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 (CP)
Pictures:: [tower] closeup of one of the towers at dusk; [towers] wide view of the station towers at dusk
History:: Appearing at least as far back as 1936, 1150 was WJRD (for James R. Doss, jr), news and easy listening in the 50's and early 60's. The 1957 Radio Annual lists it as an NBC affiate under the ownership of Wilhelmina Echols. Top 40 was added later; MOR and news ruled the day, top 40 nights. Sundays were all classical as the owner was a classical music fan. In the 80's the broadcast in stereo (Motorola) as a country station with an odd logo: it was a strange looking boot pointed upward made out of the J. ("I remember this logo and used to have a car-tag with that logo on it!" -Zach) Went to a sports talk format in the 90's. Details are sketchy of when exactly the station switched to a black gospel format, but it was between 2000-2002. Afterwards the station went silent for a while, but has come back on the air in June 2003 with the Timeless Classics standards music format.; Doss' brother James L. Doss put WJLD-AM on the air in Birmingham.; .; Again, details are sketchy but at some point in 2003-2004 the station switched back to the historic WJRD calls. In June 2005 the station began simulcasting with WFFN-FM, a station relicensed from Cordova (near Jasper) to Coaling (near Tuscaloosa).; .; On Feburary 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.