KARN (920 kHz) is a commercial AM

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 ...

Little Rock, Arkansas ( The "Little Rock") , government_type = Council-manager , leader_title = Mayor , leader_name = Frank Scott Jr. , leader_party = D , leader_title2 = Council , leader_name2 ...

, owned and operated by

Cumulus Media Cumulus Media, Inc. is an American broadcasting company and is the third largest owner and operator of AM and FM radio stations in the United States behind Audacy and iHeartMedia. As of June 2019, Cumulus lists ownership of 428 stations in 8 ...

. It airs a

sports Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, ...

radio format A radio format or programming format (not to be confused with broadcast programming) describes the overall content broadcast on a radio station. The radio format emerged mainly in the United States in the 1950s, at a time when radio was compelle ...

known as "920 AM The Sports Animal." The station's studios are located on Wellington Hills Road in West Little Rock. The

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which is applied to the ...

tower is located off North Hills Boulevard in

North Little Rock North Little Rock is a city in Pulaski County, Arkansas, across the Arkansas from Little Rock in the central part of the state. The population was 64,591 at the 2020 census. In 2019 the estimated population was 65,903, making it the seventh-mo ...

. KARN broadcasts at 5,000

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantify the rate of energy transfer. The watt is named after James ...

s, using a

directional antenna A directional antenna or beam antenna is an antenna which radiates or receives greater power in specific directions allowing increased performance and reduced interference from unwanted sources. Directional antennas provide increased performanc ...

at night to avoid interfering with other stations on AM 920. KARN is licensed by 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 ...

to broadcast a digital HD signal. Most of the day, KARN carries the

CBS Sports Radio CBS Sports Radio is a sports radio network that debuted with hourly sports news updates on September 4, 2012, and with 24/7 programming on January 2, 2013. CBS Sports Radio is owned by Paramount Global and distributed by Westwood One. Programm ...

Network. Middays it carries

nationally syndicated Broadcast syndication is the practice of leasing the right to broadcasting television shows and radio programs to multiple television stations and radio stations, without going through a broadcast network. It is common in the United States where ...

sports shows from Dan Patrick and Jim Rome. KARN is an affiliate of the

Dallas Cowboys The Dallas Cowboys are a professional American football team based in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. The Cowboys compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East divis ...

Radio Network.

History

Early years

KARN is among the oldest stations in Little Rock, getting its original broadcast license on July 6, 1928. Originally it was KGHI, operating on 890

kilocycle The cycle per second is a once-common English name for the unit of frequency now known as the hertz (Hz). The plural form was typically used, often written cycles per second, cycles/second, c.p.s., c/s, or, ambiguously, just cycles (Cy./Cyc.). T ...

s, at 500

s by day and 250 watts at night. In 1931, the station changed its

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 ass ...

to KARK, to identify with Arkansas, becoming a founding member and the

flagship station In broadcasting, a flagship (also known as a flagship station or key station) is the broadcast station which originates a television network, or a particular radio or television program that plays a key role in the branding of and consumer loyalt ...

of the Arkansas Radio Network. By the late 1930s, KARK had increased its power to 1,000 watts full-time, and became an affiliate of the

NBC Red Network The NBC, National Broadcasting Company's NBC Radio Network (known as the NBC Red Network prior to 1942) was an American commercial radio network which was in operation from 1926 through 2004. Along with the Blue Network, NBC Blue Network it was ...

. During the

Golden Age of Radio The Golden Age of Radio, also known as the old-time radio (OTR) era, was an era of radio in the United States where it was the dominant electronic home entertainment medium. It began with the birth of commercial radio broadcasting in the earl ...

, it carried NBC's dramas, comedies, news, sports,

game show A game show is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment (radio, television, internet, stage or other) where contestants compete for a reward. These programs can either be participatory or demonstrative and are typically directed by a host, ...

soap opera A soap opera, or ''soap'' for short, is a typically long-running radio or television Serial (radio and television), serial, frequently characterized by melodrama, ensemble casts, and sentimentality. The term "soap opera" originated from radio drama ...

s and

big band A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s ...

remote broadcasts.

Move to AM 920

In the early 1940s, the station switched to its current dial position at 920 kHz. It got a power boost to 5,000 watts. In an industry advertisement in ''

Broadcasting 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 wi ...

'' magazine, it touted its increased signal, saying "No one, other than KARK, covers 43 counties in Arkansas." It added that Arkansas had more retail sales than Wyoming and Vermont combined. By the 1950s, as network programming was shifting to television, KARK moved to a middle of the road format, with news and sports broadcasts. On April 15, 1954, KARK-TV

signed on Signing may refer to: * Using sign language * Signature, placing one's name on a document * Signature (disambiguation) * Manual communication, signing as a form of communication using the hands in place of the voice * Digital signature A digi ...

