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WTIC (AM)

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WTIC
WTIC NewsTalk 1080 logo.png
Broadcast areaCentral Connecticut
Frequency1080 kHz
BrandingWTIC NewsTalk 1080
Programming
Language(s)English
FormatTalk radio
AffiliationsCBS News Radio
CBS Sports Radio
Fox News Radio
Premiere Networks
Radio America
Boston Red Sox Radio Network
New England Patriots Radio Network
WFSB
Ownership
Owner
WRCH, WTIC-FM, WZMX
History
FoundedDecember 17, 1924; 98 years ago (1924-12-17)
First air date
February 10, 1925; 98 years ago (1925-02-10)
Call sign meaning
Founded by the Travelers Insurance Company
Technical information
Licensing authority
FCC
Facility ID66464
ClassA
Power50,000 watts
Transmitter coordinates
41°46′39″N 72°48′19″W / 41.77750°N 72.80528°W / 41.77750; -72.80528
Repeater(s)96.5 WTIC-FM HD2 (Hartford)
Links
Public license information
WebcastListen live (via Audacy)
Websitewww.audacy.com/wtic

WTIC (1080 kHz "WTIC NewsTalk 1080") is a commercial AM radio station in Hartford, Connecticut. It airs a news/talk radio format and is owned by Audacy, Inc. The station's studios and offices are on Executive Drive in Farmington.[1] The transmitter is a two-tower facility off Deercliff Road in Avon, Connecticut.[2] WTIC is the primary entry point (PEP) for the Emergency Alert System (EAS) in Connecticut.

WTIC is a Class A, clear channel station powered at 50,000 watts, the maximum permitted for U.S. AM stations. It has a non-directional signal in the daytime, providing at least secondary coverage to almost all of Connecticut, as well as large portions of Massachusetts and the outer suburbs of New York City. Under the right conditions, it can be heard as far as New York City itself, as well as the outer suburbs of Boston, portions of New Hampshire and Rhode Island and much of upstate New York. To protect the other Class A station on AM 1080, sister station KRLD in Dallas, WTIC's transmitter uses a directional pattern at night when radio waves travel farther, with power fed to both towers. Even with this restriction, WTIC can be heard over much of the Eastern United States and Eastern Canada at night with a good radio.

Discover more about WTIC (AM) related topics

Hertz

Hertz

The hertz is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that one hertz is the reciprocal of one second. It is named after Heinrich Rudolf Hertz (1857–1894), the first person to provide conclusive proof of the existence of electromagnetic waves. Hertz are commonly expressed in multiples: kilohertz (kHz), megahertz (MHz), gigahertz (GHz), terahertz (THz).

Hartford, Connecticut

Hartford, Connecticut

Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since the 2010 United States census have indicated that Hartford is the fourth-largest city in Connecticut with a 2020 population of 121,054, behind the coastal cities of Bridgeport, New Haven, and Stamford.

Audacy, Inc.

Audacy, Inc.

Audacy, Inc. is an American broadcasting company based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1968 as Entercom Communications Corporation, it is the second largest radio company in the United States, owning 235 radio stations across 48 media markets.

Farmington, Connecticut

Farmington, Connecticut

Farmington is a town in Hartford County in the Farmington Valley area of central Connecticut in the United States. The population was 26,712 at the 2020 census. It sits 10 miles west of Hartford at the hub of major I-84 interchanges, 20 miles south of Bradley International Airport and two hours by car from New York City and Boston. It is home to the world headquarters of several large corporations including Otis Elevator Company and Carvel. The northwestern section of Farmington is a suburban neighborhood called Unionville.

Avon, Connecticut

Avon, Connecticut

Avon is a town in the Farmington Valley region of Hartford County, Connecticut, United States. As of the 2020 census, the town had a population of 18,932.

Emergency Alert System

Emergency Alert System

The Emergency Alert System (EAS) is a national warning system in the United States designed to allow authorized officials to broadcast emergency alerts and warning messages to the public via cable, satellite, or broadcast television, and both AM/FM and satellite radio.

Boston

Boston

Boston, officially the City of Boston, is the capital and largest city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the Northeastern United States. The city boundaries encompass an area of about 48.4 sq mi (125 km2) and a population of 675,647 as of 2020. The city is the economic and cultural anchor of a substantially larger metropolitan area known as Greater Boston, a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) home to a census-estimated 4.8 million people in 2016 and ranking as the tenth-largest MSA in the country. A broader combined statistical area (CSA), generally corresponding to the commuting area and including Worcester, Massachusetts and Providence, Rhode Island, is home to approximately 8.2 million people, making it the sixth most populous in the United States.

