KMCN (94.7 FM) is a radio station licensed to

Clinton, Iowa Clinton is a city in and the county seat of Clinton County, Iowa, United States. The population was 24,469 as of 2020. Clinton, along with DeWitt (also located in Clinton County), was named in honor of the sixth governor of New York, DeWitt Cl ...

and broadcasting an Adult Hits format under the branding ''Mac 94.7''. The transmitter for KMCN is co-located with the transmitter of sister AM station

KCLN KCLN (1390 AM) is a commercial radio station licensed to serve the community of Clinton, Iowa. KCLN primarily airs an automated oldies format. KCLN and its sister station KMCN 94.7 MHz (formerly 97.7 MHz) were owned from 1999 to 2018 b ...

in northern Clinton. In addition to the music format, KMCN broadcasts selected local Clinton area programming, mainly remote broadcasts of occasional special broadcasts of community events.

History

Early history (1970 to 1998)

The current KMCN-FM went on-the-air as KCLN-FM 97.7 on December 7, 1970. The station used its KCLN-AM programming to

simulcast Simulcast (a portmanteau of simultaneous broadcast) 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 (that is, simultane ...

broadcasts in the early 1970's as many AM radio stations did in back during that period. From 1976 to 1978, the station experimented and flipped its format to a hybrid of

Top 40 In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or " con ...

with live disc jockeys mostly independent of its sister station. Under the watchful eye of P.D. Bill "The Wildman" Warner, the station's moniker became "Rock 98", playing a blend of

Album Rock Album-oriented rock (AOR, originally called album-oriented radio) is an FM radio format created in the United States in the 1970s that focuses on the full repertoire of rock albums and is currently associated with classic rock. Album-orient ...

Disco Disco is a genre of dance music and a subculture that emerged in the 1970s from the United States' urban nightlife scene. Its sound is typified by four-on-the-floor beats, syncopated basslines, string sections, brass and horns, electric pia ...

Adult Contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quie ...

as well as some

Oldies Oldies is a term for musical genres such as pop music, rock and roll, doo-wop, surf music (broadly characterized as classic rock and pop rock) from the second half of the 20th century, specifically from around the mid-1950s to the 1980s, as we ...

. On-Air Personalities at that time were: The Wildman, Fran Scheiden, Joel Craig, Mark Cooper, Bryan Bradford, Eugene Jeffreys, Mary Witt, Kim Long and Kelly Long. After that short experimental period, the station changed call letters and went to a "reel-to-reel" automated Top 40 format as KLNQ-FM in June 1978. Then the station reorganized and call letters were changed to KNJY-FM and became an Automated Adult Contemporary station on July 1, 1980. KNJY once more changed its call sign to back to KCLN-FM on June 15, 1987. Throughout those early years, the station aired

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

beautiful Beautiful, an adjective used to describe things as possessing beauty, may refer to: Film and theater * ''Beautiful'' (2000 film), an American film directed by Sally Field * ''Beautiful'' (2008 film), a South Korean film directed by Juhn Jai-h ...

music, middle-of-the-road music,

music as "Rock 98" and

music formats. The station eventually switched frequencies to 94.7 FM on August 8, 1998, and at the same time adopted the call letters KZEG-FM. The current KMCN-FM call sign was adopted on November 2, 2005.

The Eagle 94.7 (1998 to 2005)

KZEG broadcast a

format from 1998 to 2005, and was known as ''The Eagle 94.7''. In November 2005, both KZEG and Muscatine-based sister station KWCC were owned by WPW Broadcasting, which later became Prairie Radio Communications.

The New MaC FM-93.1 and 94.7 (2005 to present)

The switch from country music to adult hits on both stations happened in November 2005, with the format branded as "93.1 and 94.7 Mac FM" KZEG changed its call letters to KMCN, for "Mac North", while KWCC changed its call letters to KMCS, for "Mac South". The stations target, as well as their home cities, the "

Quad Cities The Quad Cities is a region of cities (originally four, see History) in the U.S. states of Iowa and Illinois: Davenport and Bettendorf in southeastern Iowa, and Rock Island, Moline and East Moline in northwestern Illinois. These cities are t ...

" market along the

Iowa Iowa () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wisconsin to the northeast, Illinois to the ...

–

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

border. The music mix, meanwhile generally included pop, rock and soul from the early 1970s to the present day.

George Lowe George Edward Lowe (born November 10, 1957) is an American voice actor and comedian whose voice roles include Space Ghost on the animated series ''Space Ghost Coast to Coast'' and its spin-off, ''Cartoon Planet''. The station also had a competitor of sorts with

KQCJ KQCJ (93.9 MHz) is a commercial FM radio station, licensed to Cambridge, Illinois and serving the Quad Cities radio market. Known as "Planet 93.9" the station airs an alternative rock radio format. It is operated by Fletcher M. Ford, of Regiona ...

, which had aired an adult hits format as "

Jack FM Jack FM is a radio network brand, licensed by Sparknet Communications, with the exception of the European Union where it is licensed by Oxis Media. It plays an adult hits radio format, format, in most cases not using disc jockey, DJs. Format c ...

", but has since flipped to

alternative rock Alternative rock, or alt-rock, is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1990s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from Popular culture, mainstre ...

as Planet 93.9.

References

External links

* * {{Quad Cities Radio MCN Radio stations in the Quad Cities Adult hits radio stations in the United States Clinton, Iowa