WHQX (107.7 FM, "Kicks Country") 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 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

Gary, West Virginia Gary is a city located along the Tug Fork River in McDowell County, West Virginia, United States. According to the 2020 census, the city had a population of 762. It was named for Elbert Henry Gary, one of the founders of U.S. Steel. The forme ...

, United States. The station is owned and operated by Charles Spencer and Rick Lambert, through licensee First Media Services, LLC.

Programming

WHQX broadcasts a

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

format serving Southeastern West Virginia and Southwestern Virginia. The station operates in conjunction with sister station

WHKX WHKX is a country-formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Bluefield, Virginia, serving Bluefield, Tazewell, and Bland in Virginia and Bluefield and Princeton in West Virginia. WHKX is owned and operated by Charles Spencer and Rick Lamb ...

as "Kicks Country".

History

Cedar Bluff Broadcasting Company, Inc., received the original construction permit for a new FM radio station to serve

Cedar Bluff, Virginia Cedar Bluff is a town in Tazewell County, Virginia, United States. The population was 1,139 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Bluefield, WV-VA micropolitan area, which has a population of 107,578. History Cedar Bluff is a 19th-century mil ...

, 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 jurisdicti ...

(FCC) on June 20,

1988 File:1988 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The oil platform Piper Alpha explodes and collapses in the North Sea, killing 165 workers; The USS Vincennes (CG-49) mistakenly shoots down Iran Air Flight 655; Australia celebrates its Bicenten ...

. The new station was assigned the

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 assign ...

WJHT by the FCC on December 7, 1989. WJHT received its license to cover from the FCC on March 15, 1991. Facing financial difficulties, Cedar Bluff Broadcasting Company, Inc., filed an application with the FCC in February 1992 to voluntarily assign its

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 ...

to Richard A. Money, bankruptcy trustee. The transfer was approved by the FCC on March 19, 1992. Money, in turn, reached an agreement to sell this station to the Raslor Corporation in March 1992. The deal was approved by the FCC on June 5, 1992, and the transaction was finally consummated more than a year later on June 7, 1993. Just two days later, Raslor Corporation applied to the FCC to transfer the license for WJHT to Bluefield Broadcasting Company, Inc. The deal was approved by the FCC on August 11, 1993, and the transaction was consummated on August 13, 1993. The new owners had the FCC change the call sign to WBBY on August 27, 1993. In October 1996, Bluefield Broadcasting Company, Inc., reached an agreement to sell this station to New Adventure Communications, Inc. The deal was approved by the FCC on November 29, 1996, and the transaction was consummated on January 31, 1997. In February 1997, New Adventure Communications, Inc., applied to transfer the WBBY license to Adventure Communications, Inc. The deal was approved by the FCC on March 6, 1997, and the transaction was consummated on May 29, 1997. The station was assigned the WHQX

by the FCC on May 30, 1997. In July 2000, Adventure Communications, Inc., reached an agreement to sell WHQX to Triad Broadcasting through its Monterey Licenses, LLC, subsidiary. The deal was approved by the FCC on August 8, 2000, and the transaction was consummated on September 15, 2000. At the request of the licensee, the FCC modified WHQX's

community 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 broad ...

from Cedar Bluff, Virginia, to Gary, West Virginia, effective September 30, 2003. Effective May 1, 2013, Triad Broadcasting sold WHQX and 29 other stations to L&L Broadcasting for $21 million. Effective December 14, 2018, Alpha Media (the successor to L&L Broadcasting) sold WHQX, five sister stations, and a translator to First Media Services, LLC for $1.825 million.

References

External links

Kicks Country Online
* {{Country Radio Stations in West Virginia HQX HQX Radio stations established in 1989 McDowell County, West Virginia