WIBC (93.1 FM) is a radio
station owned by Emmis
Communications in Indianapolis, Indiana
. The studios are located at 40 Monument
Circle in downtown Indianapolis. The transmitter and antenna are
located, according to the FCC, near Post Road and Burk Road on the
far east side of Indianapolis. The station currently airs a
news/
talk
format.
For over sixty-nine years, WIBC broadcast on the
AM radio frequency of 1070 kHz. On December 26,
2007, WIBC's call letters and news/talk programming moved to 93.1
FM, a station which has had various
call letters and formats since its sign-on in 1961. Also on that
date, the 1070
AM frequency assumed
the call letters
WFNI and the nickname "1070
The Fan".
WIBC history
Offices of WIBC
1070 AM WIBC went on the air on
October
30,
1938, the last of the big four in
Indianapolis.
The other big four were WFBM (now WNDE
), WIRE (now
WXNT
), and WISH/WIFE (now WTLC). In its early days, it was the
Indianapolis home of the
Mutual Broadcasting System. WIBC
would be considered one of the greatest MOR (middle of the road)
format station that placed a huge emphasis on personalities both on
the air and in the producing of the station promos: During the 70's
and into the early 80's there was: Gary Todd (mornings), Jerry
Baker, Orly Knutson, Chuck Riley, PeteSullivan, Jeff Pigeon. Two
major production voices did most of the stations promos at one time
or another during the 70's: Billy Moore, John E. Douglas and Reb
Porter. During the late 1980s and into the early 1990s, WIBC became
a
talk radio station with a lineup of
.
A longtime fixture was former News Director Fred Heckman, who began
with WIBC in 1957, abruptly resigning in 1993 under a dispute with
its then-owners. He returned in 1994 after the station was
purchased by Emmis, and remained until his 2000 retirement. His
daily "My Town Indy" radio essays, which ran for thirty years, were
among the station's most enduring favorites.
93.1 FM history
The Indianapolis station at 93.1 FM began life, coincidentally
enough, as
WIBC-FM in
1961 under a
classical music format. On July 1,
1968, WIBC-FM was re-launched as
WNAP. It was the first FM station in the
Indianapolis market to broadcast
album-oriented rock music, and was in
direct competition with WIFE-AM. Later, in the '60s and early '70s,
the station was nicknamed as "the Buzzard," even prior to its use
on WMMS in Cleveland. Its ID was "The Wrath of the Buzzard...WNAP
Indianapolis."
On March 4, 1986, the format changed to a more rock-driven
adult contemporary sound, and the call
letters became
WEAG using the name "Eagle 93." The
format changed to
classic hits with the
call letters
WKLR on August 14, 1987. On April 1,
1988 (April Fools' Day), WKLR changed from classic hits to Oldies.
Among WKLR's
disc jockeys was current
WIBC newsman Steve Simpson.
WNAP returned at 5 p.m. on Friday September 9, 1994, when WKLR
changed back to a classic hits station with a strong focus on the
"greatest hits of the 70s." WNAP later moved in a more classic rock
direction playing "classic rock that really rocks" with Howard
Stern in the morning. Despite on-air boasts that WNAP was going to
"kick (competitor)
Q-95's ass," the classic
rock format was a failure.
After weeks of stunting, WNAP changed to
contemporary hits in early
March 2000 with the call letters
WNOU and the name "Radio Now." The station
received some national notice in December 2004, when their morning
show conducted the first interview with
Indiana Pacers player
Ron Artest following the
Pacers–Pistons brawl. The
interview was simulcast on
NBC's
Today Show.
In 2006, WNOU launched a
HD2 subchannel,
dubbed "Orbital 93.1," which offered a
Dance
music format with emphasis on current and classic Dance product
24/7, but in 2007 it was replaced for one day with WNOU's Top 40
format. Orbital was discontinued with the switch to WIBC.
Upon the demise of "Radio Now" on 93.1,
Radio One purchased the
intellectual property of the station
from Emmis Communications.
The "Radio Now" branding, format and logo
were installed on the new WNOU
(formerly
WYJZ 100.9 FM). Local Radio One management claimed that they
will offer the displaced staffers of WNOU the first chance of
joining the station's lineup, and will use the same
imaging as the former WNOU. Emmis also claimed
that they would release displaced RadioNow staffers from their
"non-compete" contracts.
During the interim period between the demise of the Radio Now
format and the debut of WIBC on 93.1 FM, the frequency was known as
WEXM and was programmed with the stunting format
the "93 Days of Christmas", in which
Christmas music was heard for nearly 3
months. (The original plan was to air 93 days of the format from
October 8 to January 8; however, the move from WEXM to WIBC was
made nearly two weeks earlier than originally stated, dropping the
Christmas music the day after Christmas.)
The
WNAP calls are now used at a
gospel-formatted AM station licensed in Norristown, PA serving the
Philadelphia market area.
Programming
As of March 2009, WIBC broadcasts three daily local programs:
The Morning News with Terri Stacy and former
Indianapolis Colts player
Joe Staysniak;
Garrison, hosted by
local lawyer Greg Garrison; and an afternoon-drive program hosted
by Steve Simpson.
Staysniak moved to the morning show in October 2008. He replaced
Jake Query, who in turn replaced longtime WIBC fixture Jeff Pigeon
(referred to as "Pidge" by the staff and listeners), who left the
station October 1, 2007. Pigeon had been WIBC's morning host since
taking over for Gary Todd in 1988, and prior to that had hosted the
7:00 p.m.-midnight shift when WIBC was still a full-service/music
station. (Pigeon has since resurfaced at oldies station
WKLU.)
Staysniak previously co-hosted in the afternoon with
Dave "the King" Wilson,
whose show launched in the mid-'90s but ended in March 2009 due to
budgetary cutbacks. At that time, Simpson's show moved from 6-8 PM
to 3-7 PM.
WIBC was
the AM flagship station of the NFL's Indianapolis Colts, simulcasting the
games with sister station WLHK
.
In
addition, WIBC was the flagship for the NBA's Indiana Pacers and the WNBA's Indiana Fever, and for the Indianapolis Motor
Speedway Radio Network, carrying the Indianapolis
500
since the network's creation in 1952, and the
NASCAR Brickyard 400
since its 1994 inception. WIBC also aired
Indiana University football, while WLHK
airs that school's basketball games.
Most of WIBC-AM's sports remained at 1070 (now WFNI); WIBC today
occasionally airs IU basketball and IndyCar events that are bumped
from their respective flagship stations, as well as some high
school championship events.
Upon the move to FM,
Mike McConnell was added
to the daily schedule (replacing the former
WIBC Sports
Talk program), while
Paul Harvey,
who had been heard on WIBC since 1995, was dropped
[194799]. McConnell was replaced in February
2008 with
Clark Howard.
Rush Limbaugh and
Coast to Coast AM also air on WIBC.
References
External links
Wikis
Map
Search
