WWNC

WWNC

Asheville, North Carolina United States
Broadcast area	Western North Carolina
Frequency	570 kHz
Branding	News Radio 570
Programming
Format	Talk radio
Affiliations	Fox News Radio Premiere Networks Compass Media Networks Carolina Panthers Radio Network
Ownership
Owner	iHeartMedia, Inc. (iHM Licenses, LLC)
Sister stations	WKSF, WMXF, WQNQ, WQNS, WPEK
History
First air date	1925; 99 years ago (1925)
Former call signs	WABC (1925–1926)
Call sign meaning	Wonderful Western North Carolina
Technical information[1]
Licensing authority	FCC
Facility ID	2946
Class	B
Power	5,000 watts
Links
Public license information	Public file LMS
Webcast	Listen live (via iHeartRadio)
Website	wwnc.iheart.com

WWNC (570 kHz) is a commercial radio station in Asheville, North Carolina. It broadcasts a talk format and is owned by iHeartMedia, Inc. The station's studios and transmitter site are on Summerlin Road in Asheville.

WWNC's programming features Glenn Beck and The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show in middays, The Sean Hannity Show in afternoons, The Ramsey Show in evenings and Coast to Coast AM in overnights. Mark Starling hosts a local program in mornings.

History

Early years

WWNC is Asheville's oldest radio station, and among the oldest in North Carolina. It was first licensed, as WABC, on June 24, 1925, to the Asheville Battery Company at 19 Haywood Street.^[2] As of June 30, 1926, the station was listed on 1180 kHz with a transmitter power of 20 watts.^[3]

In late 1926, it was announced that an application had been filed to transfer ownership of WABC to the Asheville Chamber of Commerce, and change its call sign to WWNC,^[4][5] which stood for "Wonderful Western North Carolina".^[6] This allowed A. H. Grebe to transfer the WABC call sign to a New York City station, which was licensed to the Atlantic Broadcasting Company.^[7]

In early 1927, WWNC began using an upgraded facility, which included an antenna strung between two towers constructed atop the Flatiron Building.^[8]

The Chamber also financed a major upgrade, which included a power increase to 1,000 watts, and relocated the transmitter site to atop the Flatiron Building. This new configuration made its debut broadcast on February 21, 1927, at 7:00 pm.^[9] The station has traditionally recognized this as its founding date.^[10] On November 11, 1928, WWNC was moved to its current frequency of 570 kHz, as part of the implementation of the Federal Radio Commission's General Order 40.^[11] The Citizen Broadcasting Company acquired the station on February 4, 1929.^[5]

The studios were at the Vanderbilt Hotel.^{[citation needed]} Other broadcast locations have included the Flatiron Building^[12] and the Citizen-Times Building when it was owned by the daily newspaper.^{[citation needed]} For most of its early years, WWNC was powered at 1,000 watts.^[13]

In its early days, WWNC provided weather and road reports, and music at night. Country legend Jimmie Rodgers^[14] and Bascom Lamar Lunsford were among the stars who performed on the station. Information included "local sporting events, crop futures and farmers markets, and social and economic affairs (billed as being everything 'from house work to bridge')."^[6] WWNC also aired church services. Because the station could be heard throughout the Eastern United States and even in Canada and Mexico, WWNC became valuable in attracting tourists.^[6] On October 10, 1931, WWNC changed its affiliation from CBS Radio to the NBC Red Network.^[15]

Popular shows

On September 10, 1936, President Franklin Roosevelt spoke at McCormick Field. WWNC broadcast the speech.^[16] The station was the Western North Carolina home to Amos and Andy, Fibber McGee and Molly and Jack Benny. In 1938, WWNC was one of the many stations broadcasting Orson Welles' The War of the Worlds.

