KTOK (1000 AM) is a

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 ...

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 ...

Oklahoma City Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, it ranks 20th among United States cities in population, a ...

and airs a

talk radio Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often featur ...

format Format may refer to: Printing and visual media * Text formatting, the typesetting of text elements * Paper formats, or paper size standards * Newspaper format, the size of the paper page Computing * File format, particular way that informatio ...

. It is owned by

iHeartMedia, Inc. iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company fou ...

, and licensed as iHM Licenses, LLC. The

studio A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...

s and offices are in the

50 Penn Place 50 Penn Place is an upscale mixed-use complex in the inner Northwest part of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The galleria-style shopping mall and tower is located at 1900 Northwest Expressway in the Penn Square trade area immediately at I-44 and Northwe ...

Building on the northwest side of Oklahoma City. KTOK transmits 5,800

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after James Wa ...

s, using a

directional antenna A directional antenna or beam antenna is an antenna which radiates or receives greater power in specific directions allowing increased performance and reduced interference from unwanted sources. Directional antennas provide increased performance ...

at all times, with a three to five-

tower array A tower array is an arrangement of multiple radio towers which are mast radiators in a phased array. They were originally developed as ground-based tracking radars. Tower arrays can consist of free-standing or guyed towers or a mix of them. Tower a ...

. Because AM 1000 is a clear channel frequency reserved for Class A

WMVP WMVP (1000 AM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Chicago, Illinois, carrying a sports format. Owned by Good Karma Brands, the station serves the Chicago metro area as the market affiliate of ESPN Radio, the flagship station of the Chica ...

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, KNWN in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

and XEOY in

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...

, KTOK's nighttime signal must protect those stations. The

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which i ...

is located in

Moore, Oklahoma Moore is a city in Cleveland County, Oklahoma, United States, and is part of the Oklahoma City metropolitan area. The population was 62,793 at the 2020 census, making Moore the seventh-largest city in the state of Oklahoma. Located between Oklah ...

, off NE 25th Street. KTOK programming is also heard on co-owned

KXXY KXXY-FM (96.1 MHz, "96.1 KXY") is a commercial radio station in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and is owned by iHeartMedia, Inc. It airs a classic country radio format. In its logo, the station omits one of the two Xs in its call sign, calling itself ...

HD radio HD Radio (HDR) is a trademark for an in-band on-channel (IBOC) digital radio broadcast technology. It generally simulcasts an existing analog radio station in digital format with less noise and with additional text information. HD Radio is used ...

secondary channel and on the

iHeartRadio iHeartRadio (often shortened to just "iHeart") is an American freemium broadcast, podcast and radio streaming Computing platform, platform owned by iHeartMedia. It was founded in August 2008. , iHeartRadio was functioning as the national umbr ...

app.

Programming

KTOK has one local talk host each weekday, Lee Matthews. The rest of the weekday schedule is made up of nationally syndicated

conservative talk Conservative talk radio is a talk radio format in the United States and other countries devoted to expressing conservative viewpoints of issues, as opposed to progressive talk radio. The definition of conservative talk is generally broad enough ...

shows, mostly from co-owned

Premiere Networks Premiere Networks (formerly Premiere Radio Networks, shortened as PRN) is an American media company, a wholly owned subsidiary of iHeartMedia, for which it currently serves as its main original radio content distribution and production arm. It ...

. They include ''

The Glenn Beck Program ''Glenn'' (previously titled ''The Glenn Beck Program'') is a news talk and political opinion show on TheBlaze hosted by Glenn Beck. It is produced and recorded at TheBlaze studios in Dallas, TX. The show originally ran on CNN Headline News fr ...

The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show ''The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show'' is an American radio program hosted by former Fox Sports Radio personality Clay Travis and former '' America Now/The Buck Sexton Show'' host Buck Sexton. It is broadcast on over 400 talk radio stations n ...

The Sean Hannity Show ''The Sean Hannity Show'' is a conservative talk radio show hosted by Sean Hannity. The program is broadcast live every weekday, from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. ET. The show is produced in the New York City studios of radio station WOR and is sometimes ...

The Mark Levin Show ''The Mark Levin Show'' is a conservative talk radio show hosted by Mark Levin. The program is broadcast nationwide on Westwood One and reaches an estimated seven million weekly listeners, according to an estimate from ''Talkers Magazine''. The ...

The Jesse Kelly Show ''The Jesse Kelly Show'' (formerly known as ''America Now'' and ''The Buck Sexton Show'') is a three-hour early evening conservative talk radio show hosted by Jesse Kelly, and carried by Premiere Networks, a subsidiary of iHeartMedia, Inc. It is ...

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 19 ...

with

George Noory George Ralph Noory (born June 4, 1950) 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 ...

'' and ''

This Morning, America's First News with Gordon Deal ''This Morning: America's First News'' (formerly ''The Wall Street Journal This Morning'') is a two-hour radio news/talk program hosted by Gordon Deal and Jennifer Kushinka, who replaced long-serving co-host Gina Cervetti on January 2, 2015. In a ...

