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WBBD (1400 AM) 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
Wheeling, West Virginia Wheeling is a city in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Located almost entirely in Ohio County, of which it is the county seat, it lies along the Ohio River in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains and also contains a tiny portion extending ...
, United States, carrying an all-sports format. Owned by
iHeartMedia iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company fou ...
, WBBD serves both the
Wheeling metropolitan area The Wheeling, WV-OH Metropolitan Statistical Area, as defined by the United States Census Bureau, is an area consisting of two counties in the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia and one in eastern Ohio, anchored by the city of Wheeling. As of th ...
and nearby St. Clairsville, Ohio, as the market's
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 company ...
affiliate. WBBD's studios are currently located at the Capitol Theatre in downtown Wheeling, while its transmitter resides in the city's northern end. In addition to a standard
analog transmission Analog transmission is a transmission method of conveying information using a continuous signal which varies in amplitude, phase, or some other property in proportion to that information. It could be the transfer of an analog signal, using an ana ...
, WBBD is relayed over low-power FM
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 ...
W280EW () and is available online via
iHeartRadio iHeartRadio (often shortened to just "iHeart") is an American freemium broadcast, podcast and radio streaming Computing platform, platform owned by iHeartMedia. It was founded in August 2008. , iHeartRadio was functioning as the national umbr ...
. WBBD was established in 1941 as WKWK, which aired network programming in the 1940s and 1950s before emerging as 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 " con ...
station in the 1960s and 1970s. Later operating various
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 ...
and adult standards formats, it has broadcast Fox Sports Radio since 2014 after a brief period airing
comedy radio Radio comedy, or comedic radio programming, is a radio broadcast that may involve variety show, sitcom elements, sketches, and various types of comedy found in other media. It may also include more surreal or fantastic elements, as these can be con ...
.


