WOI (640 AM) – branded ''Iowa Public Radio'' – is a

non-commercial educational A non-commercial educational station (NCE station) is a radio station or television station that does not accept on-air advertisements (TV ads or radio ads), as defined in the United States by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and was or ...

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 serve

Ames Ames may refer to: Places United States * Ames, Arkansas, a place in Arkansas * Ames, Colorado * Ames, Illinois * Ames, Indiana * Ames, Iowa, the most populous city bearing this name * Ames, Kansas * Ames, Nebraska * Ames, New York * Ames, Ok ...

Iowa Iowa () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States, bordered by the Mississippi River to the east and the Missouri River and Big Sioux River to the west. It is bordered by six states: Wisconsin to the northeast, Illinois to the ...

. Owned by

Iowa State University Iowa State University of Science and Technology (Iowa State University, Iowa State, or ISU) is a public land-grant research university in Ames, Iowa. Founded in 1858 as the Iowa Agricultural College and Model Farm, Iowa State became one of the n ...

, the station covers the

Des Moines metropolitan area The Des Moines metropolitan area, officially known as the Des Moines–West Des Moines, IA Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) is located at the confluence of the Des Moines River and the Raccoon River. Des Moines serves as the capital of the U.S ...

. Broadcasting a mix of

public radio Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...

and

talk radio Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often featur ...

, WOI is the flagship station for

Iowa Public Radio Iowa Public Radio is a state network in the U.S. state of Iowa that combines the operations of the National Public Radio member stations run by Iowa State University, the University of Iowa, and University of Northern Iowa. They broadcast programs ...

's News Network and the market member station for

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 ...

Public Radio International Public Radio International (PRI) was an American public radio organization. Headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, PRI provided programming to over 850 public radio stations in the United States. PRI was one of the main providers of programm ...

, and the

BBC World Service The BBC World Service is an international broadcasting, international broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC, with funding from the Government of the United Kingdom, British Government through the Foreign Secretary, Foreign Secretary's o ...

. The WOI studios are located at Iowa State University's Communications Building, while the station transmitter resides southwest of Ames. Besides a standard analog AM transmission, WOI is relayed over low-power Ames 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 ...

K234CN (104.7 FM) and is available online. Historically, WOI is one of the oldest radio stations in the United States, and one of the oldest surviving stations in North America, having begun experimental transmissions in 1911.

History

The history of WOI can be traced back to 1911 when physics professor "Dad" Hoffman set a transmission line between the Campus Water Tower and the Engineering Building and set up a wireless

telegraph Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas p ...

station. By 1913 this was known as experimental station 9YI and it was sending and receiving weather reports by

Morse code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of ...

on a regular basis. The first sound broadcast was an hour of concert music on November 21, 1921. The Commerce Department issued a full radio license for station WOI in April 1922 and the first regular broadcast took place on April 28, 1922. The original call sign 9YI is now W0YI and is retained by the ISU Campus Radio Club, with the

amateur radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emergency communic ...

station in the Electrical Engineering building. WOI may be the oldest fully licensed noncommercial station west of the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...

. Another university radio station in Iowa,

WSUI WSUI (910 AM) is a public radio station in Iowa City, Iowa. It is operated by the University of Iowa and is a member of Iowa Public Radio's news network. Its signal serves most of eastern Iowa. WSUI is one of two National Public Radio membe ...

at the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is org ...

Iowa City Iowa City, offically the City of Iowa City is a city in Johnson County, Iowa, United States. It is the home of the University of Iowa and county seat of Johnson County, at the center of the Iowa City Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the time ...

, also began telegraph transmissions in 1911 and also has claims to being the earliest educational station west of the Mississippi. Other Midwestern universities also started experimental stations in the 1910s: the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

KUOM KUOM (770 AM) – branded ''Radio K'' – is a daytime-only non-commercial educational college/alternative rock radio station licensed to serve Minneapolis, Minnesota. KUOM covers the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area, and extends its ...

and St. Louis University's

WEW WEW (770 AM) is a radio station licensed to serve St. Louis, Missouri. Owned by Birach Broadcasting Corporation, the station features a brokered ethnic format, except for a midday show which features a mix of easy listening, adult standar ...

in 1912 and the

University of Wisconsin A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

's WHA in 1915. The first regular programming on WOI was farm market reports gathered by ticker tape and Morse code, broadcast throughout the state. Another early staple was sporting events by Iowa State's athletic teams. In 1925, "The Music Shop" aired for the first time. One of the longest-running programs in the history of radio, it moved to

WOI-FM WOI-FM (90.1 FM) is a radio station licensed to Ames, Iowa, serving the greater Ames/Des Moines area. The station is owned by Iowa State University. WOI-FM is an affiliate of Iowa Public Radio, and carries IPR's "News and Studio One" service—a ...

in the 1970s before going off the air in 2006. In 1927. another longtime favorite, "The Book Club" was added; it also aired until 2006. On December 1, 1949, Iowa State launched an FM adjunct to WOI, WOI-FM at 90.1 MHz.

