running the same PAMS series 18 jingle package as WLS. But I still liked K-POI better!
 
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Yes I was aware of their involvement with AT40. In fact I think Tom Rounds and Casey Kasem passed away around the same time about 4 years ago.
On my first trip to Hawaii in 1978, Ron Jacobs was doing mornings on (I think) KKUA. Lan Roberts who worked with Larry Lujack at KJR in Seattle was hosting mornings at KORL. Of course the guy who got the largest ratings was Hal Lewis aka "Aku".
 
cyberdad said:
Ron Jacobs and Tom Rounds indeed did work together at K-POI, and but Jacobs had moved on shortly before my arrival. The two them built the station into juggernaut that it was, and, among other things, launched American Top 40 after they reunited in California.
Click to expand...

The simplified timeline has both TR and Jacobs working as "Poi Boys" at 1380 KPOI. Jacobs was recruited to program in Fresno, where he was up against Bill Drake at the competitor. Drake liked Jacobs' work, and when Drake did the deal with RKO to convert KHJ to Top 40, he called on Jacobs. Together, they then recruited TR to take the PD duties at KFRC in San Francisco.

TR went on to do music events, starting with the same former KPOI promotion director who later went on to be the manager of Woodstock.

They circled back together to form the team that produced AT40, with Jacobs supervising the writing and production, while TR focused on management and created the first working barter model.

Caveat: I worked for over 20 years for TR as a supplier for his Radio Express, and even briefly worked with Ron Jacobs (on the World Chart show project around 1995) while also doing one of the weekly "new release" CD products.
 
radioman148 said:
Yes I was aware of their involvement with AT40. In fact I think Tom Rounds and Casey Kasem passed away around the same time about 4 years ago.
On my first trip to Hawaii in 1978, Ron Jacobs was doing mornings on (I think) KKUA. Lan Roberts who worked with Larry Lujack at KJR in Seattle was hosting mornings at KORL. Of course the guy who got the largest ratings was Hal Lewis aka "Aku".
Click to expand...

Ron Jacobs left us about two years ago, IIRC. The whole time I was in Hawaii, I don't remember ever even hearing of him, although I'm sure at some point I must have. As for TR, I did meet him a couple of times, but only in very brief passing. Exchange of a sentence or two along the lines of "good luck to ya, kid".

As for KKUA they flipped from being the old KULA to top 40 around 1966 or 67. I thought KULA was a boring waste of a 10kw signal (on 690), so just about any flip would have been an upgrade (As a teenager, I felt pretty much the same way about Aku and KGU)! I left in mid-1965, but I did get to hear KKUA thanks to a friend I was swapping tapes with. I thought that they sounded really good. Ron Jacobs in charge of the place would explain that!

Finally, you mentioned KJR in Seattle. Seattle is where the K-POI evening jock, Steve Nicolet wound up. I believe also at KJR. He's the one who lived in our apartment complex. Super nice guy. He had a feature where he'd play the top 3 songs from mainland cities. So I kept him plied with WLS survey that my grandmother sent me each week. So the top of the WLS "Silver Dollar Survey" was heard in the islands a couple of times a month!
 
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Nothing as exotic as Hawaii but in East Tennessee, (depending specifically where you are), it's WYCH, Clinton TN and/or WKJV, Asheville TN which thou shalt mostly hear in Sevierville on winter middays.

Retro/other: In West Central Ohio, one of top 40 stations we could get after 1971 was WMEE, the former and once again WKJG. Like CKLW, we lost them at pattern change but they had quite a northern signal at night. Once WMEE's pattern change occurred, they were in the background, and it was generally a hodge-podge of WLCY, Tampa (my only FL logging from those days), WAOK, Atlanta, and WBEL, Beloit IL. It was interesting to go to Florida for Fiirst Phone Wonder School and hear WLCY "like a local" day and night.

