RKO General was the main
holding companyA holding company is a company that owns other companies' outstanding stock. It usually refers to a company which does not produce goods or services itself, rather its only purpose is owning shares of other companies. Holding companies allow the reduction of risk for the owners and can allow the...
through 1991 for the noncore businesses of the
General Tire and Rubber CompanyThe General Tire and Rubber Company is an American manufacturer of tires for motor vehicles.General Tire was founded in 1915 in Akron, Ohio by William F. O'Neil. In 1943 General Tire branched out from its core business by purchasing the Yankee Network and the radio stations it owned from Boston's...
and, after General Tire's reorganization in the 1980s,
GenCorpGenCorp is an American technology-based manufacturer based in Sacramento, California. Established in 1915, GenCorp was formerly the General Tire and Rubber Company....
. The business was based around the consolidation of its parent company's
broadcastingBroadcasting is the distribution of audio and/or video signals which transmit programs to an audience. The audience may be the general public or a relatively large sub-audience, such as children or young adults....
interests, dating to 1943, and the
RKO PicturesRKO Pictures is an American film production and distribution company. As Radio Pictures Inc. and then RKO Radio Pictures Inc., it was one of the so-called Big Five studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chains and Joseph P...
movie studio General Tire purchased in 1955. The holding company acquired the name of RKO General in 1959 after General Tire dissolved the film studio. Headquartered in
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States, and the center of the New York metropolitan area, which is among the most populous urban areas in the world. A leading global city, New York exerts a powerful influence over worldwide commerce, finance, culture, fashion and entertainment...
, the company operated six
televisionTelevision is a widely used telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images, either monochromatic or color, usually accompanied by sound. "Television" may also refer specifically to a television set, television programming or television transmission...
stations and more than a dozen major
radioRadio is the transmission of signals by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
stations around North America between 1959 and 1991.
RKO General still exists, at least nominally, registered as a Delaware corporation. In addition to broadcasting, its other former operations included soft-drink bottling and hotel enterprises. The original
Frontier AirlinesFrontier Airlines was formed by a merger of Arizona Airways, Challenger Airlines, and Monarch Airlines on June 1, 1950, with headquarters at Stapleton Airport in Denver, Colorado. However, it dated its origin to November 27, 1946 when Monarch began service over routes in Colorado, Utah, New...
was a subsidiary from 1968 to 1985. In the 1980s, RKO Pictures was revived on a small scale. It is as a broadcaster, however, that RKO General left its mark. Recognized as the owner of some of the most influential radio stations in the world and as a pioneer in subscription TV service, RKO General also became known for the longest licensing dispute in television history.
Early days
General Tire entered broadcasting in 1943, when it bought a controlling interest in the
Yankee NetworkThe Yankee Network was an American radio network. It was founded in 1930 by John Shepard III; in 1949, a controlling interest in the network was purchased by General Tire when Robert Shepard chairman of the network's parent company, The Shepard Company, decided that radio and its dependence on the...
, a regional radio network in
New EnglandNew England is a region of the United States. It is located at the northeastern corner of the US, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean, Canada and the state of New York, consisting of the modern U.S...
. The Yankee Network owned and operated four stations: flagship
WNACWRKO is a radio station based in Boston, Massachusetts, currently owned by Entercom. Its transmitter is located in Burlington, Massachusetts, next to the Burlington Mall.-1920-1940:...
in Boston; WAAB in
Worcester, MassachusettsWorcester is a city in the state of Massachusetts in the United States of America. Having a population of 172,648 in the 2000 census, Worcester is ranked the second or third largest city in New England. It is the county seat of Worcester County....
;
WEANWPRV is a radio station located in Providence, Rhode Island. The station is owned by Citadel Broadcasting, and airs a news/talk format.-History:...
in
Providence, Rhode IslandProvidence is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island, and one of the first cities established in the United States. Located in Providence County, it is the estimated second or third largest city in the New England region...
; and
WICCWICC is a news and information radio station in Bridgeport, Connecticut, owned by Cumulus Media. Its signal reaches down into Long Island, New York.-History:...
in
Bridgeport, ConnecticutBridgeport is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. Located in and the former county seat of Fairfield County, the city had an estimated population of 137,912 in 2006 and is the core of the Greater Bridgeport area...
. With the Yankee Network purchase, General Tire also picked up its contracts with 17 independently-owned affiliates and acquired a stake in the
Mutual Broadcasting SystemThe Mutual Broadcasting System was an American radio network, in operation from 1934 to 1999. Of the four national networks of American radio's classic era, Mutual had for decades the largest number of affiliates but the least certain financial position. In the golden age of U.S...
, a cooperatively owned national radio network.
On June 21, 1948, the Yankee Network launched New England's third television station: Boston's
WNAC-TVWHDH-TV is the NBC-affiliated television station for Boston, Massachusetts, serving eastern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire. Its transmitter is located in Newton, Massachusetts. Owned by Sunbeam Television, WHDH is sister to CW affiliate WLVI-TV...
went on the air just days after
WBZ-TVWBZ-TV is a CBS owned-and-operated television station, located in Boston, Massachusetts, broadcasting mainly a high-definition digital signal on channel 30...
, also in Boston, and
WNHC-TVWTNH is the ABC affiliate for the state of Connecticut that is licensed to New Haven. It broadcasts a high definition digital signal on VHF channel 10 from a transmitter in Hamden. Owned by the LIN TV Corporation, the station is sister to MyNetworkTV affiliate WCTX. The two stations share studios...
, licensed to
New Haven, ConnecticutNew Haven is the second-largest municipality in Connecticut, after Bridgeport and just ahead of Hartford, with a core population of about 124,000 people. "New Haven" may also refer to the wider Greater New Haven area, which has nearly 600,000 inhabitants in the immediate area...
. The TV station's transmitter site also served a new
FMIn telecommunications, frequency modulation conveys information over a carrier wave by varying its frequency . In analog applications, the instantaneous frequency of the carrier is directly proportional to the instantaneous value of the input signal...
outlet, the first to be established under General Tire ownership. While the Yankee Network had been operating experimental FM stations since 1939, WNAC-FM was the first that would survive past the early 1950s.
In December 1950, General Tire purchased the
Don Lee Broadcasting SystemDonald Musgrave Lee was the exclusive west coast distributor of Cadillac automobiles in the early 20th century. In 1919 Lee purchased the Earl Automobile Works of Hollywood, California. Harley Earl, the son of the company's owner, was kept on as manager...
