WECZ

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WECZ is a commercially-licensed daytime-only AM radio station, licensed to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. The station operates at 1,540 kilohertz with a maximum power output of 5,000 watts daytime, and 1,000 watts during critical hours. WECZ is owned by Renda Radio, Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Renda Broadcasting Corporation of Pittsburgh.

[edit] Beginnings: The WPME Years

WECZ became Jefferson County's very first radio station, having signed on the air in 1953 as WPME-AM. The call letters were an acronym formed by the first letter of the last names of the station's three founding owners, headed by Charlie Erhart. In the seventies, it used the slogan "Western Pennsylvania's Musical Experience, WPME."

Like other small, community radio stations, WPME was a full-service station that offered music, news, and other local programming to local listeners daily from sunrise to sunset. Another AM radio station broadcasting on AM 1290 came on the air a couple years later, but later failed. Its callsign was WPXY. The license ended up in Altoona, where it was assumed by WFBG.

WPME underwent a major change in 1973, when it was granted a license for an FM station and moved to a new, larger building in Young Township, just north of the Punxsutawney border on PA Route 36, and co-located with its transmitter facility.

WECZ resides in the WPXZ studio building at 904 North Main Street Extension (PA Route 36 North) in Young Township, its home since the early 1970's. Prior to the call letter change, this was known as the WPME Building, with call letters reflecting the same.

The station signed on as WPME-FM and operated as a simulcast of the AM station's programming, allowing it to offer listeners local radio service after WPME-AM signed off at sunset.

[edit] Changes: As WPXZ-AM

Both stations were sold in 1981 to Anthony F. Renda, a native of Indiana, Pennsylvania, about 25 miles south of Punxsutawney. Renda had owned two other radio stations in McKeesport and Eastcentral Ohio before purchasing WPME-AM/FM for $300,000.

Upon purchasing the station, Renda changed the call letters of both stations to WPXZ, to more accurately reflect the station's image as that of a Punxsutawney community-based radio station. The station still continued its AM/FM simulcast until 1989, when the stations split off into separate programming entities.

[edit] WECZ: Both AM and FM Go Separate Ways

WPXZ retained its call letters for the FM station, but the AM adopted the calls WECZ and an easy-listening format of satellite-delivered MOR and nostalgia music. The new station became known as "Easy 1540" and continued operating under this format for about six years. The station also aired Pittsburgh Pirates baseball day games, and syndicated talk show host Rush Limbaugh.

The station underwent another image overhaul in the late 90's, switching to a classic country satellite-delivered format and taking the new name "The Groundhog AM 1540." Outcry from the community over the loss of the older music resulted in another format shift back to the MOR and Nostalgia music, but the Groundhog moniker was retained.

In 2002, the music was again dropped, with the increasing popularity of syndicated talk show hosts Laura Ingraham and Tom Martino. The station operated as "Groundhog Talk" for about a year until the moniker was dropped altogether and rebilled as "News/Talk AM 1540", which it continues to operate as today.

[edit] External links

• Query the FCC's AM station database for WECZ
• Radio Locator Information on WECZ
• Query Arbitron's AM station database for WECZ

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