WLAP
![]() | |
City | Lexington, Kentucky |
---|---|
Broadcast area | Lexington Metro Area, Central Kentucky |
Branding | Newsradio 630 WLAP |
Slogan | Lexington's News Talk Radio |
Frequency | 630 kHz |
First air date | September 15, 1922 (in Louisville, moved to Lexington on March 17, 1934) |
Format | News Talk Information |
Power |
5,000 watts day 1,000 watts night |
Class | B |
Facility ID | 68209 |
Transmitter coordinates | 38°7′25.00″N 84°26′45.00″W / 38.1236111°N 84.4458333°W |
Callsign meaning |
We Love All People[1] Winning Lexington's Active People |
Affiliations | Fox News Radio |
Owner |
iHeartMedia (Citicasters Licenses, Inc.) |
Webcast | Listen Live (via iHeartRadio) |
Website | wlap.com |
WLAP (630 AM) is a radio station broadcasting a News Talk Information format. Licensed to Lexington, Kentucky, United States, the station serves the Central Kentucky region. The station is currently owned by iHeartMedia and features programming from Fox News Radio.[2]
WLAP uses a four-tower directional antenna with differing patterns for daytime and nighttime; broadcast power is 5,000 daytime, 1,000 nighttime.
History
About 1912, William V. Jordan of Louisville became involved in amateur radio experiments and operation, and by 1915 had been issued call letters 9-L-K for his wireless transmitting station. Jordan reportedly started broadcasting phonograph records to patients at Waverly Hills Hospital in 1921. He continued this until September 15, 1922, when he was granted a license, under the call letters of WLAP. It is Kentucky's oldest radio station.
After WFIW was relocated from Hopkinsville to Louisville as WAVE, Turner C. Rush and Alvin L. Witt of Lexington bought the station with the intention of moving it there. WLAP signed off for the last time from Louisville on December 23, 1933, after the Federal Radio Commission granted preliminary approval for the move to Lexington. Final permission was granted on January 5, 1934. WLAP went back on the air in Lexington with Program Tests on March 17, 1934.[3]
On March 5, 1948, the Federal Communications Commission approved WLAP's application to move from 1450 kHz to 630 kHz with an increase in power from 250 W (full-time) to 5 KW (daytime) and 1 KW (night, directionalized).[4] In January 1957, the Federal Communications Commission approved the sale of the radio station along with the construction permit for a TV station to the Community Broadcasting Company whose principals were Frederick Gregg Jr., Harry Feingold and Charles Wright.[5]
WLAP aired a Top 40 music format during the 1960s and 1970s and softened to a full-service Adult Contemporary direction by the late 1970s, by which time the Top 40 format had shifted to its sister station WLAP-FM. It was also the first station in the Lexington area to utilize a generator for emergency broadcasting purposes, which served the station well during the Super Outbreak of April 3, 1974, when tornadoes disrupted electrical service to much of the state of Kentucky and WLAP was the only radio station in Lexington able to stay on the air thanks to its generator.(1)
WLAP is currently the flagship station of the Big Blue Sports Network, which carries Kentucky Wildcats football and basketball.
References
- ↑ "Call Letter Origins". Radio History on the Web.
- ↑ "WLAP Facility Record". United States Federal Communications Commission, audio division.
- ↑ "WLAP-AM History".
- ↑ "WLAP Lexington Granted Shift to 630 kc 1-5 kw" (PDF). Broadcasting. March 8, 1948. Retrieved 10 November 2014.
- ↑ "Broadcasting / Telecasting" (PDF). January 21, 1957. Retrieved September 26, 2016.