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WZGX license holding by a thread?
- Thread starter passtheword
- Start date
Good. It's about time that the FCC cracked down on these bad apples. Red Mountain Ventures / Valleydale Broadcasting / Great South Wireless / RAMS IV or whatever name they go by this week, I don't think they've ever played by the rules, exactly. They're the ones whose translator on 98.3 in Birmingham was found to be operating at variance with the license and interfering with the station in Sylacauga, and the same family that ran WZNN in Maplesville from unlicensed facilities and got caught and had the license cancelled.
It may be an ignominious end to Bessemer's original radio station, but I don't think many people would mourn the loss of a signal that doesn't even cover the metro area anymore.
It may be an ignominious end to Bessemer's original radio station, but I don't think many people would mourn the loss of a signal that doesn't even cover the metro area anymore.
I guess the obvious question is whether WZGX ever resumed operation in March 2020? And did their sale to Pedro Zamora fall through?
I've been to Birmingham several times since March 2020, staying in the Bessemer area. I'm pretty sure I've heard it on the air at least once, and it was relaying one of the other Spanish AM's, either 1220 or 1500. I forget. But the last I was there last month, it wasn't on the air that I could tell.
Edit to add: I wanted to actually drive by the studio/transmitter site but never had the chance. The last Google Street View is from 2019 and there does seem to be evidence there was a fire in the studio, but in the same shot someone is there, mowing the grass, so it was at least being upkept until then. There is also what appears to be a dog kennel attached to the TX building.
Edit to add: I wanted to actually drive by the studio/transmitter site but never had the chance. The last Google Street View is from 2019 and there does seem to be evidence there was a fire in the studio, but in the same shot someone is there, mowing the grass, so it was at least being upkept until then. There is also what appears to be a dog kennel attached to the TX building.
WZGX was on the air either in February or March. However, it has been off the air, at least for the last couple of days that I've tried to listen. The WZGX broadcast license appears to have never been transferred back to Zamora.
Yeah, kinda sad to see 1450 go since it appears it have been on the air since 1950 and was the original WENN. Given how Red Mountain Ventures and their other aliases have done business, though...probably well-deserved if the license gets canceled. They don't have a good track record...
1320 was the original WENN. This was WBCO. I remember that because it stood for "Bessemer Cut-Off", but when they flipped to R&B shortly after signing on, white people joked it meant "Became Colored Overnight".
Yes, I had always heard that AM 1450 originally began as WBCO and I've heard that info about the "Becoming Colored Overnight" from my dad who used to work in local radio and lived here during that period of time. However, after coming across some info in the Broadcasting Yearbooks from the late 50's, it turns out that WENN began on 1450, but was there for a very short period time (a year or less) before the station calls were moved to AM 1320. I wrote about this a few years ago on RadioDiscussions.com. Alex Bowab in Mobile also verified that WENN was on AM 1450 at one time on a separate thread started by someone else who also mentioned that 1450 was WENN at one time. (see comment #10 on following thread regarding Alex Bowab post and #6 with links to my original post about WENN being on 1450).
This was all during that time of the 1220/1320/1450 call sign switch-a-roo. Many radio people remember WEZB being on both 1320 and later 1220, but even AM 1450 had the WEZB calls briefly before they were finally moved to 1220 AM.
The FCC history card for WZGX 1450 also lists the call sign as being WENN at one point, as well as WEZB (and of course, as WBCO). See image #8 on history card/listed as #5 on top left of page (see below).
http://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/getimportletter_exh.cgi?import_letter_id=67065
Interesting side note: I just pulled up AM 1320's history card by accident looking for the history card for 1450. It lists the call sign for 1320 as being WENN and WEZB, but there is a call sign of WBHM listed as well. :O Not sure if AM 1320 ever went on the air as WBHM but evidently, barring some kind of error, the call sign for 1320 (or at least the construction permit) was at one time WBHM.
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Yeah, I was taken aback when I found that info about WENN being originally on 1450. My dad has always told me that 1450 was WBCO before it became WYAM in the 60s. I told him what I had found and he said he doesn't recall WENN ever being on 1450 originally, but given the short period of time the call letters were there...
Another interesting tidbit I found too a couple of years ago: Many of us in here are aware that Birmingham's AM 610 and 1320 (at that time owned by Cox Radio) were both known as WEZN during the 90s, which of course was a shared call with Cox's WEZN-FM in Bridgeport, CT. But...I discovered that WEZN-FM (99.9 FM) in CT also used the WPSB calls for a brief period of time before it became WEZN in 1973. The WPSB call letters, were of course, used on AM 1320 here during its short-lived black talk format from 2006 to 2009. It appears that Cox intentionally chose the WPSB calls for AM 1320 since they were also used on their Bridgeport FM too at one time. I doubt that was just coincidence...
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