City Bellaire, Texas Branding SB Nation Radio 1560 Format Sports | Broadcast area Greater Houston Frequency 1560 kHz | |
First air date 1961 (in Port Lavaca, TX) | ||
KGOW (1560 AM), known as "SB Nation Radio 1560," is an American sports talk format radio station based in Houston, Texas, United States. It is currently owned by GOW Communications. GOW Communications also owns SB Nation Radio, and the network's operations are based at KGOW. The transmitter site is located between Manvel and Angleton, Texas and studios are located in Uptown Houston one block from The Galleria. The facility originated in Port Lavaca, Texas and began operations in 1961 as KGUL, which remained as such until The RAFTT Corporation purchased it and moved KGUL into the Houston metropolitan area, licensed to Bellaire, in 1996.
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History
1560 first appeared in south Texas as KGUL (AM) in Port Lavaca, Texas. It began on 95.9 FM.
A time brokered station in the Houston area (the now deleted KFCC (AM)) operated in Bay City, Texas and later operated in the Stafford, Texas area. Unfortunately the station moved without proper FCC permission. When it was clear that this facility would be going away, the principals secured a front "real party in interest" to take the KGUL facility to Houston. They operated with 800 watts, later 5,000 watts on a simple directional system.
Prior to September 2007, the station was KILE, with a Multi-Language talk radio format, and was the only one in the Houston area to broadcast in many languages.
The current all-sports format began on August 20, 2007.
Programming
The station's lineup includes morning co-hosts Sean Pendergast and John Granato from 6 - 11 AM. Travis Rodgers, former producer of the Jim Rome Show, hosts a local hour from 11 to noon with noon - 3 carried by SB Nation Radio, which is owned by the same company that owns KGOW. The afternoon show features Adam Clanton (the voice of the parody "Rome On A Mobile") and John Wessling.
KGOW is the flagship radio broadcast affiliate for Rice University football.
During daytime hours, KGOW transmits from near Rosharon, TX, SSW of Houston, with 46,000 watts. At night, KGOW transmits from near Cypress-Katy, TX, NW of Houston, with 15,000 watts. The highly directive nature of both the daytime antenna array (six towers, with high efficiency) and the nighttime antenna array (nine towers, with standard efficiency) means that the apparent power towards Houston is greatly in excess of the licensed power, about the equivalent of 857,000 watts days and 197,000 watts nights (when compared to the 1,000 watt non-directional reference antenna for this class of station, Class B). This effect is shared by a number of other Class B stations in the Houston market. Houston has no allocated Class A stations (the only Class A stations in Texas are allocated to Dallas, KRLD, 1080 kHz; Fort Worth, WBAP, 820 kHz; and San Antonio, WOAI, 1200 kHz).