On 23 Feb 2005 03:24:41 GMT, "Blue Cat" wrote:

There are some that I came upon:
WGY 810 kHz, Schenectady, NY "G" for General Electric, "Y" last letter in
Schenectady.
KGO 810 kHz, San Francisco, CA "G" for GE, "O" last letter in San
Francisco. GE owned both stations many years ago.
WROW 590 kHz, Albany, NY "Row!" (like a dog growling) "Watchdog of the
Capital District".
WPTR 1540 kHz, Albany, NY (back in the 1960s), Patroon Broadcasting Corp.
WROV 1240 kHz, Roanoke, VA (back before 1990s) "RO" for Roanoke, "V" for
Virginia.
WSLS 610 kHz, Roanoke, VA (Before 1980), Shenandoah Life (insurance) Station
WQBA 1140 kHz, Miami, FL (Spanish speaking) Q, pronounced "coo", BA as in
"bah". Said together, it is "Cuba" as said in Spanish.


WEAF (later WNBC, WRCA and WFAN) was next in sequence after the call
letters that the FCC originally offered and the owners rejected -
WDAM.

WEVD (now WEPN) stood for Eugene V. Debs, the labor union leader who
helped found the Socialist Party and was jailed for criticizing World
War I.

WCFL (I'm not sure what that is now) was Chicago Federation of Labor

WLS (then owned by Sears) was the World's Largest Store

KYW doesn't stand for anything but it has an interesting migratory
history, having originated in Chicago, then Philadelphia, Cleveland
and back to Philadelphia.

WJZ is another call associated with AT&T and Westinghouse which has
done some migration. Originally the NBC Blue Network (later ABC) call
in New York, it is now the call for the Westinghouse (later CBS) TV
station in Baltimore.

I don't think you can actually buy a call from one station to use on
another station but Ted Turner bribed the MIT student radio station
WTBS (Technology Broadcasting System) to change its call to WMBR so
that the call WTBS would become available to his TV station.

Also, are there any sets of calls in which the AM/FM and TV stations
are hundreds of miles apart other than for KCBS?

KCBS is in San Francisco. KCBS-TV (originally KNXT, from KNX for the
Los Angeles Evening Express) and KCBS-TV are in Los Angeles.

Joel Rubin wrote:
On 23 Feb 2005 03:24:41 GMT, "Blue Cat" wrote:


There are some that I came upon:
WGY 810 kHz, Schenectady, NY "G" for General Electric, "Y" last letter in
Schenectady.
KGO 810 kHz, San Francisco, CA "G" for GE, "O" last letter in San
Francisco. GE owned both stations many years ago.
WROW 590 kHz, Albany, NY "Row!" (like a dog growling) "Watchdog of the
Capital District".
WPTR 1540 kHz, Albany, NY (back in the 1960s), Patroon Broadcasting Corp.
WROV 1240 kHz, Roanoke, VA (back before 1990s) "RO" for Roanoke, "V" for
Virginia.
WSLS 610 kHz, Roanoke, VA (Before 1980), Shenandoah Life (insurance) Station
WQBA 1140 kHz, Miami, FL (Spanish speaking) Q, pronounced "coo", BA as in
"bah". Said together, it is "Cuba" as said in Spanish.



WEAF (later WNBC, WRCA and WFAN) was next in sequence after the call
letters that the FCC originally offered and the owners rejected -
WDAM.

WEVD (now WEPN) stood for Eugene V. Debs, the labor union leader who
helped found the Socialist Party and was jailed for criticizing World
War I.

WCFL (I'm not sure what that is now) was Chicago Federation of Labor

The WCFL refered to above is now WMVP and is owned by ABC and is
ESPN Radio
WLS (then owned by Sears) was the World's Largest Store

Also in Chicago, there is WMBI, Moody Bible Institute
WGN which stands for Worlds Greatest Newspaper (Chicago Tribune)
WIND does not stand for Windy City, but stands for Indiana where it was
first licensed.
Downstate in Champaign-Urbana, IL there is WILL which is licensed to the
University of Illinois and stands for Illinois.

