WABK (AM)

History

The station began broadcasting as WABI in November 1924, operating at 1250 kHz under the ownership of the Bangor Railway & Electric Company. A license had been granted in May 1923. It is Maine's oldest radio station (several other stations, including WMB in Auburn and WPAY in Bangor, were licensed prior to WABI but have since ceased operations, with WMB being deleted two months before WABI's licensing). Ownership was transferred to the First Universalist Church by 1926; within a year, it moved to 770 kHz, and on November 11, 1928, the Federal Radio Commission moved WABI to 1200 kHz By 1930, the station was owned by Pine Tree Broadcasting Corporation; in 1932, it was again transferred to the First Universalist Society. Under the First Universalist Church, WABI only broadcast on Sundays. The station was owned by Community Broadcasting Service by 1935; it was Bangor's CBS affiliate, replacing WLBZ, by 1939. During the early 1940s, WABI again changed frequencies; the North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement moved the station to 1230 kHz. in 1941, and in 1942 it began broadcasting at its current frequency of 910 kHz.

Originally, Community Broadcasting Service was controlled by Frederick B. Simpson; however, in 1949, health problems forced him to retire and sell WABI to a partnership between former Maine governor Horace A. Hildreth and Murray Carpenter. By then, the station had joined ABC, swapping affiliations with WGUY. Hildreth became the sole owner in 1953, when Carpenter sold his stake in WABI and bought WGUY; that year, WABI-TV was launched. On March 15, 1961, an FM sister station, WABI-FM, was put on the air at 97.1 MHz as a simulcast of much of the AM station's programming; around this time, the ABC affiliation was dropped in favor of Mutual, which WABI had already carried in addition to ABC for a decade. It returned to ABC in 1964.

Community Broadcasting Service merged with Journal Publications in 1971 to form Diversified Communications; the company's broadcasting division retained the Community Broadcasting Service name until 1982, when WABI was transferred to Diversified directly. The station had a contemporary format by 1973, when WABI-FM broke away from the simulcast and became WBGW, a country music station.

Diversified announced in 1993 that it would put most of its broadcasting properties, including WABI and what had become WYOU-FM, up for sale; while it would retain WABI-TV following the collapse of a deal to sell it to Vision Communications, the radio stations were sold to Bangor Radio Corporation. By 1996, WABI had an adult standards format; a year later, it and what had become WWBX were sold to Gopher Hill Broadcasting.

Clear Channel Communications signed a local marketing agreement with Gopher Hill in early 2001; a few weeks later, it bought WABI and WWBX. Clear Channel switched the station to a talk radio format, complementing WVOM, in 2005; during this time, programs included a simulcast of WVOM's morning show, Maine in the Morning, hosted by longtime WABI personality George Hale, as well as Dr. Joy Browne, Clark Howard, The Dr. Laura Program, and Coast to Coast AM. The standards format returned two years later.

Clear Channel announced on November 16, 2006 that it would sell its Bangor stations after being bought by private equity firms, resulting in a sale to Blueberry Broadcasting in 2008. Blueberry again dropped the standards format on September 1, this time for sports talk provided by Boston's WEEI; the station also began to once again simulcast with 97.1, renamed WAEI-FM. Though WABI carried WEEI's talk shows, most game broadcasts were not aired on the station. To reflect the new format, the WABI call letters were dropped after over 84 years on February 24, 2009 in favor of WAEI.

Blueberry Broadcasting ended WAEI's affiliation with WEEI on January 11, 2010, replacing it with Fox Sports Radio programming; Blueberry cited a breach of contract. WAEI moved exclusively to the AM dial on February 6, 2012, when WAEI-FM (which had swapped dial positions with WBFB on September 1, 2011 and moved to 104.7) became classic hits station WBAK. On September 1, 2013, WAEI was taken off-the-air; though Blueberry officials told the Bangor Daily News that "We have not made any final decisions regarding what’s going to happen with that radio station," in a filing with the Federal Communications Commission the company stated that it would intend to sell the station, and that if a buyer is not found the license will be surrendered.

On August 28, 2014, WAEI returned to the air with a simulcast of classic hits-formatted WABK from Gardiner. On May 13, 2015, WAEI went silent due to a transmitter failure. On March 3, 2016 WAEI returned to the air, again simulcasting WABK. WAEI changed its call letters to WABK on July 26, 2016.

Programming

Before going silent in 2013, WAEI's programming was largely provided by Fox Sports Radio; the station also aired Imus in the Morning, and The Jim Rome Show. Past programming included Downtown with Rich Kimball, a locally-produced talk show hosted by Rich Kimball that moved to WEZQ and now airs on WZON, NASCAR Nationwide and Camping World Truck Series races, which are now carried by WBAN, and Maine Black Bears basketball and baseball games, which now air on WGUY.