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AM Frequency of the Week: 1420

cyberdad

cyberdad

Let's go to the right side of the dial as we kick off the new year and stop at 1420. What are you guys hearing there these days?

Here in the far northwest suburbs of You-Know-Where, daytime it's mostly splatter from local 1kw rimshot, WRMN (1410). On a really good day, with a really good radio, I can sometimes get a whiff of either WOC (Davenport, IA) or WIMS on the other side of Chicago in Michigan City, IN. Night is usually a mess, with WOC most likely to emerge on top. But although WOC has a nighttime lobe that would appear to be somewhat favorable to me, they don't break through as often as one might expect.
 
Did you ever hear WAMM/WFLT? In the late 1960s, I heard an R & B station on 1420 in Northwest Suburban Chicago right around Sunset. I had just heard WPON, 1000 watts nondirectional on 1460, 30 miles or so away, about the same distance from Chicago. I assumed that I couldn't hear WAMM because it was just 500 watts, and directional. What I didn't know is that the inverse field in the direction of Chicago exceeded the inverse field from WPON. WFLT has been heard in Wisconsin.
 
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I hear CFGO 1200 at 1420, on every radio all across the city. It seems that it's either a harmonic or a spur.
 
In the near north Chicago suburbs the station I hear most often on 1420 is WIMS. During the day I get some splatter from WEEF. I have heard WOC at night but usually it's more of a mess.
 
1420 here is WAOC from St. Augustine. It has a pretty good signal daytime via the water path, audible pretty much anywhere inside I-526, even a little outside it.

It was sports for a long period of time (dating to about 2005-06), both ESPN and CBS. Before that it was a country station. Last August however, they flipped to a tourist information format (much like what 1390 was in Charleston). When I was there last July, they were still sports.

They actually have local people on though doing shows, so it's not canned like the station we had here.

1420 also has a FM translator in St. Augustine at 96.5. At night, 1420 is a mish mash of signals. WHK Cleveland is the one that comes in most often at 600 miles.
 
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Here around Columbus, Ohio, WHK sometimes will sneak in at night. We're in the general direction of what looks to be a pretty solid null to the southwest.
I am not sure I've ever heard WHK here during the day, nor anything else on 1420. That's between a weak WING from Dayton and WCLT out of Newark (daytime only; WCLT is gone here at night, as is WING).
 
Schroedingers Cat said:
Did you ever hear WAMM/WFLT? In the late 1960s, I heard an R & B station on 1420 in Northwest Suburban Chicago right around Sunset. I had just heard WPON, 1000 watts nondirectional on 1460, 30 miles or so away, about the same distance from Chicago. I assumed that I couldn't hear WAMM because it was just 500 watts, and directional. What I didn't know is that the inverse field in the direction of Chicago exceeded the inverse field from WPON. WFLT has been heard in Wisconsin.
Click to expand...

Nope! Never heard WAMM/WFLT here. Which isn't to say that it's not present, but simply an unidentifiable part of the slop. I'm about 15 miles south of the Wisconsin state line. I did drive by the transmitter site once, however. To me, it looked for all the world like they were broadcasting from a garbage dump!
 
Early in his career, in about 1957, Casey Kasem worked at WAMM 1420. He described to me the trailer in which the studio was located at the time. I remembered seeing that trailer when I was a kid! The area looks like a lush green lawn now.

Many station towers are located in areas that look like a dump, and some are landfills. WLAV 1340, WMAX 1480, and WFUR 1570 were all located in an actual dump in Grand Rapids. WMAX 1480 was sold to GVSU and became WGVU. Their engineer told them to not buy the tower in the dump when they bought it, and they moved the TL out to Kentwood. WJRW 1340 and WFUR 1570 are still there, though the dump may have been cleaned up.
 
Daytime in S.A. it's semi-local KGNB in New Braunfels. They air classic country / local talk and have a fairly good signal.

At night KGNB is still there but weaker and prone to fading. In it's null, I can usually hear XEH in Monterrey and XEEW in Matamoros fading in and out. The former plays regional Mexican music, and the latter is a news/talker. KPIR "The Big 1420" in Granbury pops up from time to time with classic country, news talk, and sometimes high school and college games.

I've heard KJDL "Raider Classic Country" a couple of times in the past, but it was back when they were playing current hit pop.
 
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