''. Weekends feature programs on money, health, home repair, real estate and guns. Some weekend shows are paid

brokered programming Brokered programming (also known as time-buy and blocktime) 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 comm ...

. Syndicated weekend shows include '' The Weekend with Michael Brown, Sunday Nights with Bill Cunningham'' and '' Somewhere in Time with Art Bell''. Most hours begin with world and national news from

Fox News Radio Fox News Radio is an American radio network owned by Fox News. It is syndicated to over 500 AM and FM radio stations across the United States. It also supplies programming for three channels on Sirius XM Satellite Radio. History In 2003, ...

History

Early years

KTOK was first licensed with the sequentially assigned call letters, KGFG, signing on the air on . It was owned by the Full Gospel Church in Oklahoma City. By the 1930s, the station was owned by the Oklahoma Broadcasting Company. It broadcast on 1370

kilocycle The cycle per second is a once-common English name for the unit of frequency now known as the hertz (Hz). The plural form was typically used, often written cycles per second, cycles/second, c.p.s., c/s, or, ambiguously, just cycles (Cy./Cyc.). The ...

s and was powered at 100 watts. KGFG's studios were housed in the Cotton Exchange Building. The call letters were changed to KTOK on February 17, 1937. With

WKY WKY (930 AM) is a commercial radio station in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, owned by Cumulus Media. It is the oldest radio station in Oklahoma and among the oldest in the nation. WKY airs a sports format which is simulcast with its sister station ...

as an

NBC Red Network The National Broadcasting Company's NBC Radio Network (known as the NBC Red Network prior to 1942) was an American commercial radio network which was in operation from 1926 through 2004. Along with the NBC Blue Network it was one of the first t ...

station and KOMA carrying the

CBS Radio Network CBS News Radio, formerly known as CBS Radio News and historically known as the CBS Radio Network, is a radio network that provides news to more than 1,000 radio stations throughout the United States. The network is owned by Paramount Global. It ...

, KTOK first became a

network affiliate In the broadcasting industry (particularly in North America, and even more in the United States), 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 a ...

of the

Mutual Broadcasting System The Mutual Broadcasting System (commonly referred to simply as Mutual; sometimes referred to as MBS, Mutual Radio or the Mutual Radio Network) was an American commercial radio network in operation from 1934 to 1999. In the Old-time radio, golden ...

. By the 1940s, it had switched to the

NBC Blue Network The Blue Network (previously known as the NBC Blue Network) was the on-air name of a now defunct American Commercial broadcasting, radio network, which broadcast from 1927 through 1945. Beginning as one of the two radio networks owned by the N ...

(later

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...

1940s and 50s

In 1941, with the enactment of the

North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement The North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement (NARBA, es, Convenio Regional Norteamericano de Radiodifusión) refers to a series of international treaties that defined technical standards for AM band (mediumwave) radio stations. These agreem ...

(NARBA), KTOK moved to 1400 kHz. The power increased to 250 watts. But management wanted to make KTOK's signal competitive with 930 WKY (5,000 watts) and 1520 KOMA (50,000 watts). In the late 1940s, KTOK got permission from the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction ...

to move to 1000 kHz. The power increased to 5,000 watts by day, 1,000 watts at night. The station also added an FM companion. KTOK-FM signed on in 1946 at 104.3 MHz, powered at 43,000 watts. It mostly

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 ...

the AM station. However, management saw little hope in making KTOK-FM profitable and gave it up after several years. By the 1950s, as network programming was moving from radio to television, KTOK switched to a

full service Full service or Full Service may refer to: * Full-service radio, a wide range of programming * Full Service Network, a communications company Entertainment * "Full Service", a song by the New Kids on the Block from their album ''The Block'' * F ...

, middle of the road (MOR) format of popular adult music, news and sports. As WKY and KOMA became youth-oriented

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 ...

stations, KTOK began carrying sports from their former networks, NBC and CBS, including the

World Series The World Series is the annual championship series of Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, contested since 1903 between the champion teams of the American League (AL) and the National League (NL). The winner of the World ...

, championship fights and auto racing. An advertisement in the 1960 edition of the '' Broadcasting Yearbook'' said KTOK plays "toe-tapping music (no rock and roll) and all of the announcers are adults," to contrast KTOK with the youthful Top 40

disc jockey A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include Radio personality, radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music f ...

s on WKY and KOMA.

1960s - 1980s

In the 1960s, the nighttime power increased to match the daytime power, 5,000 watts. But it had to use a complicated directional antenna system to make the higher nighttime power work, while still protecting other stations on AM 1000. In 1978, KTOK was acquired by the Insilco Broadcasting Group, which also bought an FM station at 102.7, KZUE, which aired an

adult contemporary music 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, quiet ...

format. (102.7 today is Top 40/CHR

KJYO KJYO (102.7 FM), known as "KJ103", is a Top 40 (CHR) radio station serving the Oklahoma City area owned by iHeartMedia. Its transmitter is in Northeast Oklahoma City, and its studios are located at the 50 Penn Place building on the Northwes ...