In South Bend Indiana WSBT stands for South Bend Tribune and
WNDU (now only TV) stands for Notre Dame University who owns it
through a commercial subsidiary.

KYW doesn't stand for anything but it has an interesting migratory
history, having originated in Chicago, then Philadelphia, Cleveland
and back to Philadelphia.

WJZ is another call associated with AT&T and Westinghouse which has
done some migration. Originally the NBC Blue Network (later ABC) call
in New York, it is now the call for the Westinghouse (later CBS) TV
station in Baltimore.

I don't think you can actually buy a call from one station to use on
another station but Ted Turner bribed the MIT student radio station
WTBS (Technology Broadcasting System) to change its call to WMBR so
that the call WTBS would become available to his TV station.

Also, are there any sets of calls in which the AM/FM and TV stations
are hundreds of miles apart other than for KCBS?

There is an AM & FM in Michigan that are about 175 miles apart.
WKLZ-AM, Kalamazoo and WKLZ-FM, Petosky. They are not commonly owned.

KCBS is in San Francisco. KCBS-TV (originally KNXT, from KNX for the
Los Angeles Evening Express) and KCBS-TV are in Los Angeles.


Early call letters and their meanings can be found at the top of the
page at Jeff Miller's Broadcasting History site at
http://members.aol.com/jeff560/jeff.html

Charlie

--
To respond by Email remove never- from address

Joel Rubin wrote:
Also, are there any sets of calls in which the AM/FM and TV stations
are hundreds of miles apart other than for KCBS?

KCBS is in San Francisco. KCBS-TV (originally KNXT, from KNX for the
Los Angeles Evening Express) and KCBS-TV are in Los Angeles.

Yep: for one example, WWVA-AM in Wheeling, West Virginia: WWVA-FM in an
Atlanta suburb. There are other examples.

But to the best of my knowledge, KCBS was the *first* station to "split"
their calls like that.

--
Doug Smith W9WI
Pleasant View (Nashville), TN EM66
http://www.w9wi.com

Joel Rubin wrote:

KYW doesn't stand for anything but it has an interesting migratory
history, having originated in Chicago, then Philadelphia, Cleveland
and back to Philadelphia.


I once read that it stood for "Know Your World".


Bob Radil
A ?subject=KYW" E-Mail /A

BobRadil(at)comcast.net
BobRadil(at)aol.com
BobRadil(at)yahoo.com
BobRadil(at)netscape.net

WFOR was (is?) a small 250W AM station in Hattiesburg, MS (FORrest
county). WFOR-TV is in Miami, no connection I think.

Joel Rubin wrote:
On 23 Feb 2005 03:24:41 GMT, "Blue Cat" wrote:


There are some that I came upon:
WGY 810 kHz, Schenectady, NY "G" for General Electric, "Y" last letter in
Schenectady.
KGO 810 kHz, San Francisco, CA "G" for GE, "O" last letter in San
Francisco. GE owned both stations many years ago.
WROW 590 kHz, Albany, NY "Row!" (like a dog growling) "Watchdog of the
Capital District".
WPTR 1540 kHz, Albany, NY (back in the 1960s), Patroon Broadcasting Corp.
WROV 1240 kHz, Roanoke, VA (back before 1990s) "RO" for Roanoke, "V" for
Virginia.
WSLS 610 kHz, Roanoke, VA (Before 1980), Shenandoah Life (insurance) Station
WQBA 1140 kHz, Miami, FL (Spanish speaking) Q, pronounced "coo", BA as in
"bah". Said together, it is "Cuba" as said in Spanish.



WEAF (later WNBC, WRCA and WFAN) was next in sequence after the call
letters that the FCC originally offered and the owners rejected -
WDAM.

WEVD (now WEPN) stood for Eugene V. Debs, the labor union leader who
helped found the Socialist Party and was jailed for criticizing World
War I.

WCFL (I'm not sure what that is now) was Chicago Federation of Labor

WLS (then owned by Sears) was the World's Largest Store

KYW doesn't stand for anything but it has an interesting migratory
history, having originated in Chicago, then Philadelphia, Cleveland
and back to Philadelphia.

