WBAS

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
WBAS
CityWest Yarmouth, Massachusetts
Broadcast areaCape Cod
Frequency1240 kHz
BrandingThe Memories Station
Programming
Language(s)English
FormatAdult standards
Ownership
OwnerBob Bittner
(Bob Bittner Broadcasting, Inc.)
WJIB, WJTO
History
First air date
October 2, 1940 (station itself)
May 6, 1944 (current license)
Former call signs
WOCB (1940–78)
WSOX (1978)
WOCB (1978–91)
WUOK (1991–97)
WBUR (1997–2014)
Former frequencies
1210 kHz (1940–41)
Technical information
Licensing authority
FCC
Facility ID6251
ClassC
Power1,000 watts
Transmitter coordinates
41°38′7.8″N 70°14′4.9″W / 41.635500°N 70.234694°W / 41.635500; -70.234694Coordinates: 41°38′7.8″N 70°14′4.9″W / 41.635500°N 70.234694°W / 41.635500; -70.234694
Translator(s)See § Translator
Links
Public license information
Profile
LMS
Websiteredeabr.com

WBAS (1240 kHz) is an AM radio station licensed to West Yarmouth, Massachusetts, and serving Cape Cod. It is owned by Bob Bittner and broadcasts an adult standards radio format. He also owns similarly-formatted stations 740 WJIB in Cambridge, Massachusetts, serving Boston, and 730 WJTO in Bath, Maine, serving Portland.

WBAS transmits at a power of 1,000 watts non-directional. The transmitter is on Radio Lane in West Yarmouth.[1] Programming is also heard on 250 watt FM translator W268CP at 106.5 MHz.[2]

History[]

WOCB first signed on the air on October 2, 1940;[3] the station was originally owned by the Cape Cod Broadcasting Company.[4] It was the first radio station on Cape Cod since WJBX, which operated for several months in 1926.[4]

WOCB originally operated at 1210 kHz, but moved to 1240 in 1941 as a result of the North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement.[3] WOCB shut down in May 1943 after running out of money, resulting in its license being canceled by the FCC on November 30.[3] E. Anthony and Sons, owner of WNBH in New Bedford and publisher of the New Bedford Standard-Times and the Cape Cod Standard-Times, bought the station's equipment and relaunched WOCB under a new license on May 6, 1944, as a network affiliate of the Blue Network,[3] broadcasting mostly network programming (soap operas, radio drama, newscasts, etc.) with some local programming, remaining affiliated with that network after it became ABC. When ABC Radio broke into four sub-networks in 1968, WOCB affiliated with ABC's American Entertainment Network.

Its FM signal, for years a simulcast of its AM signal, signed on May 2, 1948, on 94.3 MHz,[5] and in 1962, moved to 94.9 MHz.[6] (The 94.3 frequency is now used on Cape Cod by WZAI, the Brewster repeater for WCAI.) By the 1970s, WOCB-FM broke away from simulcasting the AM during midday and evening hours to broadcast easy-listening music while still simulcasting the AM's format (then adult contemporary, with a heavy news commitment) during weekday drive times and hourly newscasts the rest of the broadcast day. From July 31 to August 16, 1978, the station was assigned the call sign WSOX; while the WOCB call sign was promptly restored to the AM station,[7] its FM sister station would remain WSOX-FM until 1984. In the summer through winter of 1981, the afternoon drive announcer on WOCB was Edd Hall, who subsequently did voice work for Late Night with David Letterman from 1982–1990 and was the announcer on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno from 1992–2004.

In 1991, Hurricane Bob blew down WOCB's transmitter tower, and the damage suffered was so severe that the owners could not afford to rebuild. The station was then sold to Ernie Boch, Sr., an automobile dealer in the Boston suburb of Norwood, Massachusetts, who turned WOCB-FM into the flagship station for his new Boch Broadcasting company, WXTK. Concurrently, WOCB became WUOK,[8] and under that callsign programmed CNN Headline News,[9] sports radio,[10] and finally a WXTK simulcast.[11] By 1997, Boch Broadcasting, which by this point owned four FM radio stations, no longer needed WUOK and donated it to Boston University (BU) for use as a relay of WBUR-FM in Boston, under the call letters WBUR; the simulcast began March 3, 1997.[12]

