WHA (AM)

WHA

City of license	Madison, Wisconsin
Branding	Ideas Network
Frequency	970 kHz (also on HD Radio)
Repeaters	W300BM 107.9 MHz
First air date	January 13, 1922 (as 9XM 1914-1922)
Format	Public radio
Power	5,000 watts (daytime) 265 watts (30 minutes after sunset) 97 watts (60 minutes after sunset) 51 watts(nighttime) 500 watts (critical hours)
Class	D
Facility ID	6139
Affiliations	NPR
Owner	University of Wisconsin–Extension
Webcast	Listen Live
Website	wpr.org

WHA (970 AM) is a radio station operating out of Madison, Wisconsin. It is the flagship of Wisconsin Public Radio's talk-based Ideas Network.^[1] The call sign is also used for WHA-TV channel 21 (20 digital), the flagship of the Wisconsin Public Television network.

A plaque at the University of Wisconsin–Madison calls it the "oldest station in the nation." ^[2]

History

Experiments with spark gap transmitters stretch back to 1900. Professor Edward Bennett started using the call sign 9XM in 1914.^[3] A year later, the call sign was transferred to the University of Wisconsin and used for many experiments in the physics department. Professor Earle M. Terry managed many of these tests, and he eventually decided that the station should start making regular weather broadcasts. From December 4, 1916 onward, the station transmitted regular reports in Morse code.^[3]

While most early radio stations in the United States were shut down when the country entered World War I, 9XM's early transmissions were considered important enough to continue, spending much of the war broadcasting weather information to ships sailing on the Great Lakes.^[4]

Voice broadcasts took some time to work out, as there were some significant fidelity problems. Terry hosted a party at his home in 1917 to listen to the first scheduled audio broadcast, although few of the guests understood the implications of being able to listen to a piece of music that could just as easily be placed in a nearby record player.^[5] The fidelity issues were worked out by February 1919 when a transmission was made for the U.S. Navy.

Regularly scheduled audio broadcasts began a year later in February 1920. A six day per week schedule began on January 3, 1921, notable for the introduction of the first radio broadcast of a weather forecast. The station received its WHA call sign on January 13, 