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Meanings behind Mississippi call letters

WSJC 810 in Magee, with 50 kw day, call letters represented the 4 counties it blanketed with the strongest signal ... don't have a map in front of me, and I suffer from an old man's fading memory, but how about Walthall, Simpson, Covington, and Jones? WVMI possibly Voice of MIssissippi. WVIM FM Coldwater, used to say We're Very Involved (in) Mississippi. A stretch, but ...

If I got some of the WSJC counties wrong, look at a map and correct me. I can take it.
 
WSJC 810 in Magee, with 50 kw day, call letters represented the 4 counties it blanketed with the strongest signal ... don't have a map in front of me, and I suffer from an old man's fading memory, but how about Walthall, Simpson, Covington, and Jones? WVMI possibly Voice of MIssissippi. WVIM FM Coldwater, used to say We're Very Involved (in) Mississippi. A stretch, but ...

If I got some of the WSJC counties wrong, look at a map and correct me. I can take it.
 
Walthall is on the Louisiana border between McComb and Columbia, so it would be too far down to border Simpson County. Jones doesn't border Simpson, but Jefferson Davis does. However, I just looked up WSJC on Wikipedia and it says that the call stand for "We Share Jesus Christ".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WSJC
 
Golden, the significance you attach to the WSJC call letters is certainly valid for what the station is today, a religious outfit ... but was that what the original owner had in mind when choosing the calls? I doubt it. The station was not a religious outlet in the 50s through the 70s. Maybe S, J, and C were the only calls that signified counties, and the W was automatically there, as it would be for any station east of the Miss River. Didja know that WSJC was originally on 1280 with about 500 watts ... moved to 790 with a little more power, then went to 810 with the big signal. I'm recalling it back to about 1957.
 
WSJC was owned by the Mathis family (I knew Mike Mathis). They had a thing for high powered stations in small towns ... another situation similar to WSJC was their WCPC 940 in Houston Ms ... 50 kw in a town of maybe 5000 people. And a thought that reinforces what I remember them telling me about the significance of the calls: The CPC in WCPC stood, like SJC, for the 3 primary counties reached: Chickasaw, POntotoc, Calhoun.
 
Gosh, I had no idea the WOHT calls had been in Jackson before. REC Net shows them also having been in Cleveland and Drew before settling in Grenada.

It's amusing to see how well known calls often wind up be re-used in the same state for completely different types of stations. In Alabama, the calls of two B'ham top 40s are still in the area. WSGN is now the public radio outlet in Gadsden and WVOK is AC K-98 in Anniston.
 
flytrap said:
Speaking which. I've notice that the last few times I've been through Vicksburg WQBC has been off the air. Is it gone forever? If it is, its a shame because I believe its the oldest station in Mississippi that still has its original call letters.
Click to expand...

It's being sold, and according to the Taylor on Radio-Info letter, they lost the lease to the tower site.
 
DE
[/quote]

I was working at WMSI / WJDX when they made the switch to WOHT during the big ice storm in '89. When they finally got power back at the transmitter site, you could hear them at several spots on the FM dial from the antenna being coated with 2-3 inches of ice.

I remember that. For a while 95.5 was one of the few FM or TV stations still on the air. Several had no electricity or were on greatly reduced power. I believe that was also the time Z 106's tower fell and they could only be heard by tuning to the AM simulcast on 1590. If I remember correctly the stations that were down were the same stations that also went off during the power failure that also knocked WAPT off the air during the super bowl one year. WJDX had an exclusive on the superbowl until WAPT came back. They must have be on a differnent line because they don't have multiple radio/tv station outages like they used to.

during that ice storm I remember there were more AM stations still on the air but the FM stations were dark.
 