, a long-standing West Coast regional network, for $12.3 million. This brought three more leading stations into the General Tire stable—
KHJKHJ Radio in Los Angeles, California broadcasts Spanish-language entertainment programming as La Ranchera. It was also one of America's most formidable Top 40 radio stations in the 1960s and 1970s as 93 KHJ before changing its format in 1980....
(with its simulcasting sister,
KHJ-FMKRTH is a U.S. oldies radio station located in Los Angeles, California, broadcasting to the Greater Los Angeles Area. Its signal covers an extremely large area, and sometimes can be heard as far south as San Diego and Tijuana, as far east as Moreno Valley, and as far north as Baker,...
) in Los Angeles,
KFRCKFRC was a radio station in San Francisco, California in the United States, which began operating in 1924. For over 80 years, the station had broadcast on 610 kHz AM, until 2005. The station was also simulcast on FM, on 106.1 MHz in the 1970s, and later began simulcasting on 99.7 MHz in 1991, and...
in San Francisco, and
KGBKLSD is a sports station based in San Diego, California. The sports programming began on November 12, 2007. Previously, KLSD's format was progressive talk radio....
in
San DiegoSan Diego , named after Saint Didacus , is the second-largest city in California and the ninth largest city in the United States, located along the Pacific Ocean on the west coast of the United States. The US Census Bureau estimates the city's population at 1,279,329 as of 2008...
. The acquisition also expanded the company's holdings in the Mutual Broadcasting System. Under the terms of the deal, the
Columbia Broadcasting SystemCBS Broadcasting Inc. is an American television network, one of television's original "big three", which also include NBC and ABC. Like NBC, CBS started out as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System...
acquired Don Lee's Los Angeles television station,
KTSLKCBS-TV is the West Coast flagship station of the CBS Television Network located in Los Angeles, California. KCBS-TV shares its offices and studio facilities with sister station KCAL-TV inside CBS Studio Center in the Studio City section of Los Angeles, and its transmitter is located atop Mount...
. In 1951, General Tire acquired its own station in the city when it bought KFI-TV from
Earle C. AnthonyEarle C. Anthony was a pioneer businessman based in Los Angeles, California. He is primarily known for his achievements in two fields: Broadcasting and automobiles...
, changing the call letters to
KHJ-TVKCAL-TV, channel 9, is an independent television station in Los Angeles, California, owned by the CBS Corporation. KCAL-TV shares its studio facilities with KCBS-TV inside CBS Studio Center in the Studio City section of Los Angeles, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson.-Early...
.
In 1952, General Tire purchased the Bamberger Broadcasting Service, owner of
WOR-AMWOR is a class A , AM radio station located in New York, New York, U.S., operating on 710 kHz. The station has a talk format and has been owned by Buckley Broadcasting since 1987, after the station was sold by RKO. The station has conservative, or right of center hosts.Its call letters have no...
-FM-
TVWWOR-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the flagship station of the MyNetworkTV network licensed to Secaucus, New Jersey and serving the New York City metropolitan area. WWOR is owned by Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation, and is a sister station to Fox network flagship WNYW...
in New York, from
R.H. Macy and CompanyMacy's is a chain of mid-to-high range American department stores. Its selection of merchandise can vary significantly from location to location, resulting in the exclusive availability of certain brands in only higher-end stores...
. Bamberger itself was a division of General Teleradio Inc., a Macy's subsidiary. In the deal, General Tire acquired the rights to the name General Teleradio, under which the company merged its broadcasting interests as a new division. The deal also gave General Tire majority control of the Mutual Broadcasting System. After purchasing
WHBQ (AM)WHBQ is an AM radio station in Memphis, Tennessee, in the United States of America. Its frequency is 560 kHz. Although today it broadcasts sports news exclusively, the station became famous in the 1950s for playing rhythm and blues....
in
Memphis, TennesseeMemphis is a city in the southwest corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. Memphis rises above the Mississippi River on the 4
th Chickasaw Bluff just south of the mouth of the Wolf River....
, the company established
WHBQ-TVWHBQ-TV, channel 13, is an owned-and-operated television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in Memphis, Tennessee. Its studios and transmitter are located in Memphis...
in 1953; following WNAC-TV, it was the second television station built from the ground up by General Tire. Exiting two mid-sized urban markets in 1954, General sold off WEAN to the
Providence Journal and KGB to the San Diego station's general manager, Marion Harris. On the evening of July 8, 1954, WHBQ disc jockey
Dewey Phillips"Daddy-O" Dewey Phillips was one of rock 'n' roll's pioneering disk jockeys, along the lines of Cleveland's Alan Freed, before Alan Freed...
introduced a song called "
That's All Right (Mama)"That's All Right" is the name of the first single released by Elvis Presley, written and originally performed by blues singer Arthur Crudup as "That's All Right, Mama"...
," the first ever recording to air on the radio by a local singer named
Elvis PresleyElvis Aaron Presley was an American singer and actor. A cultural icon, he is commonly known simply as Elvis and is also sometimes referred to as The King of Rock 'n' Roll or The King....
.
The RKO purchase
General Teleradio's chairman, Thomas O'Neil (son of General Tire founder William O'Neil) recognized that his television stations needed access to better programming. In 1953, he tried to buy the film library of
RKO Radio PicturesRKO Pictures is an American film production and distribution company. As Radio Pictures Inc. and then RKO Radio Pictures Inc., it was one of the so-called Big Five studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chains and Joseph P...
—including many of the most famous movies made by
Fred AstaireFred Astaire , born Frederick Austerlitz, was an American film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of 76 years, during which he made 31 musical films...
,
Ginger RogersGinger Rogers was an American film and stage actress, dancer and singer.During her long career, she made a total of 73 films, and is noted for her role as Fred Astaire's romantic interest and dancing partner in a series of ten Hollywood musical films that revolutionized the genre...
,
Katharine HepburnKatharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, television and stage.Hepburn holds the record for the most Best Actress Oscar wins with four, from 12 nominations. Hepburn won an Emmy Award in 1976 for her lead role in Love Among the Ruins, and was nominated for four other Emmys, two...
, and
Cary GrantArchibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was a British-American actor...
—but was rebuffed by the studio's then owner,
Howard HughesHoward Robard Hughes, Jr. was an American aviator, engineer, industrialist, film producer, film director, philanthropist, and one of the wealthiest people in the world. He gained fame in the late 1920s as a maverick film producer, making big budget and often controversial films like Hell's Angels,...
. However, after Hughes failed in a bid to acquire total control of RKO, he sold the studio to General Tire for $25 million in July 1955. Merging RKO with General Teleradio to form RKO Teleradio Pictures, General Tire quickly recouped most of the purchase price by selling the primary rights to RKO's film library to C&C Television Corp, a subsidiary of beverage maker Cantrell & Cochrane, for $15.2 million. Historian William Boddy describes the sale of the RKO library as "the trigger for the flood of feature films to television in the mid-1950s."
