WTUL
Encyclopedia
- This article is about the radio station. See also the Women's Trade Union LeagueWomen's Trade Union LeagueThe Women's Trade Union League was a U.S. organization of both working class and more well-off women formed in 1903 to support the efforts of women to organize labor unions and to eliminate sweatshop conditions...
.
WTUL is a progressive
Progressive rock (radio format)
Progressive rock is a radio station programming format that prospered in the late 1960s and 1970s, in which the disc jockeys are given wide latitude in what they may play, similar to the freeform format but with the proviso that some kind of rock music is almost always what is played...
/alternative
Alternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...
FM radio
FM broadcasting in the USA
FM broadcasting in the United States began in the 1930s at engineer and inventor Edwin Howard Armstrong's experimental station, W2XMN. The use of FM radio has been associated with higher sound quality in music radio.-History of FM radio in the U.S.:...
outlet in New Orleans, Louisiana
New Orleans, Louisiana
New Orleans is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The New Orleans metropolitan area has a population of 1,235,650 as of 2009, the 46th largest in the USA. The New Orleans – Metairie – Bogalusa combined statistical area has a population...
, operating at 91.5 MHz with an ERP
Effective radiated power
In radio telecommunications, effective radiated power or equivalent radiated power is a standardized theoretical measurement of radio frequency energy using the SI unit watts, and is determined by subtracting system losses and adding system gains...
of 1.5 kW
Kw
kw or KW may refer to:* Kuwait, ISO 3166-1 country code** .kw, the country code top level domain for Kuwait* Kilowatt* Self-ionization of water Kw* Cornish language's ISO 639 code* Kitchener–Waterloo, Ontario, Canada...
.
The station, which is operated by Tulane University
Tulane University
Tulane University is a private, nonsectarian research university located in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States...
, offers a mix of cutting-edge, progressive, alternative, electronica
Electronica
Electronica includes a wide range of contemporary electronic music designed for a wide range of uses, including foreground listening, some forms of dancing, and background music for other activities; however, unlike electronic dance music, it is not specifically made for dancing...
, classical, New Age, straight ahead jazz, folk, blues Latin, world reggae, show tunes, kid's show and an eclectic mix of a variety of genres.
History
WTUL was established on March 14, 1959. It is the station which gave future mayorMayor
In many countries, a Mayor is the highest ranking officer in the municipal government of a town or a large urban city....
-turned TV news anchor-turned talk show host Jerry Springer
Jerry Springer
Gerald Norman "Jerry" Springer is a British-born American television presenter, best known as host of the tabloid talk show The Jerry Springer Show since its debut in 1991...
his start. The yearly "Rock On Survival Marathon" fund raisers featuring live bands on the Tulane campus are a locally famous event. In spite of the low wattage, WTUL was occasionally picked up as far away as New York City in its early years due to the limited number of stations operating on the FM band.
"Mother in Law" singer Ernie K-Doe
Ernie K-Doe
Ernie K-Doe , born Ernest Kador, Jr., was an African American rhythm and blues singer best known for his 1961 hit single "Mother-in-Law" which went to #1 on the Billboard pop chart in the U.S.-Early career:...
was a DJ at WTUL for many years.
WTUL went off the air on August 28, 2005 as Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...
approached the New Orleans area. The Tulane campus
Campus
A campus is traditionally the land on which a college or university and related institutional buildings are situated. Usually a campus includes libraries, lecture halls, residence halls and park-like settings...
building which housed the station (itself a temporary location due to the renovation of the University Center) was damaged by the resulting flood waters. On December 15, 2005 the station began broadcasting again, using donated studio space on the mezzanine of the Rue de la Course coffeehouse
Coffeehouse
A coffeehouse or coffee shop is an establishment which primarily serves prepared coffee or other hot beverages. It shares some of the characteristics of a bar, and some of the characteristics of a restaurant, but it is different from a cafeteria. As the name suggests, coffeehouses focus on...
in the Carrollton neighborhood
Carrollton, Louisiana
Carrollton is a neighborhood of uptown New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, which includes the Carrollton Historic District. It is the part of Uptown New Orleans farthest up river from the French Quarter...
of Uptown New Orleans
Uptown New Orleans
Uptown is a section of New Orleans, Louisiana on the East Bank of the Mississippi River encompassing a number of neighborhoods between the French Quarter and the Jefferson Parish line. It remains an area of mixed residential and small commercial properties, with a wealth of 19th century architecture...
, about 10 blocks from the Tulane campus. The station kept its Internet broadcast running via donated bandwidth from CCRMA at Stanford University. The station resumed a limited broadcast until it moved to Uptown Square on the corner of Broadway Street and Leake Avenue. It is now broadcasting on a normal 24 hour schedule from a new studio in the basement of the Lavin-Bernick Center for University Life on the Tulane campus. WTUL is volunteer-run, accepting DJs from across the Tulane and New Orleans community.
WTUL releases an edition of its compilation CD "Songs from the Basement" featuring local, national and international artists to coincide with its annual Marathon, WTUL's main fundraiser.