WVOT is a radio station

Radio station

Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...

 licensed to and located in Wilson, North Carolina

Wilson, North Carolina

Wilson is a city and the county seat of Wilson County in the Coastal Plain region of the U.S. state of North Carolina. The 18th largest city in the state, Wilson had a population of 49,167 according to the 2010 census.- Geography :...

, USA. The FCC assigned frequency is 1420 kHz. The station operates at 1000 Watts non-directional by day, and 500 watts directional at night, largely on a north-facing axis.

Programming

The current format is urban contemporary gospel

Urban contemporary gospel

Traditional black gospel is music that is written to express either personal or a communal belief regarding Christian life, as well as to give a Christian alternative to mainstream secular music...

. Past formats have included talk

Talk radio

Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often feature interviews with a number of different guests. Talk radio typically includes an element of listener participation, usually by broadcasting live...

, Carolina beach music

Beach music

Beach music, also known as Carolina beach music, is a regional genre which developed from various musical styles of the forties, fifties and sixties. These styles ranged from big band swing instrumentals to the more raucous sounds of blues/jump blues, jazz, doo-wop, boogie, rhythm and blues,...

, oldies

Oldies

Oldies is a term commonly used to describe a radio format that concentrates on music from a period of about 15 to 55 years before the present day....

, adult contemporary, contemporary hit radio

Contemporary hit radio

Contemporary hit radio is a radio format that is common in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada and Australia that focuses on playing current and recurrent popular music as determined by the Top 40 music charts...

, and block programming. The station's call letters originally stood for W-V(oice)-O(f)-T(obbacoland.)

History

The original studio/transmitter building was located across from the Wilson city operation center on East Herring Avenue. The small brick and frame building held the business office, advertising office, production studio, news room, "on-air" control-room/studio, and transmitter. Though space was limited and spartan, the studio provided a venue for interviewing a variety of celebrities, including Tiny Tim.

The studio was also the starting point for many broadcasting personalities. Past air personnel of WVOT include Bill Bunn, Dave Edwards, Randy Steele, Pat Patterson, Bob Johnson (dec.) Andrew Scott Honeycutt, Dave Mack, Jamie Eller (Jones), Dan Mills, Bill Benjamin, Mark Miller, J.T. Austin, Maurice Brown, Jones Fuquay, Matthew Bulley, Joe George, Don Flowers, Rick Mendleson, Michael Buscemi, Mac McKee, Steve McRae (Steve Sipe), Rick D. Rhodes, Jay Lance, Terry Tunes (Dan Robins), Joe Overman, Kevin O'Neal ( Ramey Frazier Dec.), Crazy Rob Lee (Abrams), Charles Russell (Tom Shannon), Uncle Sam, Kevin Coan, Spencer Manning and many others.

The Fire

During the 1980s and early 1990s, the station signed off the air each night at midnight. The duties of the last announcer of the evening included recording the weather forecast on a 24-hour answering machine "The WVOT 24-Hour Weather Center", cleaning up the control room (food boxes, ash trays, etc.) and locking up the station for the five hours or so it would be un-occupied before the morning airstaff arrived.

In one corner of the control room was a pre-internet relic of broadcasting, a teleprinter

Teleprinter

A teleprinter is a electromechanical typewriter that can be used to communicate typed messages from point to point and point to multipoint over a variety of communication channels that range from a simple electrical connection, such as a pair of wires, to the use of radio and microwave as the...

, which spewed yards and yards of paper throughout an air shift. One further responsibility of the night announcer was clearing the wire service area of the accumulated teleprinter paper. Unfortunately, one night in 1992 an announcer completed all of his duties, including throwing away all the wire-service paper, and emptying the ash tray from the control room into the same trash can. The blaze destroyed the building.

Within days under the continued leadership of Rick Mendleson, the studios were moved to an historic house on Jackson Street in downtown Wilson. A new transmitter building was erected on the original Herring Avenue tower site.

WRDU-FM

In 1984, Century Communications sold WVOT-WXYY to Voyager Communications. The FM was moved to Raleigh and the call letters were changed to WRDU. A new tower site was built near Middlesex, North Carolina

Middlesex, North Carolina

Middlesex is a town in Nash County, North Carolina, United States. It is part of the Rocky Mount, North Carolina Metropolitan Statistical Area. Middlesex is about 25 miles east of Raleigh, North Carolina...

, and the confusing, FCC-required announcement of the station's licensing was broadcast hourly: "W-R-D-U, F-M, Wilson, Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill".

Career Communications bought WVOT in 1992.