City Springfield, Missouri Branding The Jock 98.7 First air date November 1972 | Broadcast area Springfield, Missouri Frequency 98.7 MHz
Channel 254 Format sports talk | |
KWTO-FM is a radio stations licensed to Springfield, Missouri, United States. KWTO-FM operates at 98.7 MHz and carries a sports talk format.
The station is owned by Meyer Communications. It and its sister stations KWTO (AM), KBFL, and KTXR, and Baptist Bible College owned KWFC are the only radio stations in the Springfield market to be locally owned and operated.
History
KWTO-FM went on the air in November 1972 at 98.7 FM with a rock format and was known as "Rock 99." This format lasted well into the 1980s until rival station KXUS went on the air in April 1985 with a similar format. Rock 99 was originally an automated music format utilizing the TM Stereo Rock format based from Dallas, TX. Several FM radio stations used this format during the 1970s into the 1980s. These stations had the same announcer and same call letter type music jingles. One example, WIBW-FM 97.3 in Topeka, KS was Rock 97 and sounded just like KWTO-FM Rock 99. That was a great automated music format without the talkative DJ's, it was rock, pop, oldies, and some album cuts. The on-air format basically went like this: Two new songs followed by two older songs then commercial break (usually four commercials) then call letter jingle and back to the music.
In March 1987, the station adopted a more Top-40 format and became "99 Hit FM." This format was changed again in 1991 to a soft-rock format, the call letters were changed to KKHT and the slogan became "The Heart - 98.7 FM." In 1993, the station returned to its classic rock roots with "98.7 FM Rock 99" and changed the call letters back to KWTO-FM.
In 2001, the station adopted an all-sports format and became known as "The Jock, 98.7 FM." The station became an affiliate of Fox Sports Radio but also carried The Jim Rome Show from CBS Sports Radio daily.
On October 23rd, 2014, it was announced that KWTO-FM would drop Fox Sports Radio and affiliate with ESPN Radio effective January 1st, 2015. On the same date, Fox Sports Radio moved to KGMY, which was the previous ESPN Radio affiliate for Springfield.