WDLW
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| Broadcast area | Lorain, Ohio |
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| Branding | Kool Kat Oldies 1380 |
| First air date | December 13, 1969 as WLRO October 26, 1958 as WWIZ |
| Frequency | 1380 (kHz) |
| Format | Oldies |
| Power | 500 watts (daytime) 57 watts (nighttime) |
| Class | D |
| Callsign meaning | owners Doug and Lorie Wilber |
| Former callsigns | WELL (June 6-August 1, 1997) WRKG (1984-1997) WLRO (1969-1984) WWIZ (1958-1967) |
| Affiliations | Associated Press |
| Owner | WDLW Radio, Inc. |
| Website | www.koolkatwdlw.com] |
WDLW is an AM radio station broadcasting in Lorain, Ohio, operating on 1380 kHz. WDLW features a 50s/60s rock and roll oldies format dubbed "Kool Kat Oldies," and carries ethnic programs on Sunday. It is locally owned and operated by Doug and Lorie Wilber, along with sister station WOBL 1320-AM and Tele-Hold Systems, Inc.
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[edit] History
WDLW can be traced back to WWIZ a modest daytime-only station at 1380 kHz. The second AM station in Lorain, WWIZ was the first to directly serve Lorain with studios in downtown Lorain, and a transmitter in adjacent Sheffield Township (where it remains to this day). Among the early radio hosts at "W-WIZ" included the late Bob Lockwood, Alan Mink, Jeff Baxter (who doubled as program director), Bob Lee and the late Bob "BJ" Sellers, later known as "The Polka King" in the morning slot. [1] WWIZ signed on in October 26, 1958, and soon promoted itself as "Lorain's Most Listened to Radio Station." Behind the scenes, WWIZ's history was troubled right from the start.
The station was founded by Sanford A. Schafitz, a native of the Youngstown area. Schafitz also started up WFAR in Farrell, Pennsylvania and WXTV-TV in Youngstown a few years earlier. But on September 15, 1958—one month before the station signed on—Schafitz arranged a deal with The Journal in Lorain. The Journal, as it turned out, was a party that actually tried to get the station assigned in the first place via a complicated straw-man transaction designed to circumvent the legal requirements which prevented Journal Publishing from holding a license. This likely came about after the parent company of The Journal's chief competitor, The Elyria Chronicle-Telegram, acquired Elyria-Lorain Broadcasting (owner of WEOL AM/FM) months earlier.
The station was incorporated as "WWIZ, Inc.", and while the Journal was not the controlling shareholder of WWIZ (the ratio was 55% to 45% in favor of Schafitz, who now held the titles of president and director), it ended up controlling the operations nonetheless. Schafitz, however, told the FCC that he held total control of the station at the time, and the deal was not made public until announced on February 26, 1959. [2] Harry Horvitz, chief owner of Journal Publishing, then bought the station outright on June 20, 1961. [3]
Both WEOL and the FCC soon objected to the move, as neither was properly notified of the previous action. WWIZ's license was put up for immediate renewal by the FCC in March 1962. After a lengthy court fight, the renewal was denied in April 1964, appealed before the Supreme Court, and revoked in late 1966. The station then operated under a temporary permit until being ordered off the air entirely on July 14, 1967. [4] [5]
Because WWIZ's license had been revoked and placed in a trusteeship, any reactivation of the station was, treated as a new station application, The station was silent until December 13, 1969, when Lorain Community Broadcasting Co. signed on as WLRO (for LoRain, Ohio) with a temporary permit (the official license was not granted for over a year). Coincidentally, Jeff Baxter again served the same program director duties with WLRO's launch. WLRO initially had a middle-of-the-road/oldies format, but has since changed formats several times over the years, including Top 40, county, pop standards, country and gospel (with Hispanic music in the overnights), ethnic music (via WELW), and most recently Hispanic music full-time.
On July 7, 1984, WLRO was sold by Lorain Community Broadcasting to local real estate developer Jon Veard. Shortly thereafter, on July 13, the call sign was changed to WRKG. In 1990 Jon Veard sold WRKG to Victory Radio, Inc. headed by Vernon Baldwin, who was also the owner of WZLE 104.9-FM. (Clear Channel Communications acquired WZLE in 1999 and changed the music format to Top 40 as "Kiss 104.9.") Both stations now had studios in the Antlers Hotel in downtown Lorain.
By the spring of 1997, WRKG entered into a daytime-only simulcast arrangement with WELW in Willoughby, Ohio. Accordingly, the callsign was changed to WELL on June 6, 1997—and eventually to WDLW on August 1, 1997. This simulcast did not last long, however, and owner Vernon Baldwin ended up flipping WDLW into a 24-hour Spanish/tropical format. This made WDLW the first, and only, such station in the state of Ohio. WDLW also offered Spanish-language broadcasts of Cleveland Indians baseball and Cleveland Crunch indoor soccer.
On January 2, 2002, WDLW was sold to WOBL Radio, Inc.'s owners, Doug and Lorie Wilber. The studios and operations were consolidated with WOBL's studio/transmitter facility in Oberlin. On November 8, 2002, WDLW switched to a 50s/60s rock-and-roll oldies format as "Kool Kat Oldies 1380-AM". "Kool Kat" was a play on "Cool Cat," the name of a 1960s Warner Bros. cartoon character, and a popular catch-phrase in that same period. [6]
In addition to the oldies format, WDLW still maintains an amount of Spanish/tropical music on Sunday afternoons, as well as a lengthy lineup of ethnic and variety shows now promoted as "International Sunday"—a nod to the ethnic communities within the "International City" of Lorain. The best known of all these ethnic programs is "The Polka Express," whose on-air tenure spans that of 1380-AM's current incarnation with two different hosts—first with Jimmy Bryda from 1969 until his passing in 2003, and with Tom Borowicz from 2003 to the present.
[edit] Programming
[edit] Weekdays
- 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.: Gene Briscoe
- 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.: Wally Mintus
- 3:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.: Brian Deitz
[edit] Fridays
- 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.: Hey, Look What I Found! with Pete Delmonico (March through September)
[edit] Saturdays
- 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.: Wally Mintus
- 2:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.: Bobby Soxx
[edit] Sundays
- 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.: The Friendly Promoter Club with Matty Bright
- 9:00 a.m. to 9:45 a.m.: Fairfield Missionary Baptist Church
- 9:45 a.m. to 10:00 a.m.: Building a Caring Community with Jerry Scully
- 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m.: The International Polka Show with Dick Benetto
- 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.: The Polka Express with Tom Borowicz
- 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.: The German Music and Variety Show with George Jurjev
- 3:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.: Your Latino Taste with Jose 'Pepe' Rivera
[edit] External links
- WDLW's homepage
- Live and archived sports play-by-play from LorainCounty.com
- Query the FCC's AM station database for WDLW
| AM Radio Stations in the Cleveland, Ohio Market (Arbitron #26)
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