Technical Profile: WWTM

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Frequency:

1400
1390 (CP)

Format:

Religious Teaching

Transmitter Location:

[map] [street view] Off Finley Drive NW, near the railroad tracks.
[map] East of Segers Road, north of Old Highway 20 and south of the railroad tracks, in Madison County. (CP)

Power (ERP):

1 kW
350 watts (CP)

Antenna:

1 tower

Other Information:

0.5 mV/m Daytime Groundwave Service Contour from the FCC's Public Files

[FCC]
[FCCdata.org]

[Radio-Locator]

[Wikipedia]

[Studio] Google Street View of the studios on Danville Road SW in Decatur, behind a convenience store.

[Picture] The sign for WMSL, in front of the studios, from the late 80's during the last attempt at Top 40 music. 77 kb.
[Picture] The studios at 718 Bank Street, which was the former Alabama Theater dating back to the 20's. 81 kb.
[Picture] The DJ's booth, which was built right on the theater's stage. At the time the station had a Harris 8-pot board and ran two turntables, a three slot cart and a reel-to-reel Otari deck.  Off to one side were transmitter controls, a patch panel and a collection of 45's. 91 kb.
[Picture] Another view inside the DJ booth, with one of the turntables and a collection of carts.  78 kb.
[Picture] The view of the DJ booth from the theater.  While on air the host was performing in front of hundreds of empty seats. 62 kb.
[Picture] The view from the front door; a false floor was built in the concessions and lobby areas and offices were constructed. 61 kb.

// W232DL Decatur, AL (CP)
// W247AT Huntsville, AL (CP)

Owned by Brantley Broadcast Associates

History:

This station came on the air in 1935 with 250 watts at 1400 kHz as WMSL by the Tennessee Valley Broadcasting Company.  The calls stood for the true owner, Mutual State Life Insurance. The station later spawned WMSL-FM in 1950 (later WVNN-FM) and WMSL-TV (now WAFF). 

New Decatur Radio bought the station in September 1971.  It's unknown what the format of the station was early on, but by the mid-70's it was Top 40, and had increased power to 1 kW during the day. 

The station stuck with contemporary pop music until the early 80's, when FM finally became dominant.  The station flipped around '81-'82 to a Middle of the Road (MOR) music format, but it only lasted a few years before they gave Top 40/CHR another go.  According to the NAB, in 1985 the station was broadcasting in stereo using the Harris system.  The stab at pop music failed, and in 1986 the station was sold to R&B Communications for $228,000.  They changed the calls to WAVD and flipped the format to Contemporary Christian music.

Through the 90's, R&B tried their hand at Adult Contemporary, then Oldies, then towards the end of the decade Talk and Sports.  The calls changed to WWTM in June 2001.  The station went all-sports with ESPN network programming in 2003 and upgraded to 1 kW day and night around this time.

The station failed to renew their license in 2004, and the FCC deleted the license in March 2005.  The station came back with a series of Special Temporary Authorities to stay online through 2007, when the license was finally re-instated.

In January 2018, the station received a permit to construct a new FM translator on 94.3 MHz in Decatur.  It signed on in the fall of 2018 as W232DL, however it appears a license to cover for the translator wasn't granted until March of 2020.

The station received a construction permit in May 2018 to relocate to 1390 kHz, with just 270 watts of power, days only.  A month later, the station was sold by R&B Communications to Brantley Broadcast Associates for $117,000.  In July, Cameron Reynolds bought translator W247AT and its Construction Permit to move to Huntsville, for $50,000, and changed the parent station to WWTM.  That same month, he also bought translator W243AP Mooresville, which also had a permit to move to Huntsville, and changed its parent station from WJAB-HD2 to WWTM as well. That translator's license was cancelled by the FCC in December 2018 when it was discovered that it had been off the air for more than 12 consecutive months.

In May 2020, the construction permit was modified to change to full time operation with 310 watts, but that modification was cancelled in May 2021.  The permit was cancelled due to a number of circumstances, most of which revolved around trying to find a suitable transmitter site in a rapidly growing part of Madison County, and within a narrow slice of land where channel spacing requirements to other existing AM stations could be met.  Brantley concurrently filed a new permit with a new location just north of the old one, and it was approved in October 2021.  The station was reported off the air for at least a month prior to this grant.

In November 2021 it was also reported that the FM translator was silent.

The station filed a Resume Operations notice for the 1400 kHz licensed facility in July 2022, and was reported on air with Religious Teaching on both 1400 kHz and the 94.3 MHz translator.

In July 2023 it appears a modified construction permit was granted, moving the transmitter site to near the intersection of Seger Road and Old Highway 20 just west of Madison and northwest of the Huntsville Airport. This permit will bump power up to 350 watts but it will remain a daytime-only operation. That permit appears to have run into some sort of issues at the FCC and was rescinded or deleted from the system; it was reapplied for in late September 2024.

The Decatur-based translator filed for a modification in late February 2024 to move off the communications tower located in downtown Decatur to the WWTM tower off Finley Drive NW, just a few blocks west of the prior location.  That application was granted in mid-March 2024.  Of note is that the WWTM tower already has a 2-bay FM antenna attached, but it is for W234DN, licensed to Athens and repeating WIEZ in Decatur.