Technical Profile: WJRD

AM Technical Profile: WJRD

Frequency:: 1150
Format:: Oldies
Transmitter Location:: [map] [bird's eye] [street view] Northwest of Northport, west of US-43 on CR-86 (Flatwoods Road).
Power (ERP):: Day: 20 kW; Night: 1,000 watts
Antenna:: Day: 1 tower; Night: 3 towers [pattern - PDF]
Other Information:: 0.5 mV/m Daytime Groundwave Service Contour from the FCC's Public Files

[FCC]
[FCCdata.org]
[FCCInfo]; [Radio-Locator]; [Wikipedia]

[Facebook]; // W271AM Tuscaloosa, AL
// W276DP Tuscaloosa, AL

Owned by JRD, Inc.
Pictures:: [tower] closeup of one of the towers at dusk; [towers] wide view of the station towers at dusk
History:: WJRD was Tuscaloosa's first radio station. James R. Doss, Jr. applied for a new facility on 1420 kHz in July 1935. In that original application both the station (operating with 100 watts daytime only) and studios were to be located at 2206½ 6th Street in downtown Tuscaloosa. One month after filing, however, Doss amended the application to move to 1200 kHz and switch the transmitter to a location specified only as "…to Greensboro Road, opposite Jug Factory Road" and move the studios to the basement of the First National Bank building at the corner of Greensboro Road and University Avenue in downtown Tuscaloosa. The amended application was granted in early October 1936. The license to cover for that facility was granted in November 1936. In 1937, the station applied to boost power to 250 watts. That was put on the air in the fall of 1937. In December of that year the station made a first attempt at moving to another frequency to attain 24 hour broadcasting. They applied to move to 1140 kHz with 5 kW but that application was denied. Instead, they were able to change to full time operation on 1200 kHz by operating with 250 watts days and 100 watts at night, in a grant given out in January 1940. Just a few months later they applied and were granted another change in power to 250 watts day and night.

(Aside #1: If the Doss name seems familiar, it's because Doss' brother James L. Doss put on WJLD AM in Birmingham.)

In April 1947 the station was granted a permit to change to 1150 kHz, with a significant boost in power to 5 kW days and 1 kW nights with a nighttime directional array. This major change also came with a new transmitter (Raytheon RA-5) and a new transmitter location. In the application, it was specified as "Off Crabbe Road, North Port, Alabama." (Aside #2: It's unclear where exactly this is located, but it's possible it's the site that's in use today.) The station filed multiple other technical changes, including substituting a Gates 5-A transmitter for the previous Raytheon, before a license to cover was filed in March 1948.

After the passing of James Doss in 1949, the license passed to Wilhelmina Q. Doss (Echols).

In the 50's and into the early 60's it appears the station was a mix of News and Easy Listening programming. The 1957 Radio Annual listed it as an NBC affiliate. Top 40 music came later; MOR (Middle-of-the-Road) and news ruled the day, while the Top 40 played at night. Sundays were all classical as the owner was a fan of that format.

In 1962, the license was transferred to Cooper Radio (John C. Cooper, Jr.) By 1975, the license was shown as being involuntarily transferred to Tidmore & Harrison, Receiver. That same year there appears to have been multiple petitions to deny the station's license renewal for unspecified reasons. In 1976, the license was voluntarily assigned to GMC Broadcasting, Incorporated. By this point, the station was being listed as a Country music station.

By the 1980's the station was known to be broadcasting in stereo with the Motorola C-QUAM system. (Aside #3: The station's logo was a strange one at this time, with the J in the WJRD call sign being a cowboy boot pointed upward. I had this logo on a car tag! — Zach) In 1987, the station picked up the WZBQ call sign which had previously been on 102.5 licensed to Jasper.

In June 1992 the call letters changed to WSPZ and the station flipped to a Sports Talk format. That lasted until about 1997, when Birmingham Christian Radio (as Willis Broadcasting) acquired the station along with WRAG in Carrollton for $130,000 and flipped the format to Black Gospel. The station went silent for a while prior to 2003, when the station came back on the air with the "Timeless Classics" Standards music format after being bought by Radio South, Inc. for $150,000.

The original WJRD calls came back in October 2004. In July 2005, the station was acquired (along with several other Tuscaloosa-area stations) by Citaldel Broadcasting. Under their ownership, they began simulcasting this station with a new move-in from the Jasper known as WFFN-FM. That station, once it moved to Tuscaloosa (being licensed to Coaling) flipped to County as "95.3 The Bear", putting this station back in the Country business after 13 years.

On February 6, 2006, the station flipped to "1150, The People's Station" with a mix of black-oriented Talk programs. It was reported in trade publications that Citadel sold this station in September of 2007. At the end of September the station returned to the "Timeless Classics" Nostalgia/Standards format. That format lasted just over a year as they flipped in the fall of 2008 to Oldies with the Scott Shannon's satellite-fed True Oldies Channel. That network was killed off in the summer of 2014; WJRD replaced it with Westwood One's "Good Times Oldies" format on 30 June 2014. Shannon's True Oldies Channel was revived late in 2015 and is now back on this station again.

The station won another construction permit for a new FM translator on 103.1 MHz north of town in May 2018. In September 2019, the station received a permit for the other translator, on 102.1 MHz, to relocate from the Jug Factory Road tower to one in Holt, co-located with WMHZ and other stations.