.) KTOK became an affiliate of the ABC Information Radio Network. KTOK gradually increased the talk programming and cut the MOR music programming. By the 1980s, it had become a talk station.

1990s - Today

KTOK and its FM station were acquired in 1992 by

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-based

Clear Channel Communications iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company fou ...

(the forerunner to current owner

iHeartMedia iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company fou ...

).Broadcasting & Cable Yearbook 2000 page D-361
/ref> At one time, the news staff numbered 12. iHeart moved its Oklahoma City operations to

off Northwest Expressway and

Interstate 44 Interstate 44 (I-44) is a major Interstate Highway in the central United States. Although it is nominally an east–west road as it is even-numbered, it follows a more southwest–northeast alignment. Its western terminus is in Wichita Fal ...

. In the 2010s, the station got a slight power increase, going from 5,000 watts to 5,800 watts, day and night. It also got a simulcast on an

HD Radio HD Radio (HDR) is a trademark for an in-band on-channel (IBOC) digital radio broadcast technology. It generally simulcasts an existing analog radio station in digital format with less noise and with additional text information. HD Radio is used ...

subchannel of co-owned

KXXY-FM KXXY-FM (96.1 MHz, "96.1 KXY") is a commercial radio station in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and is owned by iHeartMedia, Inc. It airs a classic country radio format. In its logo, the station omits one of the two Xs in its call sign, calling itself ...

Current and former on-air staff

Show hosts: * Dink Bernardi * Larry Bledsoe * Jack Bowen * Robert D. "Bob" Coker * Carole Arnold * Jerry Bohnen * Gene Collett * Carlton Cordell * John Dale * Jason Doyle (host of "Doyle in the Morning") * Tom Furlong * Ken Gaines * Sharon Gaines * Mike Hutton * Niles Jackson * Dave Marshal * Greg Merrick (sportscaster) * Mike McCarville (afternoon drive show) * Lee Matthews (weekday mornings & afternoons) * Greg "Eggman" Moore * Steve Neumann * Pam Pryor * Bob Riggins * Billie Rodely * Ed Sossen * Rick Tasetano *

Mark Shannon Mark Shannon (born Mark Jackson Fullerton; August 4, 1951 – May 8, 2010) was a long-time conservative radio personality who lived in Edmond, Oklahoma. Shannon was born in Lincoln, Nebraska where he lived until graduating high school in 1969. ...

(hosted "The Drive") * B. J. Wexler (later hosted " KETA-TV" Movie Club) * Jim Rupe * Al Eshbach News reporters and anchors: * Tim Allen * Phil Bacharach * Bill Bateman * Natalie Bell * Megan Bishop * Jerry Bohnen * Bill Boren * Bob Burke * Mike Gannon * Stephanie Chase * Chris Davala * Bob Durgin * Jon Dahlander * Bob Davidson * Trey Davis * Jack Edens * Cam Edwards * Mike Elder * Brian Gan * Melissa Gandal * Mary Beth Henschel * Carrie Hulsey * Steve Jones * Karen Fuhrmann * Gwin Faulconer-Lippert * Jackson Kane * Delvin Kinser * Rand Lavonn * Laura Knoll (later with

KGOU KGOU is a National Public Radio member news/talk/jazz music/blues music radio station serving the Oklahoma City area, western and northwestern Oklahoma, and towns in Pontotoc, Seminole and Grady counties.

) * Ken Johnson * Craig Logsdon * Beth Meyers * Dan Mahoney * Karen McCoy * Gene Molter * Bill Mondora * Reid Mullins * Mark Myers * Derrick Nance * Charles Newcomb * Joe Oliver * Jim Palmer * Jim "Captain" Perdue * Randy Pyburn * Jim Reagan * Jacqueline Scott * Bill Reker * Randy Renner (sports director, formerly a reporter at CBS affiliate

KWTV-TV KWTV-DT (channel 9) is a television station in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, affiliated with CBS. It is the Flagship (broadcasting), flagship broadcast property of locally based Griffin Media, and is co-owned with MyNe ...

) * Mike "Road King" Rogers * Scott Rowland * Cynthia Rozmaryn * David Rucker * Mary Shea * Dawn Shelton * Bill Simonson * Matt Skinner * Linda Steele * Larry Stein (later the

County Assessor Tax assessment, or assessment, is the job of determining the value, and sometimes determining the use, of property, usually to calculate a property tax. This is usually done by an office called the assessor or tax assessor. Governments need to ...

for

Oklahoma County Oklahoma County is located in the central part of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. As of the 2010 census, the population was 718,633, making it the most populous county in Oklahoma. The county seat is Oklahoma City, the state capital and largest ci ...

) * Merrit Thomas * Bryan Walke * Kim Walkingstick * Nate Webb * Connie Webber * John Williams * Calvin Wright * John Wright

References

External links

KTOK Home pageKTOK described

FCC History Cards for KTOK
(covering KGFG / KTOK from 1927-1980) {{IHeartMedia Radio stations established in 1927 TOK News and talk radio stations in the United States 1927 establishments in Oklahoma IHeartMedia radio stations