Quincy IL-a weak KGLD (this was 1985-86)
 
1380 in Atlanta is the Al Sharp Tongue station WAOK. It used to be a CBS O&O but is now owned by EnterCom.
Now I don't listen to Crazy Al because I agree or disagree with his perspective. I listen because I try to figure out how many drinks he's had before going on the air.
But he's selling spots- both national and local.
 
Here in NE PA, in my 'option years' as a DXer (hi), it's WMLP Milton PA during the day, a talker owned by the Sunbury Broadcast group. WMLP is about 20-25 miles northwest of here.
I did catch the 'WKDM' from New York City a few times at night.

* * * * *

In the retromaniac DX days near JFK Airport long ago, 1380 was a surprisingly proliferate frequency when you consider it had not just one but two (click) two (click) local NYC share-time stations -- WBNX and WAWZ. I count 22 stations logged there, with the best being KRKO Washington and their 'Jetline News' at 4AM one Monday. KUDL Kansas City and KWK St. Louis were two other 'K' stations heard in the wee hours when WBNX was off.
You see, WAWZ often was late signing on during their designated hours of worship (if they signed on at all). Poor WAMS in Wilmington DE had to use at least three different patterns daily to adjust for the two NYC regionals. I heard WAMS exactly * once * in all those feverish teenaged DXing years.


@ Gr8Oldies: I wonder if WMEE ever played
a) 'Blue Velvet' by Bobby Vinton
b) 'Do You Know The Way To San Jose'
c) 'I Need Your Lovin' by Don Gardner and DeeDee Ford
d) 'She's a Lady' by Tom Jones
e) any other songs with lyrics containing 'wo-wo' , hi
 
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Yakima, WA
1380 days - usually nothing, sometimes KRKO Everett WA (Sports) during winter.
Night - Usually KRKO Everett dominates, sometimes KKOO Ontario OR (Oldies) and/or KTKZ Sacramento (Conservative Talk) mix in.
I've also heard KLPZ Parker AZ (Country), mainly during strong aurora, and KOTA Rapid City (News/Talk) an hour or two before sunrise in October and sometimes in winter when the conditions are good and our sunrise is well after 7AM.

The only station I'm looking for on 1380 is KJUA Cheyenne (Urban), it runs 1000 watts daytime and should be an easy pick at sunrise, but I've never heard them. The other two in CA (KOSS Lancaster, 1KW-D/20W-N and KVSM Santa Maria, 650W-D/500W-N) are almost impossible to try for with KTKZ in the way. I'm sure my 1380 log would be much larger if I was living in the Midwestern U.S.!
 
DXing The Theatre of The Mind: Having spent nearly a decade in the Captivating Climate Capital of Colorado, Cañon City (with the economy firmly focused in the "Capitivating"!), I've often wondered why Cañon's original AM, KRLN, never applied to move from the crowded 1400 to 1380.

If it were my station, I'd have applied to run 5 kW day, ND on 1380 with at least 500 watts night into a two tower array (if it were possible). Then again, if I were a farmer, I'd be "equipment poor," with a fancy 8 row combine where a two row corn picker was all that needed to do the job.
 
I'm guessing when KRLN signed on, the original owners probably figured the graveyard channel would give them all that they wanted...and would ever want. Then, once they became established and got into a comfort zone, they didn't want to bother with an 8-row combine. :)
 
From NW San Antonio:

Daytime: Semi-local KWMF, a Spanish-language Catholic station in Pleasanton.

Sunset: Classic hits station KBWD in Brownwood starts mixing in/under KWMF, as does KRCM "Radio Vida" in Shenandoah.

Night: KWMF drops from 4 kW to 160 watts ND and is barely heard. XECO "Romantica" in Mexico City is most dominant, while KBWD and KRCM are in and out. Aiming west I can often hear sports talker KHEY in El Paso.

Retro/DX: I haven't heard r&b/soul station KKRX in Lawton, OK, or Catholic station WPYR in Baton Rouge in at least a couple of years.
 
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