KRLD (AM)

KRLD (AM)

KRLD is a commercial AM radio station in Dallas, Texas. Owned and operated by Audacy, Inc., the station carries an all news radio format on weekdays, switching to mostly non-political talk radio nights and weekends. Syndicated shows include The Dave Ramsey Show, Our American Stories with Lee Habeeb and America in the Morning with John Trout. Some weekends hours carry paid brokered programming. Most hours begin with CBS News Radio. The studios and offices are in Uptown Dallas.

Dallas

Dallas

Dallas is the third-largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 million people. It is the largest city in and seat of Dallas County with portions extending into Collin, Denton, Kaufman, and Rockwall counties. With a 2020 census population of 1,304,379, it is the ninth-most populous city in the U.S. and the third-largest city in Texas after Houston and San Antonio. Located in the North Texas region, the city of Dallas is the main core of the largest metropolitan area in the Southern United States and the largest inland metropolitan area in the U.S. that lacks any navigable link to the sea.

Directional antenna

Directional antenna

A directional antenna or beam antenna is an antenna which radiates or receives greater radio wave power in specific directions. Directional antennas can radiate radio waves in beams, when greater concentration of radiation in a certain direction is desired, or in receiving antennas receive radio waves from one specific direction only. This can increase the power transmitted to receivers in that direction, or reduce interference from unwanted sources. This contrasts with omnidirectional antennas such as dipole antennas which radiate radio waves over a wide angle, or receive from a wide angle.

Eastern United States

Eastern United States

The Eastern United States, often abbreviated as simply The East or The East Coast, is a region of the United States located east of the Mississippi River. It includes 26 states and the national capital of Washington, D.C. As of 2011, the region had an estimated population exceeding 179 million, representing over 58 percent of the total U.S. population.

Canada

Canada

Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's second-largest country by total area with the world's longest coastline. Its southern and western border with the United States is the world's longest binational land border. Canada's capital is Ottawa and its three largest metropolitan areas are Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.

Programming

On weekdays, WTIC features local shows during the day, with syndicated programs at night, including Dana Loesch, Sean Hannity and Coast to Coast AM with George Noory. On weekends, specialty shows are heard on money, health, real estate, travel, pets and the law, some of which are paid brokered programming.

The station is an affiliate of the Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots Radio Networks. The station features local newsbreaks, as well as updates from CBS Radio News. WTIC's newsroom is staffed 24 hours a day with a team of local newscasters and reporters. It shares some news and weather forecasts with WFSB, the CBS TV affiliate in Hartford.

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Dana Loesch

Dana Loesch

Dana Lynn Loesch is an American radio and TV host. She is a former spokesperson for the National Rifle Association and a former writer and editor for Breitbart News. Loesch was the host of the program Dana on TheBlaze TV from 2014 to 2017. She also hosts a nationally syndicated weekday radio talk show. Loesch has appeared as a guest on television networks such as Fox News, CNN, CBS, ABC, and HBO.

Sean Hannity

Sean Hannity

Sean Patrick Hannity is an American talk show host, conservative political commentator, and author. He is the host of The Sean Hannity Show, a nationally syndicated talk radio show, and has also hosted a commentary program, Hannity, on Fox News, since 2009.

Coast to Coast AM

Coast to Coast AM

Coast to Coast AM is an American late-night radio talk show that deals with a variety of topics. Most frequently the topics relate to either the paranormal or conspiracy theories. It was hosted by creator Art Bell from its inception in 1988 until 2003, and is currently hosted by George Noory. The program is distributed by Premiere Networks, a subsidiary of iHeartMedia, both as part of its talk network and separately as a syndicated program. The program now airs seven nights a week from 1:00–5:00 a.m. Eastern Time Zone. It appears on over 600 affiliates, and has repeatedly been called the most popular overnight show in the country.

George Noory

George Noory

George Ralph Noory is an American radio talk show host. Since January 2003, Noory has been the weekday host of the late-night radio talk show Coast to Coast AM. The program is syndicated to hundreds of radio stations in the U.S. and Canada by Premiere Networks. Noory has also appeared in the History Channel series Ancient Aliens and in Beyond Belief, a subscription-based online video series presented by gaia.com.