History

On July 10, 1940, Community Broadcasting applied with 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 jurisdiction ...
(FCC) to build a new radio station at 1370 kHz in Wheeling. This application was approved on November 26 of that year, and after being changed to 1400 kHz as part of
NARBA The North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement (NARBA, es, Convenio Regional Norteamericano de Radiodifusión) refers to a series of international treaties that defined technical standards for AM band (mediumwave) radio stations. These agreem ...
reallocation in March 1941, WKWK began broadcasting on May 2 of that year as an affiliate of
CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
. It operated with 100 watts of power, raised to 250 later that year, from studios at the corner of 16th and Market streets. Its owner was Joe L. Smith, Jr., son of Joe L. Smith, a Democratic U.S. representative for the state; its first general manager was John B. Reynolds, who resigned from his post as assistant secretary of the FCC to run the new Wheeling outlet. The station remained with CBS until 1947, when it traded network affiliations with the more powerful WWVA (1170 AM) and became an
ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster ** Disney–ABC Television ...
outlet. The next year, it expanded to the FM band with the launch of
WKWK-FM WKWK-FM is an adult contemporary formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Wheeling, West Virginia, United States, serving the Wheeling/Steubenville area. WKWK is owned and operated by iHeartMedia, Inc. The station carries Murphy, Sam and Jodi ...
97.3 on March 17, 1948; the region's third FM outlet in operation, it initially served as a simulcaster for the AM output. Smith Jr. sold his stake in WKWK-AM-FM in 1951 to Reynolds, who had held 49 percent of the business. The AM transmitter was relocated from its existing site to be co-sited with the FM transmitter on Glenwood Road in 1958. Reynolds died after a long illness on March 22, 1959; he was 62. Reynolds's estate wasted little time in selling the WKWK stations, reaching a deal in August with Lewis W. Dickey, who had been an advertising salesman for WWVA. It was the first station owned by Dickey, the father of later
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 87 ...
president Lew Dickey, who was credited with turning around the new acquisition; also during his tenure as owner, the station increased its power to 1,000 watts. The WKWK stations were sold again in 1965 to WK, Inc., a company owned by the Resources and Facilities Corporation (REFAC)—a company controlled by
Eugene Lang Eugene Michael Lang (March 16, 1919 – April 8, 2017) was an American philanthropist who founded REFAC Technology Development Corporation in 1951. REFAC held patents relating to liquid crystal displays, automated teller machines, credit card ...
—and Victor Oristano, for $575,000. Four years later, the pair were purchased by Publishers Broadcasting Corporation, a subsidiary of the Washington-based Publishers Co., for $649,000. The contract printing and binding concern was making an incursion into broadcasting by buying stations to build what it hoped would be a maximum-size group; prior to acquiring the outlets in Wheeling, it had purchased an AM-FM combo in
Tallahassee, Florida Tallahassee ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Leon County, Florida, Leon County. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In ...
. The company renamed itself Camptown Industries in December 1972; having not bought any additional stations beyond those in Wheeling and Tallahassee, it had instead diversified into owning the
Uline Arena The Uline Arena, later renamed the Washington Coliseum, was an indoor arena in Washington, D.C. located at 1132, 1140, and 1146 3rd Street, Northeast, Washington, D.C. It was the site of one of President Dwight D. Eisenhower's inaugural balls ...
in
Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
, and the namesake Camptown at East Lake Toho in Osceola, Florida. During this time, WKWK was 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 " con ...
outlet, complete with "Good Guys" disc jockeys and a large teenage listening audience. Community Service Broadcasting, owned by the Glassman family of Illinois, acquired the WKWK stations in 1975. It attempted to sell its Wheeling operation to Price Communications Corporation in 1981, but the deal fell apart, and Price ultimately bought WWVA and WCPI (98.7 FM) in late 1982. Meanwhile, the station was shifting to target an older audience. It adopted the
Music of Your Life Music of Your Life is an American syndicated music radio format featuring adult standards music. First created by recording executive Al Ham in 1978, the format achieved popularity in the 1980s among AM radio stations in the United States and C ...
syndicated adult standards format in 1982. Community Service sold all of its stations—including WKWK-AM-FM—in 1986 to CR Broadcasting, a partnership of two men from Virginia and Maryland. WKWK switched to an oldies format the following year. The entire CR portfolio was repurchased by the Glassman family in 1992. Wheeling radio would be hit by successive rounds of change in the late 1990s as deregulation led to rapid industry consolidation. Osborn Communications Corporation acquired the WKWK stations from the Glassmans in February 1996, paying $2.75 million. In April 1996, WKWK, having by this point become a sports talk station, became WBBD after dropping most of its sports programming to return to standards; the WBBD call letters had previously been on 1600 kHz until 1995, when that station became
Radio AAHS Radio AAHS was a radio network managed by the Children's Broadcasting Corporation. Its flagship station was WWTC (1280 AM) in Minneapolis, which broadcast from the former First Federal Bank building at Minnesota State Highway 100 and Excelsior ...
affiliate WOHZ. Three months later, Osborn and its 17 radio stations were purchased by Capstar Broadcasting Partners in a $100 million transaction; by this time, the Wheeling cluster of stations had grown to six. Capstar merged with Chancellor Media, which renamed itself AMFM, Inc., in the summer of 1999, then merged into
Clear Channel Communications iHeartMedia, Inc., formerly CC Media Holdings, Inc., is an American mass media corporation headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It is the holding company of iHeartCommunications, Inc. (formerly Clear Channel Communications, Inc.), a company fou ...
in a deal that closed in 2000. The station's "Real Oldies" format was dropped in 2012, when WBBD became an affiliate of the 24/7
Comedy Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term o ...
Network as part of a 12-station flip of mostly AM stations in various markets. This lasted until June 2014, when the station adopted its current sports format. The comedy format had been a failure in the local ratings, registering a zero share among listeners 12 and up in the fall 2013 Nielsen report.


Taking over for WWVA

On August 4, 2010, a downburst event generating strong winds pushed through the Wheeling area, knocking the three–tower array used by WWVA, located in nearby St. Clairsville, Ohio, to the ground. The station was knocked completely off the air; in the immediate wake of the storm, WBBD was pressed into service to carry all of WWVA's programming. On August 5, 2010, at 10:30 p.m., WWVA began to broadcast from a temporary facility, allowing WBBD to resume its existing programming. Similarly, in 2000, WBBD was used as a temporary substitute for WWVA during tower work.


FM translator

WBBD rebroadcasts its signal to the following low-power FM
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 ...
:


References


External links

* * * {{IHeartMedia BBD Sports radio stations in the United States Radio stations established in 1941 IHeartMedia radio stations 1941 establishments in West Virginia