Courier Journal Louisville, KY - June 12, 1962

 

Bill Ladd's Almanac
WKLO To Put AM Ideas On FM August 1

 

 

Louisville's newest FM radio station should be on the air about August 1.

 

The Federal Communications Commission recently approved the application by the owners of WKLO.

 

Before this raises the temperature of the fine-music, stereo, and multiplex bugs, these are roughly the programming plans:

1. Serve an area in Southern Indiana now short of nighttime service by doing numerous Indiana basketball and football games and possibly Indiana-accented news.
2. Duplicate the present WKLO radio programs until 6 p.m. and duplicate the WKLO news programs throughout.
3. After 6 p.m. use show tunes, albums, and the Kostelantz-Montovani type music with three commercials at the 15-minute breaks.

Bill Spencer, who will operate the station, says plans may change, but this is the present thinking.

 

Louisville has had no commercial FM station since WLVL left the air. That station currently has no license, although operators have recently insisted that an application for renewal would be made, None has been made. 

 

Thus Louisville's only FM service has been the two stations operated by the Louisville Free Public Library. While these stations do much classical music and important talk programs, they schedule the same programs for seven consecutive days. This limits their effectiveness.

 

FM means, to many people, classical music lectures, and cultural programs. This is not the type of service the WKLO station plans to render, at least for now.

 

There has been a dramatic increase in the number of FM stations devoted to classical music and talk in recent months. WQXR, a good music station formerly operated by The New York Times, is now planning a nationwide network of some 100 stations which would meet such program standards.

 

A recent survey in Broadcasting magazine pointed out that some 15,000,000 families now have FM equipment. These families, the survey said, are of higher educational standards, make more money, spend more money, and attend more outside events than the average radio or television family.

 

There is still an opportunity in Louisville for a station with classical music and talk programs. Such a station needs imaginative promotion as well as imaginative programming because the audience is small and needs cultivation. 

 

There is a growing feeling that FM will expand -- some even think that it may someday replace AM radio because of the present crowding of the AM dial and difficulty of reception.

 

In fact the F.C.C., after the recent "chill" on applications of AM stations, began urging those who seek to get into the business to consider FM rather than AM.