City Huntsville, Alabama Branding WTKI/WEKI | Broadcast area Huntsville, Alabama Frequency 1450 kHz | |
Slogan "Talk Radio For Real Life" Translator(s) 92.9 W225AH (Huntsville) | ||
WTKI (1450 AM, "WTKI/WEKI") is a radio station licensed to serve Huntsville, Alabama, USA. The station is owned by Christian Voice of Central Ohio, Inc., although a sale to FRC of Alabama LLC, doing business as "Focus Radio Communications", is currently pending FCC approval.
Contents
Since November 2009, FRC has operated WTKI under a local marketing agreement, broadcasting a combined news/talk/sports format. Some programming is provided by Fox Sports Radio and Fox Business Network. This programming is also simulcast on sister station WEKI (1490 AM) in Decatur, Alabama. WTKI and WEKI will on occasion carry separate programming intended for a specific market only.
In 2010, the station will broadcast at least 85 Southern League baseball games as the flagship station of the Huntsville Stars Radio Network. The network also includes sister station WEKI and WWIC in Scottsboro.
The beginning
This station signed on as WFUN on November 26, 1946, and was acquired by the Huntsville Broadcasting Company in May 1948. The station served Huntsville since as WFUN, WFIX, WKGL, WHOH, and now WTKI.
WFIX (1970s) was a full-service middle-of-the-road adult contemporary station, until the market upheaval of the 1980s when Arbitron expanded the survey area beyond Madison County and the FM stations began their rise to local market dominance. Since the mid-1980s the station has broadcast a number of formats, most notably talk radio, classic country, relationship radio, and in 2002 flipped to sports talk as "ESPN 1450". The station was the radio flagship of the Huntsville Stars minor league baseball radio network until the 2007 station ownership and format change. WTKI also broadcast games of the Huntsville Channel Cats of the Central Hockey League from the team's inception in 1995 through the penultimate 1998-1999 season.
Switch to WTKI
The station was assigned the WTKI call letters by the Federal Communications Commission on September 1, 1992. It has held those call letters since then except for an eight-month period in 2002 when it was a "relationship radio" formatted female-oriented talk station known as WHOH, the "Heart of Huntsville."
In November 2006, Christian Voice of Central Ohio Inc, headed by President Dan Baughman, agreed to buy WTKI from Mountain Mist Media, LLC., headed by President David Barnhardt, for a reported $475,000. As a result, the station flipped formats from sports talk to religious programming in early January 2007. The station, branded as "ProTalk 1450", was operated as a simulcast of sister station WDPT until both ceased operations and went temporarily silent on January 30, 2009, due to the late 2000s recession. Both stations returned to the air in early November 2009 broadcasting a mix of talk radio and sports talk programming.
WTKI today
On December 23, 2009, Christian Voice of Central Ohio Inc. applied to the FCC to transfer the broadcast license for WTKI to FRC of Alabama LLC, doing business as "Focus Radio Communications". As of February 10, 2010, the Commission has accepted this application for filing but taken no further action. Focus Radio, which has contracted to provide programming for both WTKI and WEKI (the former WDPT) under a local marketing agreement since November 2009, will pay a total of $235,000 for the licenses and assets of both stations.