, the second TV station in Little Rock. (Channel 7

KATV KATV (channel 7) is a television station in Little Rock, Arkansas, United States, affiliated with ABC and owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group. The station's studios are located at the former Worthen Bank Building on East 4th and Main Streets in ...

had gone on the air seven months earlier.) Since KARK was an NBC Radio affiliate, KARK-TV began broadcasting

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

-TV programming, and has since its sign-on. On June 22, 1961, 103.7 KARK-FM began broadcasting,

simulcast Simulcast (a portmanteau of simultaneous broadcast) is the broadcasting of programmes/programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time (that is, simul ...

ing 920 KARK. In 1972, Channel 4 was sold to a

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

-based company. The TV station kept the KARK-TV call sign but that required the radio stations, now owned by Ted Snider, to switch to new call letters. They became KARN and KARN-FM. By this point KARN-FM had stopped simulcasting, instead becoming a

Top 40 In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or "cont ...

outlet, later taking the call letters KKYK (now

KABZ KABZ (103.7 MHz) is a commercial FM radio station in Little Rock, Arkansas. The station is owned by Signal Media and the broadcast license is held by Signal Media of Arkansas, Inc. KABZ airs a sports radio format, known as "103.7 The Buzz." The ...

Switch to talk radio

By the early 1980s, KARN had discontinued music programming. It became an affiliate of

CBS Radio News CBS News Radio, formerly known as CBS Radio News and historically known as the CBS Radio Network, is a radio network that provides news to more than 1,000 radio stations throughout the United States. The network is owned by Paramount Global. It ...

and switched to a news/talk format, picking up nationally syndicated shows such as

Rush Limbaugh Rush Hudson Limbaugh III ( ; January 12, 1951 – February 17, 2021) was an American conservative political commentator who was the host of '' The Rush Limbaugh Show'', which first aired in 1984 and was nationally syndicated on AM and FM r ...

and Sean Hannity. Generations of Arkansas broadcasters have worked at KARN, including sportscaster Jim Elder, talk show hosts Dave Elswick , Pat Lynch, Ray Lincoln, Bob Harrison, Taylor Carr and Sharon Lee, farm broadcasters Gary DiGiuseppe, Bob Buice, Lowell Ruffcorn, John Philpot, Stewart Doan, Janet Adkison and Keith Merckx and newscasters Bob Steel, Don Corbett, Vern Beachy, Scott Crowder, Michael Hibblen, Scott Charton, Rita Richardson, Ron Breeding, Don Griffin, Barry Green, David Wallace, Ken Miller, Paula Cooper, Terry Easley, Jayson Rogers, Grant Merrill, Alan Caudle, Patrick Grant, Ed Johnson, Jeff Herzer and Jack Heinritz. KARN's Program Directors have included Rick McGee, Dennis Turner, Chuck Martin, Dennis Kelly, Dale Forbis, Bob Shomper, Greg Foster, Neal Gladner, Bud Ford and Dave Elswick.

FM simulcasts

In 1997,

Citadel Broadcasting Citadel Broadcasting Corporation was a Las Vegas, Nevada-based broadcast holding company. Citadel owned 243 radio stations across the United States and was the third-largest radio station owner in the country. Only iHeartMedia and Cumulus Media ...

, a forerunner of Cumulus Media, bought KARN and several other Little Rock stations. Citadel wanted to aggressively market KARN's talk format. For a number of years, KARN simulcast on two suburban FM signals, 3,000 watt 102.5 FM licensed to Cabot (now

KPZK-FM KPZK-FM (102.5 FM, better known locally as Praise Radio) plays a gospel format in the Little Rock metropolitan area. It is under ownership of The Last Bastion Station Trust, LLC. The station's studios are located in West Little Rock, and the trans ...

), and 6,000 watt 101.7 FM licensed to Humnoke (now KVLO). While both stations added to KARN's ratings, neither signal covers the Little Rock radio market well. In the summer of 2004, the decision was made to simulcast KARN full-time on the co-owned 50,000 watt 102.9 FM frequency, licensed to

Sheridan Sheridan may refer to: People Surname *Sheridan (surname) *Philip Sheridan (1831–1888), U.S. Army general after whom the Sheridan tank is named *Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751–1816), Irish playwright (''The Rivals''), poet and politician ...

, which became KARN-FM. Now KARN listeners could continue to hear the station on AM 920 or switch to the better sound quality of FM on 102.9. In 2007, when Citadel acquired nearly two dozen ABC Radio stations, the company relinquished 11 of its radio stations, including KARN-FM, to The Last Bastion Station Trust, LLC. At first, the trust decided it would not simulcast KARN, which had remained with Citadel, on KARN-FM. But later, Citadel transferred

urban adult contemporary Urban adult contemporary, often abbreviated as urban AC or UAC, (also known as adult R&B,) is the name for a format of radio music, similar to an urban contemporary format. Radio stations using this format usually would not have hip hop music ...

102.1 KOKY to the trust, while re-acquiring KARN-FM. Citadel merged with Cumulus Media on September 16, 2011.

The Sports Animal

In 2009, Citadel Broadcasting decided to end the simulcast. KARN became "920 AM The Sports Animal" airing local shows and national programming from

Fox Sports Radio Fox Sports Radio is an American sports radio network. Based in Los Angeles, California, the network is operated and managed by Premiere Networks in a content partnership with Fox Corporation's Fox Sports division and iHeartMedia, parent compan ...

.Broadcasting Yearbook 2010 page D-73
/ref> 102.9 KARN-FM continues as a talk station. Cumulus Media owns an interest in the CBS Sports Radio Network. So in 2013, when CBS Sports Radio became a 24/7 network, KARN switched its network affiliation, dropping Fox Sports for CBS Sports.

References

External links

KARN official website

FCC History Cards for KARN
{{Cumulus Media ARN Cumulus Media radio stations Sports radio stations in the United States Radio stations established in 1928 1928 establishments in Arkansas CBS Sports Radio stations