The first time the world heard Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys was February 2, 1939, at 3:30 pm when the group played a fifteen-minute segment on Mountain Music Time. At the time, WWNC was an NBC affiliate, owned by the Asheville Citizen-Times. Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys played the daily 3:30-3:45 Mountain Music spot until April 1, 1939. On that date, WWNC left NBC and rejoined CBS.^[17]

On September 28, 1953, the Asheville Citizen-Times and WWNC were sold to Roger C. Peace and J. Kelly Sisk, owners of the Greenville News and Piedmont and WFBC in Greenville, South Carolina;^[18] the $2.3 million deal was approved by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that November.^[19] In September 1967, the News-Piedmont Company and its associated companies announced that they would merge to form Multimedia, Inc., by January 1, 1968.^[20]

MOR and country

As network programming moved from radio to television, WWNC switched to a full service, middle of the road (MOR) format, including popular adult music, news and sports.^{[21][22][23][24]} In 1969, WWNC switched from MOR to country music.

In the days before FM became popular, WWNC was sometimes the highest-rated station in the United States with an Arbitron share over 40 percent, occasionally as high as 50 percent for morning drive time disc jockey Scotty Rhodarmer.^[25] It was the top station in the Asheville radio market for many years.^[26]

Heritage Broadcast Group purchased WWNC from Multimedia, Inc., for $7.25 million in 1987.^[27] Heritage already owned WISE and WKSF in Asheville;^[28] it would sell WISE to United Broadcasting Enterprises a few months later.^[29] In 1993, Heritage sold WWNC and WKSF to Osborn Communications, in a $22.5 million deal that also included WAAX and WQEN in Gadsden, Alabama; WFKS in Palatka, Florida; and WOLZ in Fort Myers, Florida.^[30] Capstar Broadcasting Partners purchased Osborn for $100 million in 1996.^[31]

Capstar and Chancellor Media announced in August 1998 that they would merge (Hicks, Muse, Tate & Furst was a major shareholder in both companies);^[32] upon the merger's completion in July 1999, the combined company was named AMFM Inc.^[33] AMFM was in turn acquired by Clear Channel Communications (forerunner to iHeartMedia) in a deal announced on October 4, 1999,^[34] and completed in August 2000.^[35]

Talk radio

In 2002, WWNC changed its format from country music (except for the Scotty Rhodarmer morning show) to all-talk, taking over talk shows previously heard on WTZY (now WPEK).^[36] In 2004, Rhodarmer retired as WWNC morning host after more than 40 years in the position and 50 years as a station employee. In 1979, he had 56 percent of the audience according to Arbitron, more than any other local radio personality.^[22] His theme song was "Carolina in the Morning". On June 18, 2010, many of the former DJs had a reunion. They included Rhodarmer, Frank Byrd, Wiley Carpenter, John Roten, John Anderson and Randy Houston.^[25]

Western Carolina University broadcast a program in December 2010 on WWNC recreating Welles' 1938 broadcast of A Christmas Carol, including Arthur Anderson, who at age 16 performed with Welles in the original broadcast.^[23]

