WJLS-FM (99.5
MHz
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 one he ...
) is a commercial
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 to
Beckley, West Virginia
Beckley is a city in and the county seat of Raleigh County, West Virginia, United States. It was founded on April 4, 1838. This city is the home of the West Virginia University Institute of Technology or West Virginia University, Beckley Campus.
...
, serving Southeastern West Virginia and Southwestern Virginia with 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. The station, which utilized the call letters WBKW from 1957 to 1990, was the second FM radio station to go on the air in West Virginia, and is the oldest to still exist. Since February 2013, it and
its sister AM station have been owned by
WVRC Media
WVRC Media is a media corporation comprising radio stations and two radio networks based in the state of West Virginia. The company was known as the West Virginia Radio Corporation prior to a December 2021 rebranding.
The company is controlle ...
, which purchased them from First Media Radio, LLC.
History
The AM station was founded in Beckley in 1939 by Joe L. Smith Jr. During World War II it became the smallest
CBS affiliate in the country.
The FM station launched as WBKW, a 4:00 pm–midnight music station, in late 1957. Both were purchased in the mid-2010s by the West Virginia Radio Corporation.
[ In 2016, WJLS moved from its original building in Beckley to occupy a floor in a building across the street.]
References
External links
*
History of WJLS
by Jeff Miller
JLS-FM
JLS-FM
Radio stations established in 1947
1947 establishments in West Virginia
{{WestVirginia-radio-station-stub