WXTK
Encyclopedia
WXTK known as "95 WXTK Newsradio", is a news
/talk
radio station
licensed to West Yarmouth, Massachusetts
, and headquartered in Hyannis, Massachusetts
. It is the direct descendant of Cape Cod
's first commercial radio station, WOCB.
WOCB first signed on as an AM
station in 1941 as an affiliate of the NBC
Blue Network, broadcasting mostly network programming (soap operas, radio drama, newscasts, etc.) with some local programming, remaining affiliated with that network after it became ABC
. When ABC broke into four sub-networks in 1968, WOCB AM and FM became affiliated with ABC's American Information Network.
Its FM signal, for years a simulcast of its AM signal, signed on in 1949 on Channel 232/94.3Mc. (becoming the Cape's first FM commercial station as well), and after numerous FCC allocation changes for the FM band, eventually settled on 94.9 Megahertz.
By the 1970s, WOCB-FM broke away from simulcasting the AM during midday and evening hours to broadcast easy-listening music while still simulcasting the AM's format (then adult contemporary with a heavy news commitment) during weekday drive times and hourly newscasts the rest of the broadcast day.
Interesting note: In the summer through winter of 1981, the afternoon drive announcer on WOCB was Edd Hall. He later did voice work for "Late Night with David Letterman" from 1982 - 1990 and was, of course, Jay Leno's announcer on "the Tonight Show with Jay Leno" from 1992 - 2004.
In 1991, Hurricane Bob
blew down WOCB's transmitter tower, and the damage suffered was so severe that they could not afford to rebuild. The station was then sold to Ernie Boch, Sr., an automobile dealer in the Boston suburb of Norwood, Massachusetts, who turned WOCB-FM into the flagship station for his new Boch Broadcasting company. WXTK's first news director, Hal Lamb, applied to the FCC to change the station's calls to WXTK, or "X-Talk," a reference to the rarity of Newstalk radio on the FM dial at the time. WOCB-AM was donated to Boston University, which used it to relay WBUR
-FM in Boston, changing call letters to WBUR (AM).
When WXTK returned to the air in late 1991, Lamb had negotiated several syndication agreements including license to broadcast the Rush Limbaugh radio program. Limbaugh himself acknowledged his newest affiliate by remarking on-air, "I am now beaming into Kennedy compound."
However, WXTK's eventual station branding of "Extreme Talk", was never actually used, though a few station IDs were produced using the branding (as late as 1998, the unused IDs were still in the station archives). Despite the unused branding, WXTK remained a news and talk station, and over the next few years would become the Cape's home of such popular syndicated hosts as G. Gordon Liddy
(cancelled from the station as of July 2006), Rush Limbaugh
, and Howie Carr
, and longtime local morning hosts Ed Lambert and Don McKeag.
In September, 1997, responding to listener comments of signal interference from WHOM, a powerful 94.9 FM signal based out of New Hampshire
broadcasting from the top of Mount Washington
, WXTK changed their frequency to 95.1Mc. (Channel 236), increasing their signal radius significantly. To ease people into the new frequency, there were two weeks of promotional material over-the-air, and after the switch their branding was changed to "95.1 is 95 WXTK", putting stress on the word "is".
In 2005, Boch Broadcasting sold WXTK and its sister stations to Quantum Communications (now called Quantum of Cape Cod, LLC), owner of WRZE (now a simulcast of sports radio WEEI
) and WCIB
(Cool 102), though Quantum had to sell what is now "Frank FM
" to Nassau Broadcasting in order to stay within FCC regulations. Until that sale, WOCB/WXTK had been broadcasting from the same studio building for over 60 years.
Local, regional & national shows featured include The Ed Lambert Show, Glenn Beck
, Rush Limbaugh
, Howie Carr
, Sean Hannity
, C.L. Fonari's Gardenline, Fooding Around with John Rega, The Handyman Hotline with Larry Egan. The station broadcasts games for the Boston Red Sox
, New England Patriots
& Boston Celtics
.
The news staff featuring Judith Goetz & Mark Mumford have tallied countless Awards many due to their Spectrum Series. Operations Manager Steve McVie & PD Joe Rossetti oversee programming.
According to Arbitron
, WXTK is currently (as of Fall 2008) the highest-rated radio station on Cape Cod, with a 10.4 rating.
News Radio
News Radio can refer to:* NewsRadio, the NBC sitcom which aired from 1995–1999.* News radio, the all-news or news/talk radio format....
