KLBS (1330 AM) is a

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 ...

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

Los Banos, California Los Banos ( ), alternatively Los Baños ( ), is a city in Merced County, California, United States. It is located in the San Joaquin Valley in central California, near the junction of State Route 152 and Interstate 5. Its population was 45,532 ...

, United States. The station, established in 1961, is currently owned by Ethnic Radio of Los Banos, Inc.

Programming

KLBS broadcasts a

Portuguese-language Portuguese ( or, in full, ) is a western Romance language of the Indo-European language family, originating in the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It is an official language of Portugal, Brazil, Cape Verde, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau and ...

world music format featuring Portuguese-language news and community information as part of The Portuguese Radio Network. KLBS and its

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

, KSQQ(FM), serve the large Portuguese community of California's

San Joaquin Valley The San Joaquin Valley ( ; es, Valle de San Joaquín) is the area of the Central Valley of the U.S. state of California that lies south of the Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta and is drained by the San Joaquin River. It comprises seven c ...

History

The beginning

This station began licensed broadcasting on May 1, 1961, with 500

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 of power on the frequency 1330

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 ...

, restricted to daytime-only operation. The station was assigned the KLBS

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 assigne ...

by 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 ...

. Under the leadership of company president James Rose, license holder Los Banos Broadcasting Company served the diverse local population by including eight hours of farm programming, five hours of

Spanish language Spanish ( or , Castilian) is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from colloquial Latin spoken on the Iberian peninsula. Today, it is a world language, global language with more than 500 millio ...

programming, and seven hours of

Portuguese language Portuguese ( or, in full, ) is a western Romance language of the Indo-European language family, originating in the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It is an official language of Portugal, Brazil, Cape Verde, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau and ...

programming each week. The Portuguese programming included a weekday morning show from 7:00 to 8:00 a.m. and a Sunday afternoon block from noon to 2:00 p.m.

New ownership

John R. McAdam acquired Los Banos Broadcasting Company in 1963. McAdam expanded the ethnic programming to as much as 12 hours of Spanish language and 16 hours of Portuguese language programming each week throughout the 1970s. In April 1982, McAdam and Los Banos Broadcasting Company reached an agreement to transfer ownership of KLBS to a new company called Ethnic Radio, Inc. The deal was approved by the FCC on May 25, 1982.

24-hour broadcasting

KLBS filed an application with the FCC in November 1985 to begin operating around the clock by adding nighttime service with 5,000 watts of power. The FCC granted authorization for this major change on February 24, 1986, and tower installation began in June 1986. Construction was completed in November 1986 and the station was issued a license to cover the changes on December 3, 1987.

KLBS today

Ethnic Radio, Inc., applied in June 1987 to assign the KLBS

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 ...

to the Vieira family's Ethnic Radio of Los Banos, Inc. The transfer was approved by the FCC on July 2, 1987, and the transaction was consummated the same day. Broadcasting 90% of its programming in Portuguese, KLBS was then the only radio station in California broadcasting predominantly in the Portuguese language. That would change in 1990 when sister station

KSQQ KSQQ (96.1 FM) is a world ethnic radio station broadcasting in the Chinese and Portuguese languages. The station is owned by Coyote Communications and licensed to Morgan Hill, California, with a translator, K277BN, in San Martin, California. It ...

signed on with a multi-ethnic format, broadcasting in a dozen languages but with Portuguese language programming taking the bulk of the station's time.

References

External links

*
KLBS official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Klbs LBS Los Banos, California Mass media in Merced County, California LBS Portuguese-American culture in California Portuguese-language radio stations in the United States Radio stations established in 1961 1961 establishments in California