PAST HOUSTON RADIO OWNERSHIP

[OldChicago]

Sonderling Broadcasting, Jimmy Swaggart and RKO General. I understand
those companies owned stations in Houston in the 60's/70's. Which stations were they and when did they sell.

Old Chicago

 

[Kent]

I believe Sonderling owned KIKK. I'm not sure exactly when they bought it, but it went to Viacom along with the rest of Sonderling's properties in the early 80's.

I know Jimmy Swaggart owned KJOJ 106.9 in the 80's. I'm not sure if he owned anything prior to that, though.

 

[davideduardo]

Sonderling Broadcasting, Jimmy Swaggart and RKO General. I understand
those companies owned stations in Houston in the 60's/70's. Which stations were they and when did they sell.

Old Chicago

http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Broadcasting_Yearbook_Summary_of_Editions_Page.htm

Look at the 60's and 70's editions and the By State and City sections for Houston, and you will see the ownership of all the stations for each year.

 

[hrhwebmaster]

I have never heard of a station in Houston owned by RKO and the Wikipedia article on the company does not list one among its broadcasting properties.

 

[Shannon]

I think Sonderling owned KYND prior to selling it to Sourhern Broadcasting around 1973. Southern owned KTHT, which became KULF. They paid a little over $1 million. At that time it was the most paid for a FM in the country.

Jim Shannon KTHT/KULF '70-'74

 

[johndavis]

Just for grins, I pulled up 1976 on The Old Gringo's site. It shows that Sonderling owned KIKK at the time, and the local holding company of KIKK, Inc is listed as acquiring it in 1973.

The listing for KULF says that Southern owned it in 1976 and acquired it in March 1961.

Interestingly enough, the listing for KUHF says that it was a member of the MBS and Mutual Black networks in 1976, and it had a half hour of Greek and a half hour of Arabic programming weekly. The format was listed as "diversified."

KTRU was listed as members of MBS and Texas State networks with a format description of Progressive, Jazz, Classical, Educational.

KPFT was listed as a NPR affiliate with a "progresssive" and "black" format and specialty programming of 4 hours of German, half hour of Spanish, and 10 hours of Country and Western a week.

KTRH is listed as having 12 hours of farm reports a week and 14 hours of hunting & fishing reports a week. You could buy a spot on KTRH for $62, according to the yearbook. Across the hall at KLOL, the rate is reported as $24.

Up in Conroe, the yearbook says you could call Errol Coker, the GM and CE of KIKR 900 and KNRO 106.9 and buy spots for $6.60.

It's kind of fun to look at this old stuff.

 

[johndavis]

Looking at the yearbooks further, I can say that some of the data is only as good as the intern tasked with compiling it.

The call signs and owners seem to be dead on because the editors can fact check it against their own coverage. But in looking at the formats, networks, and people, you can tell when the receptionist doesn't have time to answer a lot of questions when the station gets the call. For example, when I looked up a station that I used to program for about 3 years, it showed us as affiliates of networks we dropped prior to the format change, and my name didn't show up in the listing until my last year with the station. One year showed the proper owner after a sale but the staff listed were all people who exited during the ownership change.

At another station I worked at, it had the correct call letters and GM but the wrong PD and it listed someone who had died a few years before that ever went to press as a vice president.

Still, it's the closest thing we have to a definitive record in an industry where change is the only constant.

 

[davideduardo]

Looking at the yearbooks further, I can say that some of the data is only as good as the intern tasked with compiling it.

For decades, Broadcasting would send out a form, every year, to the manager of every station. Whether it got filled in depended on the manager's desire to have a good listing. If there was no reply, they repeated the prior year listing. I think at some point, if they did not get anything from a station for a couple of years, they defaulted to a generic listing.

I think I first filled one of those forms in for my GM at WCUY in about 1960. The last time was for the group I was managing in the early 90's. IIRC, they did not follow up if you did not reply.

 

[hrhwebmaster]

Some 'S' owners of Houston radio stations (to the best of my knowledge):

Susquehanna - KRBE
Sonderling - KIKK
Sudbrink - KYND - Woody Sudbrink bought KLVL-FM from Felix Morales, broadcast from the Pasadena State Bank bldg, using the call letters KFMY-FM and then KYED-FM, according to the Wiki article. Southern bought the station from Sudbrink. Sudbrink was one of the earliest adopters of the Schulke format (beautiful music/Stereo Radio Productions) but according to wiki played big band and oldies on the station when he owned it. I don't have any confirmation of any of those calls or the format other than Wiki; I was not in the market at the time.

The chain of ownership of 790 that I know of: Texas Star (Roy Hofheinz, original, 1944), Texas Radio (Bob Strauss, ca. 1958), Winston-Salem (1961), Southern, and Harte-Hanks, then Gannett and now Cox. Winston-Salem, Southern and Harte-Hanks were basically the same company I think. Winston Salem installed Red Carpet Radio on 790 when they first took over. I'm not sure whether Demand Radio 79 came before or after.

 

[johndavis]

The chain of ownership of 790 that I know of: Texas Star (Roy Hofheinz, original, 1944), Texas Radio (Bob Strauss, ca. 1958), Winston-Salem (1961), Southern, and Harte-Hanks, then Gannett and now Cox. Winston-Salem, Southern and Harte-Hanks were basically the same company I think.

Chancellor owned KKBQ-FM between Gannett and Cox. Gannett sold out its radio to Chancellor. When they merged with Jacor and Clear Channel they had to divest of three stations, so they traded 92.9, 97.1, and 107.5 to Cox for KFI and KOST in Los Angeles. Cox never owned 790, so the chain of ownership would have been Gannett, Chancellor, Clear Channel.

All the transactions between Chancellor, Jacor, and Clear Channel happened so quickly with holding companies named for previously acquired companies (Evergreen, etc.) that it's hard to keep track of who owned what.

I think your assessment of Winston-Salem, Southern, and Harte-Hanks is accurate.

 

[johndavis]

For decades, Broadcasting would send out a form, every year, to the manager of every station. Whether it got filled in depended on the manager's desire to have a good listing. If there was no reply, they repeated the prior year listing. I think at some point, if they did not get anything from a station for a couple of years, they defaulted to a generic listing.

I think I first filled one of those forms in for my GM at WCUY in about 1960. The last time was for the group I was managing in the early 90's. IIRC, they did not follow up if you did not reply.

I remember seeing the forms being passed around over the years. The only thing that leads me to believe that at some point they tried updating over the phone was seeing certain names butchered in print that phonetically match the accent of the receptionist.

 

[hrhwebmaster]

All the transactions between Chancellor, Jacor, and Clear Channel happened so quickly with holding companies named for previously acquired companies (Evergreen, etc.) that it's hard to keep track of who owned what.

Amen to that. I remembered the Chancellor name but didn't remember they owner either of these two.