On the broadcasting front, RKO briefly owned
WEAT (AM)WFTL is a radio station broadcasting from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and licensed to West Palm Beach, Florida. The station broadcasts a mix of news and mostly syndicated talk programming. Its signal is broadcast at 50,000 watts, covering much of South Florida from its tower site in Belle Glade...
and
WEAT-TVWPEC, digital channel 13, is the CBS-affiliated television station for West Palm Beach, Florida. Its transmitter is located southeast of Wellington. The station is the flagship of Freedom Communications and has studios on Fairfield Drive in Mangonia Park...
in
West Palm Beach, FloridaWest Palm Beach, also known as West Palm, is the most populous city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The city is also the oldest incorporated municipality in South Florida. West Palm's economy is currently ranked #4 in the Milken Institute Best Performing 296 U.S. Cities index...
; they were sold off before the company's next reorganization in 1959. In 1956, WOR (AM) became the New York market's number one station with the success of its new "Music from Studio X." Hosted by
John A. GamblingJohn Alfred Gambling was a an American radio personality. He was member of the Gambling family, three generations of whom - John B., John A. and John R...
, the "
easy listeningEasy listening music is a style of popular music and radio format that emerged in the mid-20th century, evolving out of swing and big band music, and related to Beautiful music and Light music. Easy listening music features simple, catchy melodies, soft, laid-back songs and occasionally rhythms...
" show was broadcast out of an innovative high-fidelity studio where, according to reports, "each clean new record was touched by a needle only one time." Also in 1956, a new General Tire subsidiary, RKO Distributing (which would later become part of RKO General), acquired a controlling interest in the Western Ontario Broadcasting Company, which operated CKLW-AM-FM-
TVCBET, channel 9, is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's owned-and-operated television station in Windsor, Ontario. The station's signal also covers the Detroit, Michigan area across the international border in the United States, and is counted as a Detroit station for the purposes of...
in
Windsor, OntarioWindsor is the southernmost major city in Canada and lies in Southwestern Ontario at the western end of the heavily populated Quebec City-Windsor Corridor. It is within Essex County, although administratively separated from the county government. Windsor is located south of Detroit, is separated...
. The AM station, in particular, served a large swath of the U.S.
Rust BeltThe Rust Belt, also known as the Manufacturing Belt, is an area in parts of the Northeastern United States, Mid-Atlantic States, and portions of the Upper Midwest. The region can be broadly defined as the region beginning west of the BosWash corridor and running west to Minnesota, particularly the...
, centered on the major market of
DetroitDetroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the seat of Wayne County. Detroit is a major port city on the Detroit River, in the Midwest region of the United States. Located north of Windsor, Ontario, Detroit is the only major U.S. city that looks south to Canada. It was founded...
. CKLW was also yet another shareholder in the Mutual Broadcasting System.
General Tire retained the broadcast rights to the RKO films in the cities where it owned television stations, but it had little interest in the studio itself. After a brief, half-hearted dip into the movie industry, General Tire shut down both production and distribution early in 1957. That summer, it sold its entire, majority stake in the Mutual network to a syndicate led by famed entrepreneur
Armand HammerArmand Hammer was a flamboyant United States business tycoon most closely associated with Occidental Petroleum, a company he ran for decades, though he was known as well as for his art collection, his philanthropy, and for his close ties to the Soviet Union.Thanks to business interests around the...
. By the end of the year, the company had sold off the RKO Pictures studio facilities and backlot. Several unreleased films were put out by other studios and distribution exchanges through the spring of 1959. That same year, RKO Teleradio was renamed RKO General.
A leading broadcaster
The classic RKO General station lineup was based around the WOR stations in New York City, the KHJ stations in Los Angeles, KFRC-AM-FM in San Francisco,
WGMS-AMWTEM is a radio station that serves the metropolitan Washington, D.C. area. Now known as "ESPN 980", it is the flagship of a sports talk trimulcast with WWXT in Prince Frederick, Maryland and WWXX in Warrenton, Virginia, all affiliated with ESPN Radio and owned by Red Zebra Broadcasting.WWXT and...
-FM in and near
Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C. , formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States, founded on July 16, 1790...
, the WNAC stations in Boston, the WHBQ stations in Memphis, and the CKLW stations in Windsor/Detroit, which RKO purchased outright in 1963. The company later acquired radio outlets in the major markets of
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the U.S. state of Illinois, and with more than 2.8 million people, the 3rd largest city in the United States...
and Miami–Fort Lauderdale. Between 1958 and 1972, RKO owned a sixth TV station,
WHCT-TVWUVN is the Connecticut affiliate for the Spanish language Univision television network. It is licensed to Hartford. Owned by Entravision, the station broadcasts its digital signal on UHF channel 46...
, a UHF outlet in
Hartford, ConnecticutHartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located in Hartford County on the Connecticut River, north of the center of the state, south of Springfield, Massachusetts. Its 2006 population of 124,512 ranks Hartford as the state's second-largest city, after Bridgeport. New...
. After the Canadian government tightened rules on foreign ownership of radio and TV stations, RKO General was forced to sell off the Windsor group in 1970. In the mid-1970s, RKO sought to dispense with the FM outlets it had established in some of its oldest markets, while maintaining its presence on the AM dial: San Francisco's
KFRC-FMKMEL is an Urban Contemporary-formatted radio station located in San Francisco, California, and owned by Clear Channel Communications....
was sold in 1977; around the same time, WHBQ-FM in Memphis was divested as well. An attempted sale of the company's Boston FM station was aborted.
