Silent Station History: WPRN

AM History Profile: WPRN

History:: This station started out in 1959 on 1240 kHz with 1 kW fulltime, by Radio Butler, Inc. The format in the early days isn't known, but by the late 70's they primarily played country music but also set aside time for other formats, a typical setup of small town stations of the era. By the mid 80's, the station received permission to move to 1330 kHz so they could increase power to 5 kW. The trade-off was that they had to become a daytime only station. Towards the end of this facility's life, it was carrying the "Real Country" satellite music format. Butler Broadcasting Corporation turned in the license for this station in 2003 after they built WPRN-FM and moved the format there.; While this station's history is limited, it did manage to spawn two different FM stations in Choctaw County. The first came along in 1978, when WQGL-FM debuted on 93.5 MHz as a class A (3 kW) facility with a Top 40 music format. In the mid-90's the lure of the money from the nearby Meridian, Mississippi market was too tempting and the station got a permit to move out of Butler and began playing towards the 'big city'. As of March 2016, the venture had failed and the station was sold to Educational Media Foundation, who runs it with their non-commercial "K-Love" Christian Contemporary format, still targeting Meridian. The second station did not get off the ground until 1997, when Butler Broadcasting won a permit to start WPRN-FM on 107.7 MHz, a class A (6 kW) licensed to Lisman. The station did not actually get on the air until 2003, but when it did it took the country music format from the AM, which is why the company turned in the license for this station.