/talk
Talk radio
Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often feature interviews with a number of different guests. Talk radio typically includes an element of listener participation, usually by broadcasting live...
radio station
Radio station
Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...
licensed to West Yarmouth, Massachusetts
West Yarmouth, Massachusetts
West Yarmouth is a census-designated place in the town of Yarmouth in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 6,460 at the 2000 census.- Geography :West Yarmouth is located at ....
, and headquartered in Hyannis, Massachusetts
Hyannis, Massachusetts
Hyannis is the largest of seven villages in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Also it is the commercial and transportation hub of Cape Cod and was designated an urban area as a result of the 1990 census. Because of this, many refer to Hyannis as the "Capital of the Cape"...
. It is the direct descendant of Cape Cod
Cape Cod
Cape Cod, often referred to locally as simply the Cape, is a cape in the easternmost portion of the state of Massachusetts, in the Northeastern United States...
's first commercial radio station, WOCB.
WOCB first signed on as an AM
AM broadcasting
AM broadcasting is the process of radio broadcasting using amplitude modulation. AM was the first method of impressing sound on a radio signal and is still widely used today. Commercial and public AM broadcasting is carried out in the medium wave band world wide, and on long wave and short wave...
station in 1941 as an affiliate of the NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
Blue Network, broadcasting mostly network programming (soap operas, radio drama, newscasts, etc.) with some local programming, remaining affiliated with that network after it became ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
. When ABC broke into four sub-networks in 1968, WOCB AM and FM became affiliated with ABC's American Information Network.
Its FM signal, for years a simulcast of its AM signal, signed on in 1949 on Channel 232/94.3Mc. (becoming the Cape's first FM commercial station as well), and after numerous FCC allocation changes for the FM band, eventually settled on 94.9 Megahertz.
By the 1970s, WOCB-FM broke away from simulcasting the AM during midday and evening hours to broadcast easy-listening music while still simulcasting the AM's format (then adult contemporary with a heavy news commitment) during weekday drive times and hourly newscasts the rest of the broadcast day.
Interesting note: In the summer through winter of 1981, the afternoon drive announcer on WOCB was Edd Hall. He later did voice work for "Late Night with David Letterman" from 1982 - 1990 and was, of course, Jay Leno's announcer on "the Tonight Show with Jay Leno" from 1992 - 2004.
In 1991, Hurricane Bob
Hurricane Bob
Hurricane Bob was one of the costliest hurricanes in New England history. The second named storm and first hurricane of the 1991 Atlantic hurricane season, Bob developed from an area of low pressure near The Bahamas on August 16. The depression steadily intensified, and became Tropical Storm Bob...
blew down WOCB's transmitter tower, and the damage suffered was so severe that they could not afford to rebuild. The station was then sold to Ernie Boch, Sr., an automobile dealer in the Boston suburb of Norwood, Massachusetts, who turned WOCB-FM into the flagship station for his new Boch Broadcasting company. WXTK's first news director, Hal Lamb, applied to the FCC to change the station's calls to WXTK, or "X-Talk," a reference to the rarity of Newstalk radio on the FM dial at the time. WOCB-AM was donated to Boston University, which used it to relay WBUR
WBUR
WBUR refers to two radio stations in Massachusetts, WBUR AM and FM, both owned by Boston University. WBUR is the largest of three NPR member stations in Boston, Massachusetts, along with WGBH and WUMB-FM, and the only one to focus exclusively on news and talk...
-FM in Boston, changing call letters to WBUR (AM).
When WXTK returned to the air in late 1991, Lamb had negotiated several syndication agreements including license to broadcast the Rush Limbaugh radio program. Limbaugh himself acknowledged his newest affiliate by remarking on-air, "I am now beaming into Kennedy compound."
However, WXTK's eventual station branding of "Extreme Talk", was never actually used, though a few station IDs were produced using the branding (as late as 1998, the unused IDs were still in the station archives). Despite the unused branding, WXTK remained a news and talk station, and over the next few years would become the Cape's home of such popular syndicated hosts as G. Gordon Liddy
G. Gordon Liddy
George Gordon Liddy was the chief operative for the White House Plumbers unit that existed from July–September 1971, during Richard Nixon's presidency. Separately, along with E. Howard Hunt, Liddy organized and directed the Watergate burglaries of the Democratic National Committee headquarters in...
(cancelled from the station as of July 2006), Rush Limbaugh
Rush Limbaugh
Rush Hudson Limbaugh III is an American radio talk show host, conservative political commentator, and an opinion leader in American conservatism. He hosts The Rush Limbaugh Show which is aired throughout the U.S. on Premiere Radio Networks and is the highest-rated talk-radio program in the United...