RKO General's lineup included some of the leading top 40 and
urban contemporaryUrban contemporary is a music radio format. The term was coined by the late New York DJ Frankie Crocker in the mid 1970s. Urban contemporary radio stations feature a playlist made up entirely of hip hop/rap, contemporary R&B, urban pop, and on occasion, Caribbean music such as reggae, reggaeton,...
radio stations in North America. In May 1965, KHJ (AM) introduced the highly successful
Boss RadioBoss Radio was the name of two radio programming formats, both launched in the early 1960s: One in the United States, and one in the United Kingdom. Although the names were the same, the formats were quite different.- Boss Radio in the United States :...
variation of the top 40 format. Consultants
Bill DrakeBill Drake , born Philip Yarbrough, was an American radio programmer who co-developed the Boss Radio format with Gene Chenault via their company Drake-Chenault.-Early career:...
and Gene Chenault, who had devised the restrictive programming style, soon brought it to RKO's AM stations in San Francisco, Boston, and Memphis, also with great success. The format helped Windsor's CKLW (AM) to become the dominant station not only in Detroit, but also in more distant cities such as Cleveland and Toledo, Ohio. Before long, many non-RKO broadcasters around the country were hiring the Boss Radio consulting team to convert them to the format, or simply imitating it on their own. In October 1972,
KHJ-FMKRTH is a U.S. oldies radio station located in Los Angeles, California, broadcasting to the Greater Los Angeles Area. Its signal covers an extremely large area, and sometimes can be heard as far south as San Diego and Tijuana, as far east as Moreno Valley, and as far north as Baker,...
debuted Drake-Chenault's new automated rock oldies format, Classic Gold, another major hit. As WOR-FM and its later incarnations, rock-formatted WXLO and urban
WRKS-FMWRKS , better known as 98.7 Kiss FM, is an Urban Adult Contemporary radio station in New York City, owned by Emmis Communications. One of the highest-rated stations in the city, WRKS shares studio facilities with sister stations WQHT and WRXP in New York's West Village neighborhood, and its...
, RKO's New York FM station pioneered a number of styles, including a more oldies-heavy version of Boss Radio and, later, so-called
rhythmicRhythmic contemporary, also known as rhythmic top 40, rhythmic contemporary hit radio or rhythmic crossover, is a music radio format that includes a mix of dance, upbeat rhythmic pop, hip-hop and R&B hits...
formats. In 1983, it became one of the first major stations to play
rap musicHip hop music is a musical genre which developed alongside hip hop culture, and is commonly based on concepts of loop, rapping, freestyle, DJing, scratching, sampling and beatboxing. The music is used to express concerns of political, social, and personal issues...
on a regular basis. On October 1, 1979, the company launched
RKO Radio NetworkThe RKO Radio Network, a subsidiary of RKO General, was the first commercial radio network to distribute its programming entirely by satellite. When it began operations on October 1, 1979, it was the first new full-service American radio network in 40 years. Satellite distribution allowed...
s. In 1981, RKO Radio Networks began transmitting what has been claimed as the first national talk show delivered by satellite—the six-hour-long
America Overnight broadcast out of Dallas and Los Angeles.
As a television broadcaster, RKO General was known as an operator of
independent stationAn independent station is television terminology used to describe a television station broadcasting in the United States or Canada that is not affiliated with any network...
s. New York's WOR-TV ran without network affiliation during its entire tenure with RKO, as did Hartford's WHCT-TV. Los Angeles's KHJ-TV was a
DuMontThe DuMont Television Network, also known as the DuMont Network, DuMont, Du Mont, or Dumont was one of the world's pioneer commercial television networks, rivalling NBC for the distinction of being first overall. It began operation in the United States in 1946. It was owned by DuMont...
affiliate until 1955 and independent for its next 33 years under RKO control. Windsor's CKLW-TV was nominally an affiliate of the
Canadian Broadcasting CorporationThe Canadian Broadcasting Corporation , a Canadian crown corporation, is the country’s national public radio and television broadcaster. In French, it is called la Société Radio-Canada...
, but was programmed largely as an independent. Two of the company's stations were run as network affiliates: Boston's WNAC-TV, originally a CBS affiliate, also aired DuMont and
ABCThe American Broadcasting Company is an American television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. It first broadcast on television in 1948...
programming during its early years. It became a full-time ABC affiliate in 1961, returning to CBS exclusively in 1972. Memphis's WHBQ-TV was a dual CBS/ABC station at its 1953 launch; it joined ABC full-time in 1956.
The company's independent television stations (including CKLW) were known for showing classic films under the banner of
Million Dollar Movie. The trend-setting movie package was launched by WOR in 1954, nearly a year before General Tire's acquisition of RKO Pictures and its library. Into the 1980s,
Million Dollar Movie—introduced by music from 1952's
IvanhoeIvanhoe is a 1952 historical film made by MGM. It was directed by Richard Thorpe and produced by Pandro S. Berman. The cast featured Robert Taylor, Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Fontaine, George Sanders, Emlyn Williams, Finlay Currie and Felix Aylmer...
and, later,
Gone with the WindGone with the Wind is a 1939 American drama romance film adapted from Margaret Mitchell's 1936 novel of the same name and directed by Victor Fleming...
—aired RKO productions and those of many other studios as well. In summer 1962, RKO General initiated on WHCT what became the first extended venture into subscription TV service. Until January 31, 1969, the station aired movies, sports events, concerts, and other live performances without commercial interruption. The operation generated income from installation and weekly rental fees for descrambling devices—provided by RKO's partner,
Zenith ElectronicsZenith Electronics Corporation is a former American manufacturer of televisions headquartered in Lincolnshire, Illinois. It was the inventor of the modern remote control, and it introduced HDTV in North America. Zenith is now a member of the South Korean conglomerate LG Group by way of LG...
—as well as individual program charges. During its final decade as a significant business entity, the company would reenter the movie industry that had given it its name, reviving the RKO Pictures brand in 1981 for a series of coproductions and then its own independent projects. This new RKO Pictures was involved in the production of about a dozen feature films, the best known including a
1982 remakeCat People is a 1982 horror film directed by Paul Schrader and starring Nastassja Kinski, Malcolm McDowell, and John Heard. The film co-stars Annette O'Toole, Ruby Dee, Ed Begley, Jr. and John Larroquette. Jerry Bruckheimer served as executive producer. Alan Ormsby wrote the screenplay, basing it...
of the RKO classic
Cat People and the Vietnam War movie
Hamburger HillHamburger Hill is a 1987 American war film about the actual assault of the U.S. Army's 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, part of the 101st Airborne Division 'Screaming Eagles', on a well-fortified position, including trenchworks and bunkers, of the North Vietnamese Army on Ap Bia Mountain...
(1987).
Troubles begin
In 1965, RKO General applied for renewal of its license for KHJ-TV in Los Angeles. Fidelity Television, a local group, challenged the renewal, charging RKO with second-rate programming. Later, and more seriously, Fidelity claimed that General Tire conditioned its dealings with certain vendors on the basis that they would in turn buy advertising time on RKO General stations. Arrangements of this type, known as "reciprocal trade practices," are considered to be
anticompetitiveAnti-competitive practices are business or government practices that prevent and/or reduce competition in a market .- Anti-competitive practices :These can include:...
. RKO and General Tire executives testified before the
Federal Communications CommissionThe Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, directed, and empowered by Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President...
