WHPT 102-5 The Bone call letters

[icycool7227]

How come when they changed from the Point, the Bone is still WHPT? Why not WTBN-FM? It would make more sense. Does it cost anything to change call letters? Why are they still WHPT?

 

[drt]

My guess is that
WTBN- 570, a religious station licensed to Pinellas Park (with towers near Odessa) would protest Cox's 102.5 using their call letters. Now if both were owned by Salem Corporation or Cox Corp, that might be a different story.

 

[DToTheJ]

To make things even more confusing, the Cox station that might be best suited for those calls, The Point, has pretty good calls of their own, WPOI.

What a pointless post this was...

 

[Wazzie]

Kinda like WWRM - Magic! ;D

 

[larkin]

WSUN--97X

Also Cox...hmmmm

 

[Butters925]

WHO GIVES A SH*T WHAT THE CALL LETTERS ARE.....PLEASE PEOPLE GET A GRIP!!!

 

[DToTheJ]

"I remember all the call letters, Joe... What are the only call letters still being used today by a station?" -- RJ Ron Joseph

 

[sbe1]

What was this stations first call sign? WQSA- FM? WQSR? WAVE?, WHVE? Enquiring minds want to know. This was when the studios were in Mennonite territory on Beneva and Bahia Vista area in Sarasota. Transmitter was in east Bradenton.

 

[frankberry]

"I remember all the call letters, Joe... What are the only call letters still being used today by a station?" -- RJ Ron Joseph

My guess would be WQYK.

 

[OldSchoolWoman]

Kidding aside. It looks like COX is willing to spend money to fix the BONE. Any idea why the BONE?

1) How do you experts think this will impact 97X?
2) Do you understand why the POINT seems to be attempting to sound live and local. The afternoon guy has a seven hour shift.

3) Why do you think the EAGLE seems to be out of the loop? At least with changes. Q105 plays similiar stuff with much more listener interaction.

ANY THOUGHTS?
COWHEAD?

 

[rfrus]

The station went on the air as 1960 as WYAK. with 3kw ERP at 275 feet in downtown Sarasota. Then became WSAF-FM, then It became 100kw at 500 feet from a tower in Bradenton and became WQSR, WSRZ, WAVE, It moved to its current transmitter in Manatee County 100kw at 1749 feet in about 1987 and became Floridas Most Powerful FM, which it still is today. IT then became WHVE, WHPT.

 

[flwfg]

Actually the fist call sign for 102.5 in Sarasota was WYAK..back in the early to mid 60's I believe... it was east of 41 off 12th street area in the back of an old store front...which was the studio... back looked like an old junk yard... whole neighborhood looked like a ghetto... played country... the origional tower for them is now on city island used solely for 1450 am... but was used for 106.3 FM for years.

The old (newer) tower (650') off 27th street east in bradenton, about a 1/4 mile of the old WBRD/WDUV Studios in Samoset was removed a year or so ago to make room for condos. Always had lightning problems despite all the money they put in it... (The Nelson's @ WDUV just lowered the top of the antenna 3' below the tip of the tower, grounded the hell out of the tower, and let the tower take the hits instead of the antenna... well worth the slight loss in signal / coverage...) Paxton built the new 1800' tower in eastern manatee county when he owned it. I believe it came back as WQSA AM and WQSR FM when Ted rogers owned it in the late 60's early 70's and studios were off bahia vista where the two tower am antenna ( when it was legal ) was located... building still there, and WSRQ still getting special exception to hang a wire on the nearby cell phone tower... no wonder thay have such a lousey signal...

History lesson over...


walt

 

[rfrus]

Hey Walt

Only one error, Cosmo actually started the ball rolling on the project and Susqehana actually built the tower, Paxson upgraded the tower to hold the channel 66 antenna.

 

[rfrus]

Oh yeah, one more thing, the original studio was on 5th street just west of Central avenue. The tower was next door in the junk yard owned by Mel Augustine. Mel and Jimmy Grant originally owned the station and put it on the air. WYAK was the first Stereo FM on the west coast of Florida.

 

[Cowhead]

LOL seriously your asking me??
I just show up...sorry.
-Cow

 

[OldSchoolWoman]

I can try, COW.

 

[radiosanchez]

Don't have the papers in front of me, but I think there was a WTSP-FM in St. Pete on 102.5 that was deleted back when FM was just an albatross and a nuisance and a big waste of money. No relation to the Sarasota license-turned Tampa move-in. Happened alot back then.

WTSP-FM of course would make it a sister to today's 1380.

 

[drt]

I had also read that on another radio website, that WTSP FM was on the air in the mid to late 1950's at 102.5 FM, I believe Rahall communications owned both 1380 (still using the WTSP call letters before the switch of call letters to WLCY). Rahall operated the station the minimum number of hours require by the FCC at the time, just to maintain the license; I understand that when it was time to shut the station down for the day, they just went off the air, whether the were in the middle of song, ballgame etc.

On another subject, I had read that WYAK was the first FM stereo station in the area, but....... on another website I had read where WPKM 104.7 (studios and transmitter at the Bayshore Royal Hotel) in Tampa was the first FM stereo station in the area.

drt

 

[pk33616]

i realize this is eons old...but didnt it have something to do with the station being imaged as 102.5 The Point in the mid 90s?

 

[jmtillery]

Kinda like WWRM - Magic! ;D

WWRM was originally on 107.3 and represented Warm (a soft 70s and 80s based AC format) as in Warm 107.3. Hence the call letters WWRM. Back in 1993 the Warm format moved to 94.9 for Warm 94.9. When Cox decided to kick up Warm to more up tempo AC, Warm was dropped in favor of calling the station Magic. The calls really doesn't matter as the only time they are ever given is during the legal ID once an hour. Most station have started adopting this strategy in recent years.