KMVX (101.9 FM, "Mix 101.9") is an American

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 radi ...

licensed to Monroe, Louisiana, United States. The station, established in 1967, is currently owned by The Radio People and the

broadcast license A broadcast license is a type of spectrum license granting the licensee permission to use a portion of the radio frequency spectrum in a given geographical area for broadcasting purposes. The licenses generally include restrictions, which vary f ...

is held by Holladay Broadcasting of Louisiana, LLC. Studios are located in Monroe, and its transmitter is located in rural

Caldwell Parish, Louisiana Caldwell Parish (french: Paroisse de Caldwell) is a parish located in the U.S. state of Louisiana. As of the 2010 census, the population was 10,132, making it the fifth-least populous parish in Louisiana. The parish seat is Columbia. Most res ...

Programming

KMVX broadcasts an

urban adult contemporary Urban adult contemporary, often abbreviated as urban AC or UAC, (also known as adult R&B,) is the name for a format of radio music, similar to an urban contemporary format. Radio stations using this format usually would not have hip hop music ...

music format to Monroe and the greater

Alexandria, Louisiana Alexandria is the ninth-largest city in the state of Louisiana and is the parish seat of Rapides Parish, Louisiana, United States. It lies on the south bank of the Red River in almost the exact geographic center of the state. It is the prin ...

area and Natchez Mississippi. Local weekday on-air personalities include

Rickey Smiley Broderick Dornell Smiley (born August 10, 1968) is an American stand-up comedian, television host, actor, and radio personality, known for his prank phone calls. The calls feature Smiley disguising his voice and carrying on a conversation with th ...

, Rob Lloyd, DJ Scott Banks,

History

The station, under the KNOE-FM call sign, was founded in 1966 by former Governor of Louisiana James A. Noe. Noe had earlier started Monroe AM radio station KNOE in 1944 and Monroe TV station

KNOE-TV KNOE-TV (channel 8) is a television station licensed to Monroe, Louisiana, United States, serving the Monroe, Louisiana– El Dorado, Arkansas market as an affiliate of CBS and ABC. It is owned by Gray Television alongside low-power dual CW ...

in 1953. In 1936, he also acquired an AM radio station in New Orleans which he renamed WNOE and in 1968 started New Orleans FM radio station

WNOE-FM WNOE-FM (101.1 MHz) is a country music station based in New Orleans, Louisiana. The iHeartMedia outlet broadcasts with an ERP of 100 kW. Its current slogan is "New Orleans Country Station." Its transmitter is located in New Orleans' East A ...

. Noe's son, James Albert "Jimmie" Noe Jr., ran KNOE-FM along with its AM and TV sister stations for almost four decades. When Jimmie Noe died from cancer in 2005, the remaining family members agreed to place the stations up for sale and exit broadcasting. In October 2007, the Noe family reached an agreement to sell this station to Clay Holladay's Radio Monroe, LLC., for a reported $900,000. The deal was approved by the FCC on May 1, 2008, and the transaction was consummated on May 13, 2008. On March 3, 2013 KNOE-FM changed its format from CHR to urban adult contemporary, branded as "Mix 101.9". The call letters were changed to KMVX on March 21, 2013.

Tower collapse

On March 21, 1997, KNOE-FM suffered a catastrophic collapse of its broadcast tower. The 1,989 foot (606.25 m) tower, roughly 545 feet (166 m) taller than Chicago's

Sears Tower The Willis Tower (originally the Sears Tower) is a 108- story, skyscraper in the Loop community area of Chicago in Illinois, United States. Designed by architect Bruce Graham and engineer Fazlur Rahman Khan of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM ...

, collapsed as a result of a maintenance crew's failure to install a temporary support structure during the replacement of diagonal braces. Of the three workers on the tower at the time of the collapse, one was killed, one fell into a satellite dish about 12 feet (3.7 m) above the ground, and one was thrown clear and walked away basically unharmed. The workers were together about 200 feet (61 m) up the tower when it collapsed. The tower, whose primary tenant was then- sister station

, was also used by

Louisiana Public Broadcasting Louisiana Public Broadcasting (LPB) is a state network of Public Broadcasting Service ( PBS) member television stations serving the U.S. state of Louisiana. The stations are operated by the Louisiana Educational Television Authority, an agency c ...

. After operating from temporary facilities for more than a year, KNOE-FM's permanent replacement tower was ready for use in June 1998 and licensed for operation by the FCC on September 15, 1998.

Star 101.9

Star 101.9 as KNOE-FM with Top-40 Hit's

References

External links

{{Urban Radio Stations in Louisiana Radio stations in Louisiana Radio stations established in 1967 Mass media in Monroe, Louisiana Urban adult contemporary radio stations in the United States The Radio People radio stations