References

1. "Facility Technical Data for WWNC". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
2. "New stations", Radio Service Bulletin, July 1, 1925, page 3.
3. Commercial and Government Radio Stations of the United States, June 30, 1926, edition, page 67.
4. "Asheville Assured Government Permit For Radio Station", Asheville (North Carolina) Times, December 2, 1926, page 1.
5. "FCC History Cards for WABC / WWNC": "Application Record - Broadcasting", Card No. 1 (scanned card #11), the application dated 11-30-26 reads: "Renewal & assignment license in name Asheville Chamber of Commerce, loc. Chamber of Commerce-requesting call letters WWNC."
6. Chesky, Anne (May 24, 2024). "WNC History: Asheville's Flatiron Building, from 'Human Fly's' 1926 climb to today's hotel". Asheville Citizen-Times.
7. "Alterations and corrections", Radio Service Bulletin, December 31, 1926, page 8.
8. "WWNC Celebrates Birthday" by John D. Topping, Radio Register, April 1928, pages 7-8.
9. Neufeld, Rob (January 3, 2016). "Visiting Our Past: Recognizing history as it happens". Asheville Citizen-Times. Retrieved January 5, 2016.
10. "First Anniversary: Radio Station WWNC", 1928.
11. "Revised list of broadcasting stations, by frequencies, effective 3 a. m., November 11, 1928, eastern standard time", Second Annual Report of the Federal Radio Commission for the Year Ended June 30, 1928, Together With Supplemental Report for the Period From July 1, 1928, to September 30, 1928, page 200.
12. Kennell, Tiana (May 15, 2024). "Flat Iron Hotel, Luminosa restaurant opens in downtown Asheville". Asheville Citizen-Times.
13. Broadcasting Yearbook 1935 page 48, Broadcasting & Cable
14. Neufeld, Rob (January 23, 2023). "Visiting Our Past: Toasting ups and downs of the 1920s in WNC". Asheville Citizen-Times.
15. "WWNC, WIS Join NBC" (PDF). Broadcasting. October 15, 1931. Retrieved September 29, 2014.
16. "Today in Asheville history, Sept. 10". Asheville Citizen-Times. September 10, 2015. Retrieved October 6, 2015.
17. "Minnesota Group, WKBO Added to NBC". Broadcasting–Broadcast Advertising. March 15, 1939. p. 30.
18. "Greenville Group to Buy Asheville Newspapers". The Spartanburg Herald. Associated Press. September 29, 1953. p. 3. Retrieved October 27, 2024.
19. "KCMO Sale Among FCC Approvals". Broadcasting–Telecasting. November 16, 1953. p. 56.
20. "Stockholders Favor Merger Of Papers, TV". The Spartanburg Herald. Associated Press. September 16, 1967. p. 3. Retrieved October 27, 2024.
21. Tony Kiss, "WWNC radio celebrates three-quarters of a century", Asheville Citizen-Times, February 17, 2002.
22. "Rhodarmer an institution; WNC's mornings won't be the same without his voice", Asheville Citizen-Times, December 26, 2004.
23. Tony Kiss, "Tickets on sale for WCU's re-creation of radio 'Carol'", Asheville Citizen-Times, August 6, 2010.
24. Rob Neufeld, "Toasting ups and downs of the 1920s in WNC," Asheville Citizen-Times, January 13, 2014, p. B4.
25. Tony Kiss, "WWNC stars of yesteryear remember the 'magic' they created in Asheville", Asheville Citizen-Times, June 19, 2010.
26. Kiss, Tony (April 17, 1994). "Tune in new tunes across local airwaves". Asheville Citizen-Times. p. 1L – via Newspapers.com.
27. "Multimedia selling station". The Sumter Daily Item. Associated Press. April 16, 1987. p. 8B. Retrieved October 27, 2024.
28. "$230 Million Taft Sale Detailed; Compass, WIN Sell 3 Stations". Radio & Records. June 19, 1987. pp. 10, 12.
29. "$380 Million Station Trading Bonanza". Radio & Records. July 17, 1987. pp. 10, 12.
30. "SRN-Heftel Merger Creates $150 Million Spanish Group". Radio & Records. December 10, 1993. pp. 6, 8.
31. "Capstar Takes Osborn Group". Radio & Records. July 26, 1996. pp. 1, 30.
32. Littleton, Cynthia (August 28, 1998). "Chancellor, Capstar ink merger". Variety. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
33. "Chancellor/Capstar merger creates AMFM Inc". Austin Business Journal. July 13, 1999. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
34. "Clear Channel, AMFM deal". CNN Money. October 4, 1999. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
35. Variety Staff (August 30, 2000). "Clear Channel brings AMFM into focus". Variety. Retrieved April 9, 2023.
36. Tony Kiss, "Local radio stations swap formats Monday", Asheville Citizen-Times, March 15, 2002

External links

• Official website
• Facility details for Facility ID 2946 (WWNC) in the FCC Licensing and Management System
• WWNC in Nielsen Audio's AM station database
• FCC History cards for WWNC (covering 1925-1978 as WABC / WWNC)

35°35′49″N 82°36′20″W