CFOX (AM)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

CFOX
Image:Cfox1470.jpg
Broadcast area Montreal, Quebec
Frequency 1470 kHz (AM)
First air date 1960
Format Top 40
ERP 10,000 watts
Class B
Owner Lakeshore Broadcasting Ltd

CFOX was an English language Canadian AM radio station located in Pointe-Claire, Quebec from 1960 to 1977. It later operated as CKO, the Montreal station of the news network of the same name, until 1989.

With studios based at 203 Hymus Blvd. corner St-Jean blvd. in the suburb of Pointe-Claire, Quebec, the station went on air on March 15, 1960 as a Adult Contemporary station with 1,000 watts of power, but was changed on February 5, 1963 to 10,000 watts. In 1964 the station format changed to 24 hours "Country" and in 1965 to a Top 40 station.

The station was originally operated by Lakeshore Broadcasting Ltd (which was owned by noted Montreal radio journalist Gord Sinclair, son of Toronto radio/TV journalist Gordon Sinclair). It was sold to Allan Slaight in 1972 and he converted it to a "new country" format. In 1975, the station went back to a Top 40 format till September 1977 but was just a shadow of its former self. Later that year it was purchased by the CKO news network, changing the call sign accordingly and converting it from Top 40 to a news radio format. (The CFOX calls would later resurface in January 1979 at an FM station in Vancouver, British Columbia.) The station went off air when that network ceased broadcasting during a noon newscast in November 1989. The news was produced, but never aired. The broadcasting licences for the CKO network were turned into the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) in 1990, and to this day the 1470 frequency has not been reactivated in the Montreal area. Its transmitter site with three antennas in Chateauguay was demolished in 1992.

CFOX is perhaps most famous for getting exclusive access to John Lennon and Yoko Ono's 1969 bed-in for peace in room 1742 at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, during which the song "Give Peace a Chance" was recorded.

[edit] External links