94.5's "construction permit" sold for $1.825 Million. WDBL FM formerly 94.3 in Springfield sold their FM and it was moved to the Ft. Campbell KY area a couple of years ago. This station was a "pre" 80 / 90 station that should have figured out someway of moving their tower about 15 miles south to Ridgetop or Greenbriar in the late 1970's or early 1980's. One of the other pre 80 / 90 nearby 94.3's Cookeville shifted a couple of channels and got 100K. Of course WDBL had 101.1 and "swapped" it with WRUS Russellville KY to "save on the light bill"!
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WDBL Springfield "Missed the boat"
- Thread starter secondchoice
- Start date
secondchoice said:
I always thought 101.1 was originally a Bowling Green allocation...that was moved to Russelville when
the former WLBJ turned it in. Could just be urban...uhhh...legend.
When I started at WDBL Walter George and IIRC Mrs Lock (the traffic director) and the L of WDBL (Bell and Lock) were the other two letters in the Call letters repeated the legend. BTW Springfield at that time late 1960's early 1970's had a large black population. When court ordered the end of Segregation*, it was easy because the grade schools were "broken" in half 1 & 2 in one building 2 & 3 in the other. WDBL's night guy was black. He was very good and had a following because the station could "sell" nights 7 to 12 on FM pre 1973 to several local merchants even with John R on WLAC which booming in.
* yes! I am that old
* yes! I am that old
Checking the old Yearbooks...
best I can tell WDBL-FM was always on 94.3. 101.1 was originally WKYP-FM in Greenville, Ky.. The records are ambiguous as to how the channel ended up in Russellville -- WKYP-FM Greenville was listed on 101.1 in the 1967 YB, but in the 1971 book WRUS-FM was listed on the channel -- and as having signed on in 1965.
I would suppose WJJM Lewisburg is why WDBL-FM never moved into/near Davidson Co..
best I can tell WDBL-FM was always on 94.3. 101.1 was originally WKYP-FM in Greenville, Ky.. The records are ambiguous as to how the channel ended up in Russellville -- WKYP-FM Greenville was listed on 101.1 in the 1967 YB, but in the 1971 book WRUS-FM was listed on the channel -- and as having signed on in 1965.
I would suppose WJJM Lewisburg is why WDBL-FM never moved into/near Davidson Co..
w9wi said:
The "story" was WDBL was "encouraged" to take an FM by a their lawyer who stated the FCC was really trying to get the FM band going back in the early to mid 1960's. I do not have access to the original FM allotments but if you look at the 101.1 move in the current WUBT tower is about 12 miles from the WDBL site at 1200+ feet. The 94.3 "fit" farther north easy with a full 6 KW. IIRC WDBL FM* could not get 6 KW back when the FCC let the class A's go from 3 to 6 KW. I feel they could have gotten 94.5 several years ago. There are 2 AM's with a COL of Springfield TN. Even now with the exception of Lexington KY, translators, and LPFM's (which would not have been there 10 years ago!) this is a clean channel:
http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bi...s_fl=Y&is_fx=Y&is_fb=Y&format=&dx=3&radius=20
Had they done something in the early 1980's the WGSQ 94.7 "the old WPTN FM 94.3"* would not have been an issue. I am really surprised that someone else did not see this. I did not have the $$$ to do anything ownership wise then or now.
*I have worked at both the old WPTN FM 94.3 Cookeville and WDBL FM 94.3. I tried to get on at 94.3 Red Bank in 1979. Then I could have worked 3 stations on the same FM frequency in the same state, but my record is only 2 FM's on the same frequency in the same state.
The area around 94 on the FM dial is very busy locally. 93.7 and 94.1 are both FISH frequencies, with Bott's Gallatin translator in between at 93.9. Maybe 'DBL-FM was wise to move out to the Fort Campbell area. (I can only pick them up now from Dickson whenever I am there.) Seems to me that if anyone "missed the boat" on that frequency, it was Tuned-In Broadcasting back when they owned it. They had 93.7 and 94.1 to cover the east and west sides (respectively) of Nashville back when they had Thunder 94, and later, the Phoenix. It was my understanding that they were planning to use 94.3 to (also) cover the north side of town, but as we now know, that never happened, and they ended up selling ALL of their frequencies in the vicinity of 94 on the FM dial. And 93.7 and 94.1 became the FISH frequencies.
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