WSYD (1300 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

oldies Oldies is a term for musical genres such as pop music, rock and roll, doo-wop, surf music (broadly characterized as classic rock and pop rock) from the second half of the 20th century, specifically from around the mid-1950s to the 1980s, as we ...

format. Licensed to

Mount Airy, North Carolina Mount Airy is a city in Surry County, North Carolina, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city population was 10,611. History Mount Airy was settled in the 1750s as a stagecoach stop on the road between Winston-Salem, North Carolina an ...

, United States, the station serves

Surry County, North Carolina Surry County is a county located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 71,359. Its county seat is Dobson, and its largest city is Mount Airy. Surry county comprises the Mount Airy, NC Micropolitan St ...

. The station is currently owned by Granite City Broadcasting and features programming from

Salem Communications Salem Media Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: SALM; formerly Salem Communications Corporation) is an American radio broadcaster, Internet content provider, and magazine and book publisher formerly based in Camarillo, California (moved most operations to Ir ...

History

WSYD started out playing

rock and roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock 'n' roll, or rock 'n roll) is a Genre (music), genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It Origins of rock and roll, originated from Africa ...

in the mid-1950s. Prior to the most recent change, the station played a mix of

contemporary Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. Contemporary history is either a subset of the late modern period, or it is o ...

and

classic country Classic country is a music radio format that specializes in playing mainstream country and western music hits from past decades. Repertoire The radio format specializes in hits from the 1950s through the early 1980s, and focus primarily on innov ...

Expanded Band assignment

On March 17, 1997 the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) announced that 88 stations had been given permission to move to newly available " Expanded Band" transmitting frequencies, ranging from 1610 to 1700 kHz, with WSYD authorized to move from 1300 to 1640 kHz."FCC Public Notice: Mass Media Bureau Announces Revised AM Expanded Band Allotment Plan and Filing Window for Eligible Stations"
(FCC DA 97-537), March 17, 1997. A Construction Permit for the expanded band station, also in Mount Airy, was assigned the callsign WLHJ on November 10, 1997. However the expanded band station was never built, and its Construction Permit was cancelled on December 22, 2000.

Later history

A switch to oldies took place on April 6, 2011, after news director Mark Brown asked listeners what music they would like to hear. A poll was conducted, and the listeners voted overwhelmingly for the switch to a "pop oldies" format, dubbed "Granite City Gold."

References

External links

Granite City Gold Online
*
FCC History Cards for WSYD
(covering 1950-1981) * * {{Oldies Radio Stations in North Carolina SYD Radio stations established in 1951 1951 establishments in North Carolina