KGFX (1060
kHz
The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that on ...
) is a
classic country
Classic country is a music radio format that specializes in playing mainstream country and western music hits from past decades.
Repertoire
The radio format specializes in hits from the 1950s through the early 1980s, and focus primarily on innov ...
-formatted
commercial
Commercial may refer to:
* a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television)
** Radio advertisement
** Television advertisement
* (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...
AM radio station
Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radio ...
, located in
Pierre, South Dakota
Pierre ( ; lkt, Čhúŋkaške, lit=fort) is the capital city of South Dakota, United States, and the seat of Hughes County. The population was 14,091 at the 2020 census, making it the second-least populous US state capital after Montpelier, ...
and owned by the James River Broadcasting Company.
All four DRG Media Group (James River) stations in Pierre share studios at 214 West Pleasant Drive, and KGFX's transmitter site is located off
U.S. Route 83
U.S. Route 83 (US 83) is a major north–south United States Numbered Highway that extends in the central United States. Only four other north–south routes are longer: US 1, US 41, US 59, and US 87, while US ...
south of Pierre. The station operates with 10,000 watts during daylight hours, but because
AM 1060
AM or Am may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Music
* A minor, a minor scale in music
* ''A.M.'' (Chris Young album)
* ''A.M.'' (Wilco album)
* ''AM'' (Abraham Mateo album)
* ''AM'' (Arctic Monkeys album)
* AM (musician), American musicia ...
is a
clear channel frequency with priority reserved for
Class A stations
KYW in Philadelphia and
XEEP in Mexico City, KGFX must reduce power at night to 1,000 watts. Programming can also be heard on K276GT, an
FM translator station
A broadcast relay station, also known as a satellite station, relay transmitter, broadcast translator (U.S.), re-broadcaster (Canada), repeater (two-way radio) or complementary station (Mexico), is a broadcast transmitter which repeats (or tran ...
at 103.1 MHz.
KGFX's initial grant as a broadcasting station occurred in 1927, however the station traces its pre-history to a 1916 amateur radio station, giving it one of radio's longest historical records.
History
Amateur station predecessors
Although KGFX was not licensed as a broadcasting station until August 1927, by this time the owner, Dana McNeil, and his wife, the former Ida Anding, already had extensive radio experience. KGFX has commonly dated its history back to June 6, 1916, when Dana McNeil was issued a license for Special Amateur station "9ZP".
["Outlet in Pierre, S. D., Puts in 'First' Claim"](_blank)
(correspondence from Ida A. McNeil), ''Broadcasting'', May 5, 1947, page 44 (americanradiohistory.com) As was true with virtually all amateur stations of this era, 9ZP was equipped with a
spark-gap transmitter
A spark-gap transmitter is an obsolete type of radio transmitter which generates radio waves by means of an electric spark."Radio Transmitters, Early" in Spark-gap transmitters were the first type of radio transmitter, and were the main type use ...
which was only capable of transmitting the dots-and-dashes of
Morse code
Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of ...
. Moreover, it was required to shut down in April 1917, when all civilian radio stations were ordered off the air due to the United States entering into World War One. During the war, important
vacuum-tube
A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric potential difference has been applied.
The type known as a ...
transmitter improvements were perfected that made audio transmissions practical.
Dana and Ida were married in 1921, and the next year Dana McNeil was relicensed for a standard amateur station, "9CLS", located at 152 Pleasant Drive. McNeil was a Chicago & North Western Railway train conductor who worked the Pierre-Rapid City run. Ida learned how to operate the amateur station equipment, and began to use it to transmit regular reports to her husband when he was away from home. In 1923, 9CLS underwent a major upgrade, which included installation of a 100-watt vacuum-tube transmitter.
["Radio Makes South Dakota Infant Famous"](_blank)
''New Britain (Connecticut) Daily Herald'', March 28, 1924, page 18.
Pierre was located in a sparsely settled region of central South Dakota, with few of the outlying ranches having telephones or electrical service, and communication was severely limited. As knowledge of Ida's radioed weather and news reports to her husband spread, numerous persons in the region began to depend on these transmissions for up-to-date information. 1923 saw the introduction of one of the station's most popular features, when, at the request of one of the listeners, Ida began providing status reports for patients at the local hospital, Saint Mary's.
In 1924 Ida's transmissions received national publicity, via a wire-service article carried in numerous newspapers, which reported that she maintained a regular schedule of twice-daily 30-minute transmissions, at 12:15 and 6:00 p.m., made on alternate days when her husband was traveling along his railroad route.