(FCC), rejecting the accusations. In 1969, the commission issued an initial finding that Fidelity's claims were correct. That same year, RKO faced a license challenge for WNAC-TV in Boston, again charged with reciprocal trade practices. In 1973, the FCC ruled in favor of RKO in the Los Angeles case, pending findings in the still ongoing investigation of the Boston charges. When RKO applied for renewal of its license for WOR-TV in New York in 1974, the FCC conditioned this renewal on the WNAC-TV case as well.
On June 21, 1974, an administrative law judge renewed the WNAC-TV license despite finding that General Tire and RKO General had engaged in reciprocal trade practices. In December 1975, Community Broadcasting, one of the companies competing for the Boston station, asked the FCC to revisit the case, alleging that General Tire bribed foreign officials, maintained a
slush fundSlush fund is a colloquial term which has come to mean an auxiliary monetary account or a reserve fund. However, the term has special meaning within a context of corrupt political dealings by governments, large corporations or other bodies and individuals...
for U.S. political campaign contributions, and misappropriated revenue from overseas operations. RKO expressly denied these and other allegations of corporate wrongdoing on General Tire's part during a series of proceedings that followed over the next year and a half. On July 1, 1977, however, in settling an action brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission, General Tire admitted to an eye-popping litany of corporate misconduct, including the bribery and slush fund charges. Nonetheless, the RKO proceedings dragged on.
The loss of WNAC-TV
After a half-decade in the most recent round of hearings and investigations, the FCC stripped RKO of WNAC-TV's license on June 6, 1980, finding that RKO "lacked the requisite character" to be the station's licensee. Factors in the decision were the reciprocal trade practices of the 1960s, false financial filings by RKO, and the gross misconduct admitted to by General Tire in nonbroadcast fields.
The basis for revocation, however, that would prove most damning was RKO's dishonesty before the Commission. In the course of the WNAC-TV hearings, RKO had withheld evidence of General Tire's misconduct, including the fact that the SEC had begun an investigation of the company in 1976. RKO also denied that it had improperly reported exchanges of broadcast time for various services, despite indications to the contrary in General Tire's 1976 annual report. The FCC consequently found that RKO had displayed a "persistent lack of candor" regarding its own and General Tire's misdeeds, thus threatening "the integrity of the Commission's processes." The FCC ruling meant that RKO lost the KHJ-TV and WOR-TV licenses as well.
RKO appealed the decision to the District of Columbia U.S. Court of Appeals. The court upheld the revocation solely on the basis of RKO's lack of candor, writing in its opinion that "[t]he record presented to this court shows irrefutably that the licensee was playing the dodger to serious charges involving it and its parent company." However, the court interpreted the candor issue so narrowly that it applied only to WNAC-TV, and ordered rehearings for the WOR-TV and KHJ-TV licenses. RKO General again appealed, this time to the U.S. Supreme Court. On April 19, 1982, the court refused to review the license revocation. RKO had lost the case for good. As a result of the decision, RKO General sold WNAC-TV's assets to New England Television (NETV), a new company resulting from the merger of Community Broadcasting and another competitor for the license, the Dudley Station Corporation. As part of the settlement, the FCC granted a full license to NETV, which renamed the station WNEV-TV. The station has since become
WHDH-TVWHDH-TV is the NBC-affiliated television station for Boston, Massachusetts, serving eastern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire. Its transmitter is located in Newton, Massachusetts. Owned by Sunbeam Television, WHDH is sister to CW affiliate WLVI-TV...
.
Endgame
In February 1983, the FCC began a concerted effort to force RKO out of broadcasting once and for all. It began taking competing applications for all of the company's broadcasting licenses. RKO, however, was about to get a partial, and temporary, reprieve. Congress passed a law, sponsored by New Jersey senator
Bill BradleyWilliam Warren "Bill" Bradley is an American hall of fame basketball player, Rhodes scholar, and former three-term Democratic U.S. Senator from New Jersey. He ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic Party's nomination for President in the 2000 election.Bradley was born and raised in a small-town...
, requiring the commission to automatically renew the license of any commercial VHF television station relocating to a state without one, “notwithstanding any other provision of law.” The only states qualifying at the time were Delaware and New Jersey, where no commercial VHF outlet had been licensed since 1962. On April 20, 1983, RKO General officially changed WOR-TV's city of license from New York to
Secaucus, New JerseySecaucus is a town in Hudson County, New Jersey. As of the United States 2000 Census, the town population was 15,931. The town's name is pronounced "SEE-kaw-cus", with the accent on the first syllable, not the second as often used by non-natives....
, where it remains today. The FCC required the station to move its main studio to New Jersey and step up coverage of events in the state. Nonetheless, with featured programming such as
New York MetsThe New York Mets are a professional baseball team based in the borough of Queens in New York City, New York. The Mets are a member of the East Division of Major League Baseball's National League....
baseball games, WOR-TV maintained its identity as a New York station. Ironically, WOR radio was first licensed to nearby
Newark, New JerseyBrick City redirects here. For the township in Ocean County, see Brick Township, New Jersey.Newark is the largest city in New Jersey, and the county seat of Essex County. Newark has a population of 281,402, making it the largest municipality in New Jersey and the 65th largest city in the U.S...
, and didn't move to New York until 1941.
A year after the renewal of the WOR-TV license, General Tire reorganized its farflung corporate interests into a holding company,
GenCorpGenCorp is an American technology-based manufacturer based in Sacramento, California. Established in 1915, GenCorp was formerly the General Tire and Rubber Company....
, with General Tire and RKO General as its leading subsidiaries. The RKO Radio Networks operation was sold to United Stations. The WOR move did little to relieve the regulatory pressure on RKO General, and GenCorp put the station on the market early in 1986.
MCAMCA, Inc. was an American corporation in the music and television businesses. MCA published music, booked acts, ran a record company, and distributed television productions and home videos.-The Early Years:...
outbid
Cox CommunicationsCox Communications, also known as Cox Cable and formerly Cox Broadcasting Corporation is a privately owned subsidiary of Cox Enterprises providing digital cable television and telecommunications services in the United States...
and
Group WThe Westinghouse Broadcasting Company, also known as Group W, was the broadcasting division of Westinghouse Electric Corporation. It owned several radio and television stations across the United States and distributed television shows for syndication....
for control of the station, receiving FCC approval for the purchase in late November. On April 29, 1987, MCA changed the station's call letters to
WWORWWOR-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the flagship station of the MyNetworkTV network licensed to Secaucus, New Jersey and serving the New York City metropolitan area. WWOR is owned by Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation, and is a sister station to Fox network flagship WNYW...
.
