Re: WDIA/730 & 1070 kHz (Was Re: "all-girl" radio)

[mwaters@mail.wesleyan.edu (Martin J. Waters)]

>Dan Strassberg wrote:
>My reference to unprecedented was to an AM station going
>all at once from 250W-D to 50 kW-U (well, it was only 5
>kW at night). I don't think that any station had gone
>from the puniest facilities then authorized (I guess a
>few 100W stations still existed back then, but they were
>full-timers or share-timers) to (almost) the most
>powerful.
<snip>

        Especially then, I agree that it was highly unusual. In more recent
times, with the breaking down of the clear channels, I think you might find
some examples that are generally similar. For example, if you consider
WNNW, 640 kHz, Westfield, Mass., 50 kW day, 1 kW night, a change of
frequency of the old WDEW, 1 kw day, 1570 kHz, that's a pretty drastic
increase in facilities. I think in the Westfield case that, technically, to
meet the FCC requirement that those stations be "new" stations, the
application may have been for a new station and the WDEW license was later
turned in. But to me that's a technicality. It was the same licensee.
        If you looked around through the roster of stations like WNNW that
were authorized on the former I-A channels you might find some 500w
daytimer type stations that suddenly became big signals either on the same
channel or through a change of frequency. I just glanced through the 1997
NRC AM Radio Log and I see WVCH, Chester, PA., 740 kHz, 1 kW day, 6 watts
night, with a CP for 50 kW day, 450 watts night.