KOSJ (1490 AM) is a commercial

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting 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 rad ...

that is

licensed A license (American English) or licence (Commonwealth English) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another part ...

Santa Barbara, California Santa Barbara (, meaning ) is a coastal city in Santa Barbara County, California, of which it is also the county seat. Situated on a south-facing section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States excepting A ...

and serves the Santa Barbara area. The station is owned by

Rincon Broadcasting Point Broadcasting LLC is an American radio broadcasting company based in Ventura, California. The company is the owner of several radio groups in Southern California, doing business as Gold Coast Broadcasting LLC in the Oxnard—Ventura radio mar ...

and broadcasts a

rhythmic oldies Rhythmic oldies is a radio format that concentrates on the rhythmic, R&B, disco, or dance genres of music. The playlists spans from the 1960s through the 2000s. They depend on market conditions and may be designed for African-American or Hispani ...

music format branded "Old School 94.1 and 1490 AM". KOSJ is rebroadcast on FM

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''trans ...

K231CR in Santa Barbara on 94.1

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base u ...

History

Early years

The station launched on the 720

kHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base uni ...

frequency as KFCR in April 1926; it moved to 1420 kHz the following year. KFCR was purchased in 1929 by George Barnes, owner of

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

San Diego San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...

. Barnes changed the

call letters 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 Identifier, unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be fo ...

to KDB in tribute to his wife, Dorothy Barnes, and moved the station to 1500 kHz. In October of that year, KDB's license was canceled for failure to comply with regulations from the

Federal Radio Commission The Federal Radio Commission (FRC) was a government agency that regulated United States radio communication from its creation in 1927 until 1934, when it was succeeded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FRC was established by ...

(forerunner to the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...

or FCC). At issue were broadcasts featuring The Crusaders, an organization that promoted the repeal of

Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic b ...

. The station's management fought vigorously to get the license back, and KDB returned to the air by the end of the year. Over the next couple of decades, KDB was bought and sold several times. In 1931, it became part of the

Don Lee Network The Don Lee Network, sometimes called the Don Lee Broadcasting System, was an American regional network of radio stations in the old-time radio era. Origin Don Lee made a fortune as the exclusive West Coast distributor of Cadillac automobiles. ...

by virtue of being sold to Lee under the corporate name Santa Barbara Broadcasters. KDB relocated to the 1490 kHz frequency in 1941. In 1969, Len Menard, doing business as KDB Broadcasting Company, attempted to sell KDB and its FM counterpart to music publisher Hugh Heller in two separate transactions. The AM outlet was slated to sell for $500,000 on April 30, while KDB-FM was to yield $100,000 in a deal reached August 5. However, the FCC did not approve the transfer of either license to Heller. On November 27, 1970, Menard sold KDB-AM-FM to Pacific Broadcasting Company, owned by Richard E. Marsh, for $400,000; this deal was approved by the FCC. On September 1, 1990, KDB changed its call letters to KSPE. Two months later, in a reorganization effort, Pacific Broadcasting sold KSPE to Spectacular Broadcasting for $302,000. Around the same time, the station began airing a

regional Mexican Regional Mexican music refers collectively to the regional subgenres of the country music of Mexico and its derivatives from the Southwestern United States. Each subgenre is representative of a certain region and its popularity also varies by ...

music format. The station's call sign changed once again on January 20, 1997 to KBKO to reflect its new branding, "Radio Bronco"; the format remained the same. In October 1998, Spectacular sold KBKO and its sister station, then known as KSPE-FM, to

Jacor Communications Jacor Communications was a media corporation, existing between 1987 and 1999, which owned many radio stations in the United States. In 1998, Jacor was purchased by Clear Channel Communications, now iHeartMedia, for $2.8 billion. Jacor Communicat ...

for $4.6 million; Jacor merged with

Clear Channel Communications iHeartMedia, Inc., or 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 founded by ...

the following year.

Rincon era (2007–present)

On January 11, 2007, Clear Channel Communications sold all of its radio stations in Santa Barbara, including KBKO, to

for $17.3 million. Rincon switched KBKO's format from regional Mexican to

progressive talk Progressive talk radio is a talk radio format devoted to expressing left-leaning viewpoints of news and issues as opposed to conservative talk radio. In the United States, the format has included syndicated and independent personalities such as ...

. On October 28, 2008, KBKO changed its call sign to KIST. On July 19, 2010, KIST adopted the call letters KSPE, a change that preceded a flip on September 15 to a

Spanish-language Spanish () or Castilian () is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin spoken on the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. Today, it is a world language, gl ...

adult hits format with the branding "La Preciosa". In July 2017, KSPE adjusted its format to Spanish

adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

and adopted the branding "La Musical". On September 14, 2017, La Musical moved to KFYZ (94.5 FM); KSPE stunted with a looped announcement in Spanish notifying listeners to tune in at the new frequency. The next day, the stunt ended and KSPE introduced a

format with new callsign KOSJ. In December 2021, KOSJ's 198-foot red-and-white transmitting tower, which it shares with KCLU and KZSB, and had long been slightly bent, was shortened to 128 feet and topped with four 12-foot "whiskers" in a horizontal X shape, to give the tower extra electrical length. The tower, which is owned by Rincon Broadcasting, was also painted dark green to better blend with its surroundings. Changes in the radiation properties of the shortened tower required a reduction in night power from 1000 to 940 watts.

References

External links

*
FCC History Cards for KOSJ
* * {{Santa Barbara Radio OSJ Radio stations established in 1926 1926 establishments in California Rhythmic oldies radio stations in the United States