WJZ is another call associated with AT&T and Westinghouse which has
done some migration. Originally the NBC Blue Network (later ABC) call
in New York, it is now the call for the Westinghouse (later CBS) TV
station in Baltimore.

I don't think you can actually buy a call from one station to use on
another station but Ted Turner bribed the MIT student radio station
WTBS (Technology Broadcasting System) to change its call to WMBR so
that the call WTBS would become available to his TV station.

Also, are there any sets of calls in which the AM/FM and TV stations
are hundreds of miles apart other than for KCBS?

KCBS is in San Francisco. KCBS-TV (originally KNXT, from KNX for the
Los Angeles Evening Express) and KCBS-TV are in Los Angeles.

On 23 Feb 2005 03:24:41 GMT, "Blue Cat" wrote:

WROV 1240 kHz, Roanoke, VA (back before 1990s) "RO" for Roanoke, "V" for
Virginia.
WSLS 610 kHz, Roanoke, VA (Before 1980), Shenandoah Life (insurance) Station

For future historical reference with these two:

The WROV calls landed on 96.3 Martinsville, VA, which inherited 1240's
history as "The Rock of Virginia" for the Roanoke/Lynchburg market.
1240 is now WGMN ("The Game", sports), simulcast with Lynchburg's
WVGM/1320.

The WSLS calls are still on TV channel 10, the R/L market's NBC
affiliate. 610 eventually became WSLC, for decades the area's
dominant country station. The format and WSLC calls migrated to FM
94.9, where it exists today as "Star Country". For a time, WSLC/610
simulcasted the new FM country signal, and is now WVBE(AM)... the AM
and Roanoke simulcast of Lynchburg-targetted urban FM station "Vibe
100" (WVBE[FM] 100.1).

That station was once WLYK ("Lynchburg's K", I presume), and IT used
to simulcast Roanoke top 40 WXLK/92.3 before breaking out on its own
with the new format in 2001.

"Blue Cat" wrote in message
...
There are some that I came upon:

Interesting list... here's another:

WCCO, Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN (830 KHz). W-C-CO stands for Washburn Crosby
Co.,
a milling company that eventually became the food giant, General Mills.

Jackie

snip

WTIC is Travelers Insurance Company, although back in the 70's I also heard it
explained as "Watch Travelers Ignore Claims".

WCBS AM radio was originally licensed to Springfield Illinois but
when the CBS radio network was formed, a deal was made to change the
call letters in Springfield so New York could get WCBS. The
Springfield calls were changed to WCVS and until the 1980's the
station logo included an asterisk over the V and a small print
addition at the bottom to say 'formerly WCBS'.

WTMC in Ocala Florida, the first radio station there, stood for
Welcome To Marion County. Calls were changed in the nineties.

WXCV FM in Crystal River, Florida calls were invented by one of the
owners. Because the station was at 95 on the FM dial, roman numberals
were used for 95. XC=90 V=5

WHBO AM in Tampa Bay was designed to spell out Hillsborough, the
county of license.

WAFC in Clewiston Florida was picked by one of the founders from the
AFC switch (automatic freq control??) located on the front panel of
the GE Super Radio unit.

WSMD (long since gone) in Chicago was a jazz station that supposedly
stood for Smack Dab in the Middle as they were in the middle of the FM
dial (exact freq I dont recall, but around 98)

Kristopher Chase wrote:



WSMD (long since gone) in Chicago was a jazz station that supposedly
stood for Smack Dab in the Middle as they were in the middle of the FM
dial (exact freq I dont recall, but around 98)



The Chicagoland Radio History web pages at
(check it out for just about anything in Chicago area
broadcast history)

http://www.angelfire.com/nm/negativfan/callhistory.html

give the answer to this question:
Quoting from their pages:
WSDM -- was on 97.9, "Smack Dab in the Middle" from the mid-60s to
1976, when the all-female ez/jazz station was thrown for a WLUP.
Presently the call is being used in Brazil, IN.

Charlie
the old engineer
--
To respond by Email remove never- from address