WEXY (1520
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 ...
broadcasting an
urban contemporary gospel 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 ...
, with some paid
brokered programming on religion, health and other topics.
Licensed to
Wilton Manors, Florida
Wilton Manors is a city in Broward County, Florida, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 11,426. Wilton Manors is part of the Miami metropolitan area, which was home to 6,166,488 people at the 2020 census.
Histor ...
, United States, the station serves the
Fort Lauderdale
A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...
area. The station is currently owned by
Multicultural Radio Broadcasting Licensee, LLC
Multicultural Broadcasting is a media company based in New York City founded by Chinese-American businessman Arthur Liu. It caters mostly to the Asian American community and owns television and radio stations in several of the top markets in mul ...
. The original call letters were WIXX. The station had once been co-owned with WIXX-FM, now
WBGG.
History
In addition to WEXY 1520 AM
Multicultural Broadcastingalso operates two sister stations in Miami/Dade County,
WNMA
WNMA (1210 AM) is a radio station licensed to Miami Springs, Florida, serving the Miami/Fort Lauderdale area. It airs a Spanish-language Christian format known as "Radio Oasis 1210". The station is owned by Multicultural Broadcasting and cur ...
1210 AM and
WJCC 1700; both stations serve their listening areas with a mix of Hispanic and Haitian cultural music and talk programming. WNMA was a onetime ESPN Deportes outlet, but the ESPN programming moved t
Radio Actualidads 990
WMYM
WMYM is a radio station licensed to Kendall, Florida, serving the Miami metropolitan area as the flagship station of the Spanish-language sports network Unanimo Deportes. WMYM is broadcast on 990 kHz.
History
WFAB "La Fabulosa" broadcast a Sp ...
.
WEXY first went on the air in June 1963, starting out as the AM sister station to Fort Lauderdale's WAXY-FM 105.9, then known as WFLM, which is now known as WBGG "Big 106."
According to a 1990 Sun Sentinel Newspaper interview, WEXY had its roots in the 1960s, when WEXY's owner, Juno Beattie, then operating a beauty shop in Durham, North Carolina, met Jim Beattie, who then owned Durham's top rated rock radio station. They met when Jim attempted to get Juno's shop to buy spots on the station.
The 1970s and 1980s
The Beattie's then purchased additional stations in North Carolina, Virginia, and Daytona Beach, Florida. In 1970, they (operating as "Celebrities, Inc.") purchased 1520 AM, a low wattage country station, in Wilton Manors, Florida, which served the Fort Lauderdale metro area with a 1,000 watt signal as WIXX 1520 "The Top Gun in Broward."
They eventually changed the calls to WEXY and flipped through several formats, running "
Easy Listening
Easy listening (including mood music) is a popular music genre and radio format that was most popular during the 1950s to 1970s. It is related to middle-of-the-road (MOR) music and encompasses instrumental recordings of standards, hit songs, n ...
," "
Beautiful Music
Beautiful music (sometimes abbreviated as BM, B/EZ or BM/EZ for "beautiful music/easy listening") is a mostly instrumental music format that was prominent in North American radio from the late 1950s through the 1980s. Easy listening, elevator musi ...
," "Solid Gold," and "Good Modern Music" (a mix of current hits and Golds) formats, and finally, back to country music. For a time, the station ran a "
Hit Parade
A hit parade is a ranked list of the most popular recordings at a given point in time, usually determined either by sales or airplay. The term originated in the 1930s; ''Billboard'' magazine published its first music hit parade on January 4, 1936 ...
" syndicated package produced by San Diego's Drake-Chenault programming team, which was designed for automated radio stations.
WEXY eventually lost their county audience to competition from the county formats on the stronger signals of 560
WQAM, and
WIRK
WIRK (103.1 FM broadcasting, FM) is a radio station broadcasting a country music format. Licensed to Indiantown, Florida, the station serves the Treasure Coast and Palm Beach County, Florida, Palm Beach County area. The station is owned by Hubbar ...
107.9 FM, which began running country music in September 1973. The audience erosion led to the station adopting a brokered black gospel talk and music format in 1976, similar in style to
WSWN
WSWN (900 AM) is a radio station formerly broadcasting a talk format branded as "Talk of the Palm Beaches." It was better known in the South Florida and Treasure Coast areas as "Sugar 900," named after the surrounding sugar cane industry in the B ...
"Sugar 900" to the north in Belle Glade.
Domestic problems caused Jim and Juno Beattie to split in 1982. Following their divorce, Juno relocated to Melbourne, Florida. When Jim died from cancer in November 1988, he turned over the ownership of WEXY 1520 to Juno. She returned the station to a full-time black gospel outlet by 1990.
In October 1989, WEXY received clearance to increase from 1,000 to 3,500 watts.
The 2000s
By 2003, Juno Beattie sold WEXY to MRBI Broadcasting, Inc. of New York City, which flipped the station to a Hispanic Christian Music and Talk format "The Voice of Hope" ("La Voz, de la Esperanza") while also running Asian-based sports broadcasts.
An eventual mid-2000s increase to 5,000 watts allowed the station to cover Dade, Broward, Southern Palm Beach Counties and Freeport in the Grand Bahamas. The station currently brands itself as "The Spirit of South Florida" with a mix of brokered black gospel church talk programs and black gospel music filling out its unsold airtime.
In 2015, the WEXY made the local news when the family of the stations' program director, Doug DeVos, became an alleged victim of a funeral home scam.
In late 2017, the bankrupt and long off the air
WFLL
WFLL (1400 AM; "Nossa Rádio 1400") is a radio station in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, serving the Miami-Fort Lauderdale radio market. It airs a Brazilian Portuguese Ethnic format. The station is owned by International Church of the Grace of God, In ...
1400 AM (the old, iconic
WFTL 1400) began duplexing (renting tower space and transmitter facilities) on one of two of WEXY's towers in Oakland Park, Florida. The City of Oakland Park maintains a manicured Dog Park around WEXY's main quad-post tower. WFLL 1400, an old James Crystal Radio property, is owned by Jorgensen Broadcasting, a radio brokerage firm.
References
External links
Short History of WEXY 1520
{{Multicultural Broadcasting
Gospel radio stations in the United States
EXY
Chu So-jung ( ko, 추소정; born November 6, 1995), better known by her stage name Exy, is a South Korean rapper, singer and songwriter. She debuted as a member and leader of South Korean-Chinese girl group WJSN under Starship and Yuehua E ...
Radio stations established in 1985
Multicultural Broadcasting stations
1985 establishments in Florida