KGFX
Amateur radio stations were supposed to refrain from transmissions intended for the general public, so on August 15, 1927 Dana McNeil was issued a broadcasting station license with the randomly assigned call letters KGFX, for operation on 1180 kHz with 200 watts from the family home at 510 Summit Avenue in Pierre. This grant specified operating hours of 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. On November 11, 1928, as part of a major reallocation resulting from the
Federal Radio Commission
The Federal Radio Commission (FRC) was a government agency that regulated United States radio communication from its creation in 1927 until 1934, when it was succeeded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FRC was established by t ...
's
General Order 40
The Federal Radio Commission's (FRC) General Order 40, dated August 30, 1928, described the standards for a sweeping reorganization of radio broadcasting in the United States. This order grouped the AM radio band transmitting frequencies into thre ...
, the station's frequency was changed to 580 kHz,
daytime
Daytime as observed on Earth is the period of the day during which a given location experiences natural illumination from direct sunlight. Daytime occurs when the Sun appears above the local horizon, that is, anywhere on the globe's hemis ...
-only.
In 1930 the
National Weather Bureau closed its Pierre data-collecting station, after which KGFX personnel volunteered to assume responsibility for collecting the local weather information, which was considered vital for area ranchers. Every 6 hours, around the clock, they launched weather balloons and weather-measuring equipment to record information reported to the Weather Bureau and also broadcast over KGFX. Although Pierre is South Dakota's capital, until
KCCR was licensed in 1959, KGFX was the city's only radio station, and it became known as a local institution. The station carried legion baseball games beginning in 1934, as well as numerous live broadcasts of official government proceedings. Ida McNeil generally worked as the station's sole announcer, but because she almost never mentioned her name on the air, she became known by most listeners only as "Mrs. Pierre".
In May 1931, Dana McNeil applied to move the station to Aberdeen under the control of Equity Union Creameries, but the move was not approved. (Station
WNAX in Yankton, South Dakota opposed the transfer, and also reported that KGFX was currently broadcasting "less than an hour a day".) In 1932 KGFX's transmitting frequency was changed to 630 kHz., in order to allow WNAX, operating on 570 kHz, to increase power without causing mutual interference. KGFX's 630 kHz assignment was limited to daytime-only operation, with a further reduced "specified hours" schedule of 9:30 a.m. to local sunset. Previously commercial free, that same year the station began soliciting and selling advertising time.
Dana McNeil retired from the railroad in 1935 and died on October 15 of the next year at the age of 71, leaving the station's ownership and operation to Ida. Around this time the family, including the radio studio, moved to 203 West Summit (later renamed Broadway Avenue).
In 1956, KGFX celebrated its 40th anniversary. A review noted that an engineer was the station's only other full-time employee, so in addition to being the owner, Ida McNeil was KGFX's "operator, business manager, newscaster, program director, and advertising solicitor" and was "on the air eight hours a day and spends another six hours or so on paperwork. It's rugged, she admits." In 1957, Ida McNeil received one of the seven "Mike" awards given that year by ''
McCall's
''McCall's'' was a monthly American women's magazine, published by the McCall Corporation, that enjoyed great popularity through much of the 20th century, peaking at a readership of 8.4 million in the early 1960s. It was established as a small-f ...
'' magazine in recognition of women in broadcasting.
In 1962 Ida NcNeil, now 74 years old, decided to retire, and sold KGFX to Black Hills Radio, Inc.
"'Mrs. Pierre,' at 74, Will Retire"
by Dorothy Dancker, ''Sioux Falls (South Dakota) Argus-Leader'' (included in "Ida McNeil: A Real Public Servant" (extension of July 19, 1962 remarks of Senator Karl E. Mundt), ''Congressional Record–Appendix'', pages A5544-A5545). At the time of the sale the station was still operating with a limited "specified hours" schedule and 200 watts, and the new owners began to make significant upgrades. The hours of operation were expanded to the full available daytime hours, and in 1967 the station moved to 1060 kHz, now operating with 10,000 watts although still limited to daytime-only broadcasts, from a two tower directional-antenna site constructed south of Fort Pierre along Route 83. In 1976 two additional towers were constructed, which allowed the station to add a nighttime service with 1,000 watts.["KGFX Timeline"](_blank)
Dakota Radio Group, 2012. (archive.org)
The studio remained in the McNeil house at 203 West Broadway Avenue until 1967, when it moved to the Sahr Building, at the corner of East Capital and Highland Streets. In 1972 James River Broadcasting moved the studio to 214 West Pleasant Drive.
References
External links
*
FCC History Cards for KGFX
(covering 1927-1980)
"Ida McNeill" (sic)
biography compiled for the South Dakota Broadcasters Association's "Hall of Fame". Includes a recorded 1970 interview.
{{Country Radio Stations in South Dakota
GFX
Country radio stations in the United States
Radio stations established in 1927
Hughes County, South Dakota