Technical Profile: WJSR

FM Technical Profile: WJSR

Station Name:: 91.1 The Edge
Frequency:: 91.1
Format:: Rock
Transmitter Location:: [map] [bird's eye] Jefferson State Community College, Pinson Campus.
Power (ERP):: 230 watts.
Antenna:: Directional
Antenna HAAT:: 194 feet.
Other Information:: 60 dBu protected contour map, from the FCC.
How's the Signal?: Signal is strongest right near the campus. Signal weakens quickly going towards Center Point and Tarrant, but is much better over Pinson. Dies out before Blount county line.
More Information:: [FCC]; [FCCData]; [Radio-Locator]; [Wikipedia]
Owner:: Jefferson State Community College.
Noted Personalities:: DJs are rotated regularly since this is a college station.
History:: Went on the air in 1979 as a class D station with 10 watts. In 1985 saw an upgrade to 120 watts, with a directional antenna pointing north, away from the Samford University station WVSU, which is also on this frequency. The station upgraded sometime after the mid-90's (when I was there!) to the current 230 watts, with a directional antenna pointing towards Gardendale. The station ran only when students were available, typically from 9 am to 6 pm each weekday. During my short stint there, the music was played off four reel-to-reel tape machines, hooked to a junction box with four buttons. Press one button, player one plays one song. Press the second button, the second plays one song, and so on. The clock, designed to drill into prospective disc jockeys the mind numbing repetition of the job, consisted of playing one song and three or four PSAs, then back to one song. Rinse, repeat. Most PSAs were generic national radio ads, but at times one could hear student-produced ads. (If this sounds incredibly boring, I suspect that was the point. Not that any real radio stations of the mid-90s era played music from tape or that any station ever had such an odd clock. No one excepted the broadcasting professors listened, as I found out one night when I dared to play two songs in a row and talk up a song. I may have nailed the post like a wannabe pro, but I still got a phone call chastising me. ~ Zach)

At some point in the early to mid-2000s, the station upgraded to 1980's technology: CD players. With the new equipment came a new, more contemporary rock and alternative format as "91.1 The Edge".

Jefferson State discontinued the radio broadcasting program and shut down the station, most likely in the spring of 2014. The license was turned in and FCC record deleted in July 2014. The deletion of WJSR allowed co-channel WVSU further south in the Birmingham metro to drop their directional antenna a few months later.