WOI-TV WOI-DT (channel 5) is a television station licensed to Ames, Iowa, United States, serving the Des Moines area as an affiliate of ABC. It is owned by Tegna Inc. alongside CW affiliate KCWI-TV (channel 23), also licensed to Ames. Both stations sh ...

was subsequently launched in 1950 as the first television station in central Iowa. It was also the first commercial TV station in the country owned by an educational institution. It was affiliated with all four networks of its time before it became solely 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 ...

affiliate in 1955. WOI-TV was sold by the

Iowa Board of Regents The Board of Regents, State of Iowa (commonly referred to as the Iowa Board of Regents) is the 9-member governing body overseeing the three public universities in the state of Iowa: the University of Iowa, Iowa State University, and the University ...

on March 1, 1994; the station is now owned by

TEGNA Tegna Inc. (stylized in all caps as TEGNA) is an American publicly traded broadcast, digital media and marketing services company headquartered in Tysons Corner, Virginia. It was created on June 29, 2015, when the Gannett Company split into t ...

. WOI-AM-FM became a charter member of National Public Radio when it began its regular schedule of afternoon news program ''

All Things Considered ''All Things Considered'' (''ATC'') is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio (NPR). It was the first news program on NPR, premiering on May 3, 1971. It is broadcast live on NPR affiliated stations in the United ...

'' in 1971. Today WOI's programming consists of both

and locally produced talk shows along with local news and

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

news updates. The

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 ...

of the early years migrated exclusively to WOI-FM in the 1960s. When the radio services of Iowa's state universities were merged into

in 2004, WOI became the flagship of IPR's Operations and IT services. Due to its location near the bottom of the AM dial and Iowa's mostly flat landscape (with near-perfect

ground conductivity Ground conductivity refers to the electrical conductivity of the subsurface of the earth. In the International System of Units (SI) it is measured in millisiemens per meter (mS/m). Radio propagation Ground conductivity is an extremely importan ...

), WOI's non-directional 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 Wa ...

daytime signal reaches most of the state of Iowa, similar to 50,000 watt

WHO Who or WHO may refer to: * Who (pronoun), an interrogative or relative pronoun * Who?, one of the Five Ws in journalism * World Health Organization Arts and entertainment Fictional characters * Who, a creature in the Dr. Seuss book '' Horton He ...

. With a good radio, WOI can also be heard in parts of

Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...

Minnesota Minnesota () is a state in the upper midwestern region of the United States. It is the 12th largest U.S. state in area and the 22nd most populous, with over 5.75 million residents. Minnesota is home to western prairies, now given over to ...

Nebraska Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the southwe ...

and

South Dakota South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...

. A single tower is used during the day. At night, because of the nighttime

propagation Propagation can refer to: * Chain propagation in a chemical reaction mechanism *Crack propagation, the growth of a crack during the fracture of materials * Propaganda, non-objective information used to further an agenda * Reproduction, and other fo ...

the signal is reduced to 1,000 watts at night and two towers are used in a

phased array In antenna theory, a phased array usually means an electronically scanned array, a computer-controlled array of antennas which creates a beam of radio waves that can be electronically steered to point in different directions without moving th ...

configuration to protect

KFI KFI (640 AM broadcasting, AM) is a radio station in Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, owned and operated by iHeartMedia, Inc. It began operations in 1922 and became one of the first high-powered, clear-channel station, clear-channel List of ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

, concentrating the signal eastward around Des Moines, Waterloo and

Cedar Rapids Cedar Rapids () is the second-largest city in Iowa, United States and is the county seat of Linn County. The city lies on both banks of the Cedar River, north of Iowa City and northeast of Des Moines, the state's capital and largest city. ...

References

External links

*
Iowa Public Radio – IPR News

Spark to Voice
- History of 9YI and early WOI {{Authority control µ Radio stations established in 1922 NPR member stations 1922 establishments in Iowa Radio stations licensed before 1923 and still broadcasting