WMRA is a public-radio formatted

broadcast Broadcasting is the distribution of audio or video content to a dispersed audience via any electronic mass communications medium, but typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum ( radio waves), in a one-to-many model. Broadcasting began ...

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

Harrisonburg, Virginia Harrisonburg is an independent city in the Shenandoah Valley region of the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. It is also the county seat of the surrounding Rockingham County, although the two are separate jurisdictions. At the 2 ...

. It is the

NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...

member station for the central

Shenandoah Valley The Shenandoah Valley () is a geographic valley and cultural region of western Virginia and the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia. The valley is bounded to the east by the Blue Ridge Mountains, to the west by the eastern front of the Ridge- ...

. Combined with its full-power repeaters and low-power translators, it serves much of west-central Virginia from

Winchester Winchester is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs Nation ...

to Lexington as well as the

Charlottesville Charlottesville, colloquially known as C'ville, is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Albemarle County, which surrounds the city, though the two are separate legal entities. It is named after Queen Ch ...

area. WMRA is owned and operated by

James Madison University James Madison University (JMU, Madison, or James Madison) is a public research university in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Founded in 1908 as the State Normal and Industrial School for Women at Harrisonburg, the institution was renamed Madison Coll ...

History

WMRA signed on in the summer of 1969, broadcasting on 91.1 MHz with 10 watts. The transmitter was at 851 South Main Street in Harrisonburg and the studios were at Alumni Hall on the campus of what was then Madison College. WMRA's signal was sufficient to cover the city of Harrisonburg proper. The station aired from 4 p.m. to midnight daily, and was a typical

college radio Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...

station, with all programming produced by students. WMRA moved to 90.7 MHz and upgraded power to 19.5 kW on November 12, 1975, at which time the station also applied for funding from the

Corporation for Public Broadcasting The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) is an American publicly funded non-profit corporation, created in 1967 to promote and help support public broadcasting. The corporation's mission is to ensure universal access to non-commercial, ...

and joined NPR. As a condition of CPB funding, the station hired professional staff. While students continued to handle many on-air operations, the station adopted a typical public radio format of NPR news, talk, and

classical music Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical music, as the term "classical music" also ...

, with specialty programs of folk and

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

. Unusually for a public radio station, a student-programmed

progressive rock Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog; sometimes conflated with art rock) is a broad genre of rock music that developed in the United Kingdom and United States through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Init ...

show took the late-night timeslot. All rock music was dropped in 1980 owing to low listenership, to "no great student response", according to general manager Don Lanham. Student programming moved to

WXJM WXJM (88.7 FM) is an American non-commercial educational radio station licensed to serve Harrisonburg, Virginia, United States. The station, established in 1990, is owned and operated by James Madison University. The station's broadcast licen ...

(88.7 FM) when that station signed on in 1990. On January 14, 2008, WMRA took over the operation of

Eastern Mennonite University Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) is a private Mennonite university in Harrisonburg, Virginia. The university also operates a satellite campus in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, which primarily caters to working adults. EMU's bachelor-degree holde ...

WEMC WEMC (91.7 FM) is a classical music formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Harrisonburg, Virginia, serving Harrisonburg and Rockingham County, Virginia. WEMC is owned by Eastern Mennonite University. Due to declining listenership and ...

(91.7 FM), which faced declining ratings and little student interest. WMRA moved its daytime classical programming there in exchange for extra NPR programs that WEMC had previously aired because WMRA could not fit them into its schedule. Both stations kept their evening schedules intact; WMRA was hesitant to move its evening music programs due to WEMC's inferior signal. WEMC went all-classical on August 11, 2014, while WMRA picked up WEMC's remaining information programming and dropped its weekday music programming. WMRA has since started airing several weekend music programs and occasional weeknight music programming.

Network

WMRA programming is heard on network of three full-powered repeaters. WMLU is owned by

Longwood University Longwood University is a public university in Farmville, Virginia. Founded in 1839, it is the third-oldest public university in Virginia and one of the hundred oldest institutions of higher education in the United States. Previously a college, Lo ...

, which reserves evening and late-night timeslots for its own music and student programming. WMRA also operates one fill-in

translator Translation is the communication of the Meaning (linguistic), meaning of a #Source and target languages, source-language text by means of an Dynamic and formal equivalence, equivalent #Source and target languages, target-language text. The ...

Winchester, Virginia Winchester is the most north western independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Frederick County, although the two are separate jurisdictions. The Bureau of Economic Analysis combines the city of Winchester wit ...

due to interference from

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

's WETA on 90.9.

References

External links

wmra.org
{{James Madison University 1969 establishments in Virginia Public radio stations in the United States NPR member stations Radio stations established in 1969 MRA MRA James Madison University