WRKN-RanKiN
WCSP=Crystal SPrings
WBKN-Brookhaven
WCLD-"cleveland"
WTUP="tup"elo
WELO-Tup "elo"?
WKOZ-Kosiusko
WNAT-NATchez
WTYL-Tylertown

a few out of town stations you prob already know
WSM Nashville-we shield millions-insurance company slogan
WLS-chicago-worlds largest store-sears
KCMO-Kansas City, MO
WREC Memphis-originally in MS. Wooton Radio Electric
 
Regarding the ice storm... I don't recall exactly which stations were left. But, I know we at Majic 107 stayed up, simply because the antenna was east of town where conditions were not as bad. VSWR remained within acceptable levels.

We did, however, have some odd power issues at the studio. I had to run orange extension cords down the hallway to power the control room; we had no power in there.

I don't want to get too deep into the weeds with calls of stations out of the Magnolia State. But, I'll add one, simply because it was often #1 on the Gulf Coast. WWL/870. That "L" stood for Loyola, the owner of the station for many, many years.

DE
 
WBKN would have made a meaningful set of call letters for a station in Brookhaven; however, WBKN, at 1410 on the dial, was in NEWTON, Mississippi. Station may be silent now.

Yesterday I tossed out WHNY McComb; no takers. From what I could tell, the calls have no real significance, other than that it fit a pattern set by its then-owner, Charles Holt, to wit: WHHY Montgomery, WHXY Bogalusa, WHSY Hattiesburg, and WHNY McComb. What he saw in WH-Y is beyond me, but it's more than mere coincidence.

And the other McComb calls, WCCA, were Camellia City of America.
 
J Alex Bowab said:
Yesterday I tossed out WHNY McComb; no takers. From what I could tell, the calls have no real significance, other than that it fit a pattern set by its then-owner, Charles Holt, to wit: WHHY Montgomery, WHXY Bogalusa, WHSY Hattiesburg, and WHNY McComb. What he saw in WH-Y is beyond me, but it's more than mere coincidence.
Click to expand...

I know a lot of folks that have worked for Charlie at one time or another have probably said to themselves - WHY? ;D

RFB
 
J Alex Bowab said:
WBKN would have made a meaningful set of call letters for a station in Brookhaven; however, WBKN, at 1410 on the dial, was in NEWTON, Mississippi. Station may be silent now.

WBKN in Newton was referred to as the "Beacon" of radio, in as much as a 500 watt daytimer's beacon could be.
Click to expand...
 
> Yesterday I tossed out WHNY McComb; no takers.

Well, I knew about the WHxY series. I thought you had something more pithy than that. Still, I didn't know there had been a Bogalusa station in the group.

In its day, WHNY was a pretty good station. And, it was somewhat unusual to have a 3-tower nighttime array in a market that small.

DE
 
J Alex Bowab said:
Golden, the significance you attach to the WSJC call letters is certainly valid for what the station is today, a religious outfit ... but was that what the original owner had in mind when choosing the calls? I doubt it. The station was not a religious outlet in the 50s through the 70s. Maybe S, J, and C were the only calls that signified counties, and the W was automatically there, as it would be for any station east of the Miss River. Didja know that WSJC was originally on 1280 with about 500 watts ... moved to 790 with a little more power, then went to 810 with the big signal. I'm recalling it back to about 1957.
Click to expand...

After I posted that, I thought something about that didn't seem right. I do recall WSJC being on FM at 107.5 before it was moved to Jackson in the late 80s. I remember it having some sort of contemporary format, so We Share Jesus Christ wouldn't have been relevant at that time. The county names would be more fitting considering the origination.
 
WNSL- New South Laurel (Owned by "Voice of the New South" at one time.)
WLAU- "Lau"rel (are they even still around?)
the old WJFL/Vicksburg- Win Just For Listening
I didn't notice is anyone mentioned WKOR "King Of Rock"
 
OK. Here's one to think about:

WKNZ/Collins. Your initial reaction will be "KNZ? Collins, right?" Well, not quite.

Anyone? Anyone?

DE
 
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