Strange Doings At WNTN-AM 1550 Newton, MA

[Martin Waters]

       High on the dial there, just below the shortwave bands, maybe you were getting the three-watt daytime skywave signal . . . :)   
     



On Thursday, March 27, 2014 9:08 PM, Laurence Glavin <lglavin@mail.com> wrote:
  
For many years, WNTN-AM-1550 in Newton, MA had been not only a strict daytimer even though they could have
>operated with flea-power (a la WJIB-AM 740 in Cambridge, Ma for example) at night, but in the spring and summer, they
>went off-the-air at 5:00 pm or so when local sunsets were much later. I've observed a few other datimers that stayed on a little
>longer in the evening after wintertime but nonetheless pulled the plug early in June and July, but WNTN just seemed to call it quits at 5:00
>no matter what. Then I read that lately the station has been broadcast with a mighty THREE watts overnight, so I figured that
>as the hours of sunlight increased, they'd keep running at 10,000 watts until local sunset. But no, at exactly 5:00 pm since the
>start of Daylight Saving Time, WNTN seems to start running at its nighttime authorization of THREE watts! What's surprising to
>me is that when I caught them doing that, I was in my automobile on route 93 North just before the Merrimack River in Andover. That means I must
>have one of the most sensitive AM sections on a car radio in the US to be getting an audible THREE-WATT AM station high up
>on the dial from thirty miles away.
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