The timing of the WOR-TV sale was fortunate for RKO. In August 1987, FCC administrative law judge Edward Kuhlmann found RKO unfit to be a broadcast licensee due to a long history of deceptive practices. He ordered RKO to surrender the licenses for its remaining two television stations and twelve radio stations. Among other things, he found that RKO misled advertisers about its ratings, engaged in fraudulent billing, lied repeatedly to the FCC about a destroyed audit report, and filed numerous false financial statements. Kuhlmann described RKO's conduct as the worst case of dishonesty in FCC history. After declaring that all of the employees responsible for the misconduct had been fired, GenCorp and RKO entered an appeal, claiming that the ruling was deeply flawed. However, the FCC let it be known that it would almost certainly reject any appeals and strip the licenses. It urged RKO to sell the stations before that became necessary. RKO's parent company, GenCorp, then battling a hostile takeover bid by an investor group, was hungry for cash as a result of paying a premium on its own shares to stave off the attack. Liquidation of assets on the verge of being lost was the obvious course.
Exiting the media business
Over the next four years, RKO dismantled its broadcast operations. Its original AM station in Boston, whose name it had changed from WNAC to
WRKOWRKO is a radio station based in Boston, Massachusetts, currently owned by Entercom. Its transmitter is located in Burlington, Massachusetts, next to the Burlington Mall.-1920-1940:...
in 1967, and its FM station in the city, at that point known as WROR, were sold to Atlantic Ventures. In New York, WOR (AM) was acquired by
Buckley BroadcastingBuckley Radio owns and operates twenty radio stations in seven markets. In addition, the WOR Radio Network is operated as an independent syndicated programming provider with affiliates in over 400 markets.-Stations:* WOR - New York, NY...
and WRKS-FM (the former WOR-FM) went to
Summit CommunicationsThe Summit Communications Group is an Atlanta-based communications company which once owned 16 radio stations around the United States. The company now concentrates on technology and internet services....
. The company's two radio stations in the Washington, D.C., market were sold to Classical Acquisition Partnership. In Los Angeles, the KRTH (formerly KHJ) radio stations were purchased by
Beasley BroadcastingBeasley Broadcast Group, Inc. , based in Naples, Florida, is an owner/operator of radio stations in the United States. As of November, 2007, the company owned 17 AM stations and 27 FM stations. -History:...
, which in turn sold KRTH (AM) to
Liberman BroadcastingLiberman Broadcasting is a media company based in Burbank, California. Liberman Broadcasting primarily caters to the Spanish-speaking Hispanic community and owns television and radio stations in several of the top Hispanic markets.-History:...
. Liberman renamed the station KKHJ, then restored the original KHJ calls in 2000. In 1988, the decades-long licensing saga of KHJ-TV officially came to an end: Under an FCC-supervised deal, the station's license was granted to the company that had raised the original challenge to RKO General, Fidelity, which then transferred it to the
Walt Disney CompanyThe Walt Disney Company , often simply known as Disney, is the largest media and entertainment conglomerate in the world, known for its family-friendly products...
. For the station and its assets, Disney paid $324 million, with RKO collecting approximately two-thirds and Fidelity the remainder. Disney would rename the station
KCAL-TVKCAL-TV, channel 9, is an independent television station in Los Angeles, California, owned by the CBS Corporation. KCAL-TV shares its studio facilities with KCBS-TV inside CBS Studio Center in the Studio City section of Los Angeles, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson.-Early...
the following year. During this period, the company also divested its radio stations in Chicago and Miami–Fort Lauderdale, as well as the remaining assets of its movie-related operations. By the turn of the decade, its last significant media holdings were the WHBQ TV and AM radio stations in Memphis and KFRC (AM) in San Francisco. In 1990, the Memphis stations were sold to Adams Communications. The following year, KFRC was sold to Bedford Broadcasting and RKO General was out of the entertainment business.
Television stations
| City of license A city of license or community of license, in American and Canadian broadcasting, is the community that a radio station or television station is officially licensed to serve by that country's broadcast regulator.- History :...
/Market |
Station |
Channel
TVAnalog television encodes television picture and sound information and transmits it as an analog signal: one in which the message conveyed by the broadcast signal is a function of deliberate variations in the amplitude and/or frequency of the signal...
/ DTDigital Terrestrial Television is the technological evolution and advance from analogue terrestrial television, which broadcasts land based signals...
|
Years owned |
Current affiliation and ownership |
| Secaucus, NJ Secaucus is a town in Hudson County, New Jersey. As of the United States 2000 Census, the town population was 15,931. The town's name is pronounced "SEE-kaw-cus", with the accent on the first syllable, not the second as often used by non-natives....
/New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States, and the center of the New York metropolitan area, which is among the most populous urban areas in the world. A leading global city, New York exerts a powerful influence over worldwide commerce, finance, culture, fashion and entertainment...
|
WOR-TV
(now WWOR-TVWWOR-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the flagship station of the MyNetworkTV network licensed to Secaucus, New Jersey and serving the New York City metropolitan area. WWOR is owned by Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation, and is a sister station to Fox network flagship WNYW...
) |
9 / 38 |
1952–1986 |
MyNetworkTVMyNetworkTV is a television broadcast syndication service in the United States, owned by the Fox Entertainment Group, a division of News Corporation...
affiliate owned by News CorporationNews Corporation is the world's second largest media conglomerate as of 2008 and the world's third largest in entertainment as of 2009...
|
| Los Angeles Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the municipality of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123.445 inhabitants...
|
KHJ-TV
(now KCAL-TVKCAL-TV, channel 9, is an independent television station in Los Angeles, California, owned by the CBS Corporation. KCAL-TV shares its studio facilities with KCBS-TV inside CBS Studio Center in the Studio City section of Los Angeles, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson.-Early...
) |
9 / 43 |
1952–1988 |
Independent station owned by CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc. is an American television network, one of television's original "big three", which also include NBC and ABC. Like NBC, CBS started out as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System...
|
| Boston |
WNAC-TV
(now WHDH-TVWHDH-TV is the NBC-affiliated television station for Boston, Massachusetts, serving eastern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire. Its transmitter is located in Newton, Massachusetts. Owned by Sunbeam Television, WHDH is sister to CW affiliate WLVI-TV...
) |
7 / 42 |
1948–1982 |
NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices in Burbank,California...
affiliate owned by Sunbeam TelevisionSunbeam Television Corporation is a broadcasting company based in Miami, Florida, and owns three television stations in the United States.-History:...
|
Windsor, ONWindsor is the southernmost major city in Canada and lies in Southwestern Ontario at the western end of the heavily populated Quebec City-Windsor Corridor. It is within Essex County, although administratively separated from the county government. Windsor is located south of Detroit, is separated...
/DetroitDetroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the seat of Wayne County. Detroit is a major port city on the Detroit River, in the Midwest region of the United States. Located north of Windsor, Ontario, Detroit is the only major U.S. city that looks south to Canada. It was founded...
|
CKLW-TV
(now CBETCBET, channel 9, is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's owned-and-operated television station in Windsor, Ontario. The station's signal also covers the Detroit, Michigan area across the international border in the United States, and is counted as a Detroit station for the purposes of...
) |
9 / 35 |
1956–1970 |
CBCThe Canadian Broadcasting Corporation , a Canadian crown corporation, is the country’s national public radio and television broadcaster. In French, it is called la Société Radio-Canada...
owned-and-operated (O&O) |
HartfordHartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located in Hartford County on the Connecticut River, north of the center of the state, south of Springfield, Massachusetts. Its 2006 population of 124,512 ranks Hartford as the state's second-largest city, after Bridgeport. New...
/New Haven, CTNew Haven is the second-largest municipality in Connecticut, after Bridgeport and just ahead of Hartford, with a core population of about 124,000 people. "New Haven" may also refer to the wider Greater New Haven area, which has nearly 600,000 inhabitants in the immediate area...
|
WHCT-TV
(now WUVNWUVN is the Connecticut affiliate for the Spanish language Univision television network. It is licensed to Hartford. Owned by Entravision, the station broadcasts its digital signal on UHF channel 46...
) |
18 / 46 |
1958–1972 |
Univision Univision is a Spanish-language television network in the United States. It has the largest Latin American audience, largely due to repurposed telenovelas and other Mexican programs produced by Grupo Televisa...
affiliate owned by Entravision CommunicationsEntravision Communications Corporation is a media company based in Santa Monica, California. Entravision primarily caters to the Spanish-speaking Hispanic community and owns television and radio stations and outdoor media, including billboards, in several of the top Hispanic markets. They are...
|
West Palm BeachWest Palm Beach, also known as West Palm, is the most populous city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The city is also the oldest incorporated municipality in South Florida. West Palm's economy is currently ranked #4 in the Milken Institute Best Performing 296 U.S. Cities index...
|
WEAT–TV
(now WPECWPEC, digital channel 13, is the CBS-affiliated television station for West Palm Beach, Florida. Its transmitter is located southeast of Wellington. The station is the flagship of Freedom Communications and has studios on Fairfield Drive in Mangonia Park...
) |
12 / 13 |
ca. 1955–1958 |
CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc. is an American television network, one of television's original "big three", which also include NBC and ABC. Like NBC, CBS started out as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System...
affiliate owned by Freedom CommunicationsFreedom Communications, Inc., headquartered in Irvine, California, is a media company which owns more than 100 daily and weekly newspapers in the United States, with a combined daily circulation of nearly one million subscribers, and also operates over seventy local news websites...
|
MemphisMemphis is a city in the southwest corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. Memphis rises above the Mississippi River on the 4 th Chickasaw Bluff just south of the mouth of the Wolf River....
|
WHBQ-TVWHBQ-TV, channel 13, is an owned-and-operated television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in Memphis, Tennessee. Its studios and transmitter are located in Memphis...
|
13 / 53 |
1955–1990 |
FoxThe Fox Broadcasting Company , commonly referred to as Fox , is an American television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, from 2004 to 2009 Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the 18–49 demographic...
owned-and-operated (O&O) |
Radio stations
| DMA# |
Market |
Station |
Current ownership |
| 1. |
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States, and the center of the New York metropolitan area, which is among the most populous urban areas in the world. A leading global city, New York exerts a powerful influence over worldwide commerce, finance, culture, fashion and entertainment...
|
WOR-FM/WXLO/WRKS-98.7 |
Emmis CommunicationsEmmis Communications is a media conglomerate based in Indianapolis, Indiana. The company owns radio stations and magazines in the United States, Belgium, Hungary, Slovakia and Bulgaria.-History:...
|
WORWOR is a class A , AM radio station located in New York, New York, U.S., operating on 710 kHz. The station has a talk format and has been owned by Buckley Broadcasting since 1987, after the station was sold by RKO. The station has conservative, or right of center hosts.Its call letters have no...
-710 |
Buckley BroadcastingBuckley Radio owns and operates twenty radio stations in seven markets. In addition, the WOR Radio Network is operated as an independent syndicated programming provider with affiliates in over 400 markets.-Stations:* WOR - New York, NY...
|
| 2. |
Los Angeles Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the municipality of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123.445 inhabitants...
|
KHJ-FM/KRTH-FM-101.1 |
CBS RadioCBS Radio Inc., formerly known as Infinity Broadcasting Corporation, is one of the largest owners and operators of radio stations in the United States, fourth behind main rival Clear Channel Communications , Cumulus Media and Citadel Broadcasting...
|
KHJ/KRTHKHJ Radio in Los Angeles, California broadcasts Spanish-language entertainment programming as La Ranchera. It was also one of America's most formidable Top 40 radio stations in the 1960s and 1970s as 93 KHJ before changing its format in 1980....
-930
(now KHJ once again) |
Liberman BroadcastingLiberman Broadcasting is a media company based in Burbank, California. Liberman Broadcasting primarily caters to the Spanish-speaking Hispanic community and owns television and radio stations in several of the top Hispanic markets.-History:...
|
| 3. |
ChicagoChicago is the largest city in the U.S. state of Illinois, and with more than 2.8 million people, the 3rd largest city in the United States...
|
WFYR-FM-103.5
(now WKSC-FM) |
Clear Channel CommunicationsClear Channel Communications is an American media conglomerate company headquartered at 200 East Basse Road in San Antonio, Texas. It was founded in 1972 by Lowry Mays and Red McCombs, who wields considerable influence in radio broadcasting, concert promotion and hosting, and fixed advertising in...
|
| 4. |
San Francisco |
KFRC-FM-106.1
(now KMELKMEL is an Urban Contemporary-formatted radio station located in San Francisco, California, and owned by Clear Channel Communications....
) |
Clear Channel Communications |
KFRC-610
(now KEAR) |
Family Radio Family Radio , based in Oakland, California, is a non-commercial, 24-hour, listener-supported, Christian radio religious broadcasting network in the United States, founded in 1959 by Harold Camping, also known as "Brother Camping"...
|
| 9. |
Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C. , formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States, founded on July 16, 1790...
|
WGMS-FM WGMS was a radio station in Washington, D.C. that maintained a classical music format from 1946 to 2007. Last owned by Bonneville International, it was known on air as Classical 104.1...