, and Howie Carr
Howie Carr
Howard Louis "Howie" Carr, Jr. is an American journalist, author, and conservative radio talk-show host based in Boston with a listening audience rooted in New England.-Radio:...
, and longtime local morning hosts Ed Lambert and Don McKeag.
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
broadcasting from the top of Mount Washington
Mount Washington (New Hampshire)
Mount Washington is the highest peak in the Northeastern United States at , famous for dangerously erratic weather. For 76 years, a weather observatory on the summit held the record for the highest wind gust directly measured at the Earth's surface, , on the afternoon of April 12, 1934...
, WXTK changed their frequency to 95.1Mc. (Channel 236), increasing their signal radius significantly. To ease people into the new frequency, there were two weeks of promotional material over-the-air, and after the switch their branding was changed to "95.1 is 95 WXTK", putting stress on the word "is".
In 2005, Boch Broadcasting sold WXTK and its sister stations to Quantum Communications (now called Quantum of Cape Cod, LLC), owner of WRZE (now a simulcast of sports radio WEEI
WEEI
WEEI is a sports radio station in Boston, Massachusetts, that broadcasts on 850 kHz from a transmitter in Needham, Massachusetts, and is owned by Entercom Communications. The station is one of the top-rated sports talk radio stations in the nation. Studios are located in Brighton, Massachusetts...
) and WCIB
WCIB
WCIB , known as "Cool 102", is a Classic Hits radio station licensed to Falmouth, Massachusetts. It is owned by Qantum Communications. Joe Rossetti is the morning show host. Matt Pitta provides news from sister station WXTK and WCOD's midday announcer Janet Birchfield make up Cool Mornings...
(Cool 102), though Quantum had to sell what is now "Frank FM
WFQR
WFQR and WFRQ are a pair of FM radio stations licensed to Harwich Port and Mashpee, Massachusetts respectively. They serve the Cape Cod market...
" to Nassau Broadcasting in order to stay within FCC regulations. Until that sale, WOCB/WXTK had been broadcasting from the same studio building for over 60 years.
Local, regional & national shows featured include The Ed Lambert Show, Glenn Beck
Glenn Beck Program
The Glenn Beck Program is an American talk radio show hosted by commentator Glenn Beck on Premiere Radio Networks. Since its inception as a nationally syndicated show in 2002, the program has become one of the highest rated radio programs...
, Rush Limbaugh
The Rush Limbaugh Show
The Rush Limbaugh Show is an American talk radio show hosted by Rush Limbaugh on Premiere Radio Networks...
, Howie Carr
The Howie Carr Show
The Howie Carr Show is an American radio talk-show presented by journalist and author Howie Carr. Its flagship station is WRKO AM 680, based in Boston, Massachusetts, on which the show airs every weekday between 3 and 7 PM. It is syndicated throughout northern New England and northeastern New York...
, Sean Hannity
The Sean Hannity Show
The Sean Hannity Show is a talk radio show hosted by Sean Hannity on Citadel Media and Premiere Radio Networks. The program is broadcast live every weekday, 3 p.m. to 6 p.m...
, C.L. Fonari's Gardenline, Fooding Around with John Rega, The Handyman Hotline with Larry Egan. The station broadcasts games for the Boston Red Sox
Boston Red Sox
The Boston Red Sox are a professional baseball team based in Boston, Massachusetts, and a member of Major League Baseball’s American League Eastern Division. Founded in as one of the American League's eight charter franchises, the Red Sox's home ballpark has been Fenway Park since . The "Red Sox"...
, New England Patriots
New England Patriots
The New England Patriots, commonly called the "Pats", are a professional football team based in the Greater Boston area, playing their home games in the town of Foxborough, Massachusetts at Gillette Stadium. The team is part of the East Division of the American Football Conference in the National...
& Boston Celtics
Boston Celtics
The Boston Celtics are a National Basketball Association team based in Boston, Massachusetts. They play in the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference. Founded in 1946, the team is currently owned by Boston Basketball Partners LLC. The Celtics play their home games at the TD Garden, which...
.
The news staff featuring Judith Goetz & Mark Mumford have tallied countless Awards many due to their Spectrum Series. Operations Manager Steve McVie & PD Joe Rossetti oversee programming.
According to Arbitron
Arbitron
Arbitron is a consumer research company in the United States that collects listener data on radio audiences. It was founded as American Research Bureau by Jim Seiler in 1949 and became national by merging with L.A. based Coffin, Cooper and Clay in the early 1950s...
, WXTK is currently (as of Fall 2008) the highest-rated radio station on Cape Cod, with a 10.4 rating.