Boston University's 2013 acquisition of WBUA (92.7 FM) in Tisbury (on Martha's Vineyard) to serve as a WBUR-FM satellite rendered the 1240 AM facility redundant; on August 5, 2013, BU announced that it would be sold to Alex Langer, with plans to program it with Portuguese-language programming similar to that of another Langer station, WSRO.[13][14] The call letters were changed to WBAS on February 1, 2014,[8] two days after BU and Langer agreed to a time brokerage agreement.[15] The WBUR-FM simulcast was concurrently replaced with jazz music, which Langer had been temporarily programming on WZBR in Dedham before its conversion into a simulcast of WSRO;[16] by mid-February, WBAS was itself a WSRO simulcast, creating a three-station network.[17] In December 2014, WBAS and WZBR began carrying some separate programming from WSRO;[18] by 2015, the three stations were jointly branded as "Rede ABR".[19]

Langer Broadcasting took the station and its translator silent in mid-July 2020, due to financial difficulties; WSRO and WZBR (the latter of which had left "Rede ABR" to carry a brokered R&B format a few years earlier) also concurrently suspended operations.[20] As of February 2021, WBAS returned to the air broadcasting an adult standards format. Effective April 29, 2021, Bob Bittner Broadcasting bought the station from Langer Broadcasting for $100,000.[21]

Translator[]

Broadcast translators of WBAS
Call sign Frequency
(MHz)		 City of license Facility
ID		 ERP
(W)		 Height
(m (ft))		 Class Transmitter coordinates FCC info
W268CP 106.5 West Yarmouth, Massachusetts 142210 250 0 m (0 ft) D 41°38′7″N 70°14′7″W / 41.63528°N 70.23528°W / 41.63528; -70.23528 FCC LMS

In February 2020, W268CP changed its frequency to 106.5 in order for WKFY in East Harwich to change its frequency to 101.5 and move its transmitter to Orleans.

References[]

  1. ^ Radio-Locator.com/WBAS
  2. ^ Radio-Locator.com/W268CP
  3. ^ a b c d Halper, Donna; Wollman, Garrett. "The Eastern Massachusetts Radio Timeline: the 1940s". The Archives @ BostonRadio.org. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  4. ^ a b Halper, Donna; Wollman, Garrett. "The Eastern Massachusetts Radio Timeline: the 1930s". The Archives @ BostonRadio.org. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  5. ^ "WOCB-FM W. Yarmouth Is Now on Air With 1 kw" (PDF). Broadcasting-Telecasting. May 17, 1948. p. 226. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  6. ^ "For the Record" (PDF). Broadcasting. January 15, 1962. p. 78. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  7. ^ "WOCB (WBAS) history cards" (PDF). CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved October 31, 2021.
  8. ^ a b "Call Sign History (WBAS)". CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  9. ^ "WUOK reception verification" (PDF). February 13, 1993. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  10. ^ Fybush, Scott (April 13, 1996). "New England RadioWatch". Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  11. ^ Fybush, Scott (April 16, 1996). "New England RadioWatch". Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  12. ^ Mccloy, Andrew P. (March 3, 1997). "WBUR expands coverage". Boston Business Journal. Retrieved October 13, 2017.
  13. ^ Venta, Lance (August 5, 2013). "Boston University Sells Cape Cod Signal". RadioInsight. Retrieved October 12, 2017.
  14. ^ Reidy, Chris (August 5, 2013). "Langer Broadcasting to buy 1240 AM signal in West Yarmouth from WBUR". Boston.com. Retrieved October 13, 2017.
  15. ^ "Time Brokerage Agreement" (PDF). WBAS sale application. Federal Communications Commission. January 30, 2014. Retrieved October 13, 2017.
  16. ^ Fybush, Scott (February 3, 2014). "NERW 2/3/2014: Big Consolidation in Small Upstate Markets". NorthEast Radio Watch. Retrieved October 31, 2021.
  17. ^ Fybush, Scott (February 17, 2014). "NERW 2/17/2014: Sales, Sales and More Sales". NorthEast Radio Watch. Retrieved October 31, 2021.
  18. ^ Pereira, Jehozadak (December 19, 2014). "Rádios 1240 AM e 1410 AM inauguram grade de programação Posted by Jehozadak Pereira". Rede ABR (in Portuguese). Archived from the original on July 22, 2015. Retrieved October 31, 2021.
  19. ^ "Sudbury Valley Trustees, Rede ABR to host pumpkin patch children's day event". MetroWest Daily News. October 5, 2015. Retrieved October 31, 2021.
  20. ^ Venta, Lance (July 14, 2020). "Pair Of Boston AMs Shut Down". RadioInsight. Retrieved October 31, 2021.
  21. ^ https://radioinsight.com/headlines/204233/station-sales-week-of-1-22-family-life-expands-in-pennsylvania/ Station Sales Week of 1/22

External links[]

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