Brokered programming

Brokered programming

Brokered programming is a form of broadcast content in which the show's producer pays a radio or television station for air time, rather than exchanging programming for pay or the opportunity to play spot commercials. A brokered program is typically not capable of garnering enough support from advertisements to pay for itself, and may be controversial, esoteric or an advertisement in itself.

Network affiliate

Network affiliate

In the broadcasting industry, a network affiliate or affiliated station is a local broadcaster, owned by a company other than the owner of the network, which carries some or all of the lineup of television programs or radio programs of a television or radio network. This distinguishes such a television or radio station from an owned-and-operated station (O&O), which is owned by the parent network.

Boston Red Sox Radio Network

Boston Red Sox Radio Network

The Boston Red Sox Radio Network is an American radio network composed of 54 radio stations which carry English language coverage of the Boston Red Sox, a professional baseball team in Major League Baseball (MLB). Lawrence, Massachusetts station WEEI-FM (93.7 FM), which serves Boston and the Greater Boston area, serves as the network's Flagship. The network also includes 49 affiliates in the U.S. states of Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire, New York, and Florida: 28 AM stations, 24 of which supplement their signals with one or more FM translators; and 21 full-power FM stations, one of which supplements its signal with several FM translators. Joe Castiglione currently serves as the network's play-by-play announcer; since the start of the 2020 Red Sox season, (Will Flemming, Sean McDonough, Jon Sciambi, Dave O'Brien, Dale Arnold and Tom Caron have alternated with Castiglione providing color commentary. In addition to traditional over-the-air AM and FM broadcasts, network programming airs on SiriusXM satellite radio; and streams online via SiriusXM Internet Radio, TuneIn Premium, and MLB.com Gameday Audio.

New England Patriots Radio Network

New England Patriots Radio Network

The New England Patriots Radio Network is a radio network which carries live game broadcasts of the New England Patriots. The network's flagship station is WBZ-FM Boston. Bob Socci, who now does the play-by-play with former Patriots quarterback Scott Zolak providing the color commentary and former Patriots linebacker Matt Chatham and WBZ-TV/WSBK-TV sports reporter Steve Burton providing the sideline reports. Marc Bertrand and Boston Globe sports columnist Chris Gasper host the pregame, and the postgame show is hosted by Bertrand. Albert Breer and Patriots Football Weekly writers Paul Perillo and Andy Hart are regular guest analysts on the network's pre-game show.

WFSB

WFSB

WFSB is a television station licensed to Hartford, Connecticut, United States, serving the Hartford–New Haven market as an affiliate of CBS. Owned by Gray Television, the station maintains studios on Denise D'Ascenzo Way in Rocky Hill and a transmitter on Talcott Mountain in Avon, Connecticut.

CBS

CBS

CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainment Group division of Paramount Global.

History

Early years

WTIC is the second oldest radio station in Connecticut, after WDRC, which went on the air in 1922. WTIC was first authorized on December 17, 1924.[3] It began a series of test transmissions later that month.[4][5] The station began regular programming with a debut broadcast on February 10, 1925.[6][7] The station was owned by the Travelers Insurance Company and its call sign reflects the initials of that corporation.

The station was among the first affiliates of the NBC Red Network, carrying its schedule of dramas, comedies, news, sports, soap operas, game shows and big band broadcasts during the "Golden Age of Radio". By the 1930s, WTIC was powered at 50,000 watts, originally at 1060 kilocycles. In 1941, when the North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement (NARBA) went into effect, WTIC moved to its current dial position at 1080 kHz.[8]

WTIC is known for its historic time tone, which is a broadcast of the Morse code letter "V" every hour on the hour, which has been in place since 1943. This makes it one of the oldest continuously broadcasting radio time tones in the world. WTIC employs a GPS master clock system that fires the custom-built time-tone generator shortly before the top of the hour, timed such that the final tone of the sequence occurs precisely on the hour (even though everything else heard on the station is on a 10-second delay), and listeners have been setting their watches to WTIC for many years. The notes of the sequence were pitched to mimic the famous opening sequence of Ludwig van Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, whose "short-short-short-long" rhythm matches that of the Morse code letter "V". The Morse code letter "V" for Victory was selected during the height of World War II.[9]

Bob Steele

Main article: Bob Steele (broadcaster)

WTIC's original studios were in the Travelers Insurance Building at 26 Grove Street in Hartford. Grove Street was later renamed Bob Steele Street in honor of longtime WTIC personality Bob Steele, who spent 66 years on WTIC, most of them as the morning drive time host. He joined the station in 1936. At one point, nearly a third of all radios in the Hartford area were tuned to Steele's wake up show. Even after retiring from weekday mornings in 1991, he continued hosting Saturday mornings until his death in 2002 at age 91.

