KTRU (91.9 FM) is an American

non-commercial educational A non-commercial educational station (NCE station) is a radio station or television station that does not accept on-air advertisements ( TV ads or radio ads), as defined in the United States by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and was ...

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 A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...

to serve the community of

La Harpe, Kansas La Harpe is a city in Allen County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 480. History La Harpe was founded by the Fort Scott, Wichita & Western Railroad company (later the Missouri Pacific), and was pl ...

. Established in 2011, this station's

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 ...

is held by the St. Macrina Media and Education Society.

History

In October 2007, Grace Public Radio applied to 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 jurisd ...

(FCC) for a

construction permit Planning permission or developmental approval refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. It is usually given in the form of a building per ...

for a new broadcast radio station to serve

Girard, Kansas Girard is a city in and the county seat of Crawford County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 2,496. History Girard was founded in the spring of 1868, in opposition to Crawfordsville, and named a ...

. The FCC granted this permit on October 8, 2008, with a scheduled expiration date of October 8, 2011. The new station was assigned

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assig ...

"KFKB" on January 1, 2009. In August 2010, with the station still under construction, the permit holder applied to change the new station's

city of license In American, Canadian, and Mexican broadcasting, a city of license or community of license is the community that a radio station or television station is officially licensed to serve by that country's broadcast regulator. In North American b ...

from Girard to

. The FCC issued a new permit to make this change on April 5, 2011, with a scheduled expiration of October 8, 2011. The station applied for, and was assigned, new call sign "KTRU" by the FCC on May 17, 2011. After construction and testing were completed in October 2011, the station was granted its

on October 28, 2011. KTRU went silent on September 27, 2018, as Grace prepared to sell the station. Grace then sold the station to the St. Macrina Media and Education Society for $32,000. KTRU returned to the air on September 1, 2019. The KTRU call letters had previously been associated with the radio station at

Rice University William Marsh Rice University (Rice University) is a private research university in Houston, Texas. It is on a 300-acre campus near the Houston Museum District and adjacent to the Texas Medical Center. Rice is ranked among the top universit ...

Houston Houston (; ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in Texas, the Southern United States#Major cities, most populous city in the Southern United States, the List of United States cities by population, fourth-most pop ...

, which had them from its FM debut in 1971 until Rice sold the license in 2011. When Rice got a low-power FM facility in 2015, it adopted the KBLT-LP call letters. With KTRU under St. Macrina ownership, Rice was able to purchase from the right to change KBLT-LP to

KTRU-LP KTRU-LP (stylized as ktru) is the college radio station of Rice University, a private university in south-central Houston, Texas, United States. KTRU-LP broadcasts a freeform-eclectic music format on 96.1 FM; its programming includes modern cla ...

in August 2019 for $10,000.

Programming

Under Grace Public Radio, KTRU broadcast a

Contemporary Christian Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. Contemporary history is either a subset of the late modern period, or it i ...

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 informati ...

to the greater

Iola, Kansas Iola () is the county seat of Allen County, Kansas, United States. The city is situated along the Neosho River in southeast Kansas. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 5,396. It is named in honor of Iola Colborn. History ...

area.

References

External links

* {{Religious Radio Stations in Kansas Gospel radio stations in the United States Radio stations established in 2011 Allen County, Kansas TRU