-103.5
(now WTOP-FM) |
Bonneville International Bonneville International Corporation, managed by Deseret Management Corporation, is a broadcasting company wholly owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...
|
WGMS/WTEM-570
(now WTNTWTNT is a radio station broadcasting on 570 kHz in the mediumwave AM band from Bethesda, Maryland, serving the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. It has a daytime power of 5,000 watts...
) |
Red Zebra |
| 10. |
Boston Boston is the capital and largest city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is considered the economic and cultural center of the region and is sometimes regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England"...
|
WNAC-FM/WRKO/WROR/WBMX-FM-98.5
(now WBZ-FMWBZ-FM is a sports radio station known as "98.5 The Sports Hub" and broadcasting on 98.5 MHz in Boston, Massachusetts. Owned by CBS Radio, the current WBZ-FM began on August 13, 2009 and competes with AM sports talk stations WEEI and competed with the ESPN Radio pair of WAMG and WLLH before their...
) |
CBS RadioCBS Radio Inc., formerly known as Infinity Broadcasting Corporation, is one of the largest owners and operators of radio stations in the United States, fourth behind main rival Clear Channel Communications , Cumulus Media and Citadel Broadcasting...
|
WNAC/WRKOWRKO is a radio station based in Boston, Massachusetts, currently owned by Entercom. Its transmitter is located in Burlington, Massachusetts, next to the Burlington Mall.-1920-1940:...
-680 |
Entercom CommunicationsEntercom Communications Corporation is the fifth-largest broadcasting company in the United States. As of October 2008, Entercom operates 104 radio stations in 23 markets across the United States....
|
| 11. |
DetroitDetroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the seat of Wayne County. Detroit is a major port city on the Detroit River, in the Midwest region of the United States. Located north of Windsor, Ontario, Detroit is the only major U.S. city that looks south to Canada. It was founded...
(Windsor, OntarioWindsor is the southernmost major city in Canada and lies in Southwestern Ontario at the western end of the heavily populated Quebec City-Windsor Corridor. It is within Essex County, although administratively separated from the county government. Windsor is located south of Detroit, is separated...
) |
CKLW-FM-93.9
(now CIDR-FMCIDR-FM is the callsign for a radio station, broadcasting at 93.9 FM in Windsor, Ontario. The station broadcasts a Triple A format using the brand name 93-9 The River. It is owned and operated by CTVglobemedia. It is one of the few commercial triple A stations in Canada and is the only triple A...
) |
CTVglobemedia |
| CKLW-800 |
CTVglobemedia |
| 12. |
Miami–Fort Lauderdale–
Hollywood, FLHollywood is a city in Broward County, Florida, United States. As of July 1 2008, the population estimated by the U.S. Census Bureau is 141,740. Founded in 1925, the city grew rapidly in the 1950s and 1960s, and is now the twelfth largest city in Florida...
|
WAXY-FM-105.9
(now WBGG-FMWBGG-FM is Big 105.9 in the Miami-Ft. Lauderdale radio market. The station plays classic rock.It is licensed for HD Radio and planned to commence HD Radio broadcasts in April, 2006.- History :...
) |
Clear Channel Communications |
| 17. |
San DiegoSan Diego , named after Saint Didacus , is the second-largest city in California and the ninth largest city in the United States, located along the Pacific Ocean on the west coast of the United States. The US Census Bureau estimates the city's population at 1,279,329 as of 2008...
|
KGB-1360
(now KLSDKLSD is a sports station based in San Diego, California. The sports programming began on November 12, 2007. Previously, KLSD's format was progressive talk radio....
) |
Clear Channel Communications |
| 39. |
ProvidenceProvidence is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island, and one of the first cities established in the United States. Located in Providence County, it is the estimated second or third largest city in the New England region...
–Warwick, RIWarwick is a city in Kent County, Rhode Island, United States. It is the second largest city in the state, with a population of 85,808 at the 2000 census. Its mayor has been Scott Avedisian since 2000...
|
WEAN-790
(now WPRV) |
Citadel BroadcastingCitadel Broadcasting Corporation is a Las Vegas, Nevada-based broadcast holding company. Investment house Forstmann Little & Company owns 27% of Citadel and is its largest shareholder....
|
| 49. |
MemphisMemphis is a city in the southwest corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. Memphis rises above the Mississippi River on the 4 th Chickasaw Bluff just south of the mouth of the Wolf River....
|
WHBQ-FM-105.9
(now WGKX-FM) |
Citadel Broadcasting |
| WHBQ WHBQ is an AM radio station in Memphis, Tennessee, in the United States of America. Its frequency is 560 kHz. Although today it broadcasts sports news exclusively, the station became famous in the 1950s for playing rhythm and blues....
-560 |
Flinn Broadcasting |
| 112. |
Worcester, MAWorcester is a city in the state of Massachusetts in the United States of America. Having a population of 172,648 in the 2000 census, Worcester is ranked the second or third largest city in New England. It is the county seat of Worcester County....
|
W1XOJ-107.3
(now WAAFWAAF is a Boston, Massachusetts, area commercial Album Oriented Rock/Active rock radio station that mixes music that is popular in the modern rock, heavy metal and classic rock genres....
) |
Entercom Communications |
WAAB-1440
(now WVEIWVEI is an AM radio station in Worcester, Massachusetts, operating on 1440 kHz with 5,000 watts. WVEI-FM is an FM radio station in Easthampton, Massachusetts operating on 105.5 kHz with approximately 720 watts effective radiated power....
) |
Entercom Communications |
| 122. |
Bridgeport, CT Bridgeport is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. Located in and the former county seat of Fairfield County, the city had an estimated population of 137,912 in 2006 and is the core of the Greater Bridgeport area...
|
WICCWICC is a news and information radio station in Bridgeport, Connecticut, owned by Cumulus Media. Its signal reaches down into Long Island, New York.-History:...
-600 |
Cumulus Media Cumulus Media, Inc. is the second largest Owner and Operator of AM and FM radio stations in the United States, operating 347 stations in 68 markets as of December 31, 2008.. The Company's headquarters are located in Atlanta, Georgia. Cumulus has focused on owning radio stations located in medium...
|
| 218. |
Santa Barbara, CA Santa Barbara is a city in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Situated on an east-west trending section of coastline, the longest such section on the west coast, between the steeply-rising Santa Ynez Mountains and the sea, and having a Mediterranean climate, it is called California's...
|
KDB-1490
(now KBKO) |
Rincon Broadcasting |
External links