In 1940, WTIC began experimenting with FM radio, putting W1XSO on 43.2 MHz on the air. It later became 96.5 WTIC-FM, mostly simulcasting the AM station in its early years. In 1957, a television station was added, WTIC-TV on channel 3 (now WFSB). As network programming moved from radio to television in the 1950s, WTIC-AM-FM switched to a full service, middle of the road format of popular music, talk, news and sports. In the 1960s, WTIC-FM started playing blocks of classical music in the afternoon and evening, eventually ending its simulcast of 1080 WTIC. By the early 1970s, WTIC became more of an adult contemporary full service format, with talk shows in the evening.

Changes in ownership

In 1973, Travelers Insurance announced it would divest its broadcasting properties. Channel 3 was sold to Post-Newsweek Stations (now the Graham Media Group) in 1974, switching its call sign to WFSB. WTIC-AM-FM were sold to a group of its managers, doing business as the "Ten-Eighty Corporation".[10] Also in the 1980s, some more talk shows were added to WTIC's line up. In the 1990s, as fewer listeners tuned to AM radio for music, WTIC added more talk programming, eventually eliminating the music shows.

In 1991, Bob Steele decided to retire from hosting weekday mornings. Tom McCarthy had already begun doing the early part of the morning shift and took over the entire 5:30 to 10 a.m. time slot.[11] In 1998, CBS Radio acquired WTIC-AM-FM.[12] The acquisition ended WTIC's 70-year affiliation with NBC Radio; since then it has aired CBS Radio News updates. Its former television sister had been Connecticut's CBS affiliate since 1958.

Schedule shake-up

In December 2008, the station made several programming changes. Former WTNH-TV anchor Diane Smith was dropped from the morning show she hosted with Ray Dunaway. Smith later joined the University of New Haven journalism department. "Sound Off Connecticut" hosted by conservative Jim Vicevich had an hour added to his show. The station continued to carry Rush Limbaugh at noon, but the afternoon drive personality, vocal liberal Colin McEnroe, was dismissed and his time slot replaced with a three-hour local and national news roundup.[13]

On February 2, 2017, CBS Radio announced it would merge with Entercom.[14] The merger was approved on November 9, 2017, and was consummated on the February 17.[15][16]

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Call sign

Call sign

In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigned by a government agency, informally adopted by individuals or organizations, or even cryptographically encoded to disguise a station's identity.

Network affiliate

Network affiliate

In the broadcasting industry, a network affiliate or affiliated station is a local broadcaster, owned by a company other than the owner of the network, which carries some or all of the lineup of television programs or radio programs of a television or radio network. This distinguishes such a television or radio station from an owned-and-operated station (O&O), which is owned by the parent network.

Soap opera

Soap opera

A soap opera, or soap for short, is a typically long-running radio or television serial, frequently characterized by melodrama, ensemble casts, and sentimentality. The term "soap opera" originated from radio dramas originally being sponsored by soap manufacturers. The term was preceded by "horse opera", a derogatory term for low-budget Westerns.

Game show

Game show

A game show is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment where contestants compete for a reward. These programs can either be participatory or demonstrative and are typically directed by a host, sharing the rules of the program as well as commentating and narrating where necessary. The history of game shows dates back to the invention of television as a medium. On most game shows, contestants either have to answer questions or solve puzzles, typically to win either money or prizes. Game shows often reward players with prizes such as cash, trips and goods and services provided by the show's sponsor.

Big band

Big band

A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s and dominated jazz in the early 1940s when swing was most popular. The term "big band" is also used to describe a genre of music, although this was not the only style of music played by big bands.

Golden Age of Radio

Golden Age of Radio

The Golden Age of Radio, also known as the old-time radio (OTR) era, was an era of radio in the United States where it was the dominant electronic home entertainment medium. It began with the birth of commercial radio broadcasting in the early 1920s and lasted through the 1950s, when television gradually superseded radio as the medium of choice for scripted programming, variety and dramatic shows.

North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement

North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement

The North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement refers to a series of international treaties that defined technical standards for AM band (mediumwave) radio stations. These agreements also addressed how frequency assignments were distributed among the signatories, with a special emphasis on high-powered clear channel allocations.

