Technical Profile: WNSP

FM Technical Profile: WNSP

Station Name:: Sports Talk 105.5
Frequency:: 105.5
Format:: Sports talk
Transmitter Location:: [map] [bird's eye] Just south of the intersection of Baldwin Co. 138 & Alabama 225 near the Crossroads community.
Power (ERP):: 5.3 kW.
Antenna:: Omnidirectional
Antenna HAAT:: 348 feet
Other Information:: 60 dBu protected contour map, from the FCC.; Mono; :; (inactive 08-2022)
PS-[name of show] on WNSP
Time-[?]
Text-Online at wnsp.com
PTY-Sports
PI-WNSP-FM
More Information:: [FCC]; [FCCdata]; [Radio-Locator]; [Wikipedia]
[Facebook]; [Twitter]
[Picture] Image from an Insignia HD portable showing the RDS PI (call sign) and Radio Text fields.
[Picture] Image from a Radio Shack DX-398 portable showing the RDS PS (station name) field.
[Audio] "'The Community Round Table & 251 Now with Kelley Finley' — Behind the Scenes with Tim Camp" Podcast version of the show features an interview with the owner of .COM+ and The Sound of Mobile. 54:18 (Google Podcasts)
Owner:: .COM+ LLC
History:: WBCA AM owners Faulkner Radio (Jimmy Faulkner, whose name adorns a state University), was granted a new construction permit for an FM station in Bay Minette in 1964. When the station signed on late in October 1964, it was on 105.5 MHz, with 3 kW ERP into a Gates FMA-4A four bay antenna, with a Gates FM-1C transmitter. The transmitter was originally going to be at 114 W 2nd Street in Bay Minette, but that was moved to the WBCA AM tower on White Avenue before signing on. The call sign was WBCA-FM.

A few years after debuting, the station was doing Easy Listening as WWSM (Wonderful World of Stereo Music).

In 1973, the station license was to be transferred to Brown Broadcasting, Limited, but the deal fell through and it was never consummated. By 1975, the station had flipped to an Urban Adult Contemporary/Soul format, with the call letters now conveniently standing for "Wonderful World of Soul Music". The Class A signal was limited to the Bay Minette area, so it struggled financially. Before the end of the decade, it was listed as doing Top 40.

By the early 80's, the station was trying Country music. In 1987, WLPR FM 96.1 MHz dropped its Beautiful Music format, so this station took that music and the WLPR calls. In 1988, in order to try and improve coverage of the larger Mobile market, the station received a construction permit to relocate to the tower site it uses today. It signed on from that new facility that same year. The station changed formats again in 1989, to Urban Contemporary as WMMV, FM companion to WMML AM.

In March 1992, the station flipped to Christian Rock as New Life 105, with the WYMZ calls. The format was a failure, and appears to have gone dark for a time. In October 1992, the chief engineer Tim Camp at WABB AM entered into a LMA with Faulkner Radio to carry WABB's News/Talk format on FM. The stations were the first in Alabama to carry the newly syndicated Don & Mike Show out of Washington DC; it would later go on to have quite a following in Mobile.

In August 1993, the calls changed to WNSP (for News and Sports) and became the first Sports Talk station on FM in the United States, with ESPN Radio programming.

+COM+, LLC (Kenneth S. Johnson and Tim Camp) acquired the station in 1998 for $1.05 million.

In May 2011 it was announced the station was dropping ESPN due to high fees required in a new contract. The new feed will come from Sporting News Radio. SNR changed branding to Yahoo Sports Radio on 1 August 2011. In 2013 the station dropped Yahoo for Fox Sports. The station would later be the debut outlet for Paul Finebaum's radio show in Mobile.