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical music repertoire and span the transition from the Classical period to the Romantic era in classical music. His career has conventionally been divided into early, middle, and late periods. His early period, during which he forged his craft, is typically considered to have lasted until 1802. From 1802 to around 1812, his middle period showed an individual development from the styles of Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and is sometimes characterized as heroic. During this time, he began to grow increasingly deaf. In his late period, from 1812 to 1827, he extended his innovations in musical form and expression.

Bob Steele (broadcaster)

Bob Steele (broadcaster)

Robert Lee Steele was an American radio personality. He was a radio host with WTIC Radio in Hartford, Connecticut, for more than 66 years, and hosted the morning radio scene in Southern New England for most of that time. He was born in Kansas City, Missouri.

Drive time

Drive time

Drive time is the daypart in which radio broadcasters can reach the most people who listen to car radios while driving, usually to and from work, or on public transportation. Drive-time periods are when the number of radio listeners in this class is at its peak and, thus, commercial radio can generate the most revenue from advertising. Drive time usually coincides with rush hour.

Simulcast

Simulcast

Simulcast is the broadcasting of programmes/programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time. For example, Absolute Radio is simulcast on both AM and on satellite radio. Likewise, the BBC's Prom concerts were formerly simulcast on both BBC Radio 3 and BBC Television. Another application is the transmission of the original-language soundtrack of movies or TV series over local or Internet radio, with the television broadcast having been dubbed into a local language.

Middle of the road (music)

Middle of the road (music)

Middle of the road is a commercial radio format and popular music genre. Music associated with this term is strongly melodic and uses techniques of vocal harmony and light orchestral arrangements. The format was eventually rebranded as soft adult contemporary.

Source: "WTIC (AM)", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, March 22nd), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTIC_(AM).

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Further Reading

KRLD (AM)

WTNH

WCTX

WFSB

WKSS

WTIC-FM

WZMX

WXYT-FM

WRCH (FM)

Bob Steele (broadcaster)

WPOP

WDRC (AM)
References
  1. ^ WTIC.radio.com/general-contest-rules
  2. ^ Radio-Locator.com/WTIC
  3. ^ "New Stations", Radio Service Bulletin, January 2, 1925, page 3.
  4. ^ "Travelers Radio Broadcasts Today", Hartford Courant, December 19, 1924, page 24.
  5. ^ "Travelers Radio Program of Carols", Hartford Courant, December 21, 1924, page 2A.
  6. ^ "Through the Static", New Britain (Connecticut) Daily Herald, February 11, 1925, page 16.
  7. ^ "New Stations and Changes", Radio Digest, February 21, 1925, page 7.
  8. ^ Broadcasting Yearbook 1942 page 114
  9. ^ Ramsey, John. (2012). Hartford radio. Charleston, S.C.: Arcadia Pub. ISBN 978-0-7385-7666-4. OCLC 756576789.
  10. ^ Broadcasting Yearbook 1975 page C-32
  11. ^ Courant.com "Bob Steele Throws Last Punch Line" by Jon Lender, Oct. 1, 1991
  12. ^ Broadcasting & Cable Yearbook 2000 page D-79
  13. ^ Grant, Steve. "Colin McEnroe, Diane Smith Laid Off By WTIC-AM". Hartford Courant. Archived from the original on 2008-12-31.
  14. ^ CBS Radio to Merge with Entercom
  15. ^ "Entercom Receives FCC Approval for Merger with CBS Radio". Entercom. November 9, 2017. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  16. ^ Venta, Lance (November 17, 2017). "Entercom Completes CBS Radio Merger". Radio Insight. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
External links
  • Official website
  • WTIC in the FCC AM station database
  • WTIC on Radio-Locator
  • WTIC in Nielsen Audio's AM station database
  • FCC History Cards for WTIC
  • Northeast Airchecks, with an aircheck of their switch to 50,000 watts in 1929
  • Goldenage-WTIC.org In the late 1960s, with declining listenership at night, WTIC management decided that there was a market for long-form shows that could be packaged and sold to sponsors. Two of those shows were The Golden Age of Radio and A One Night Stand with the Big Bands. They were broadcast monthly through the mid 1970s, and can be heard here, thanks to a project created by former WTIC personality, Dick Bertel, and former WTIC engineer, Bob Scherago.
  • WTIC Alumni website A site that was created by Bill Clede and carried on by David Kaplan featuring pictures, audio, information and trivia about the old WTIC AM/FM/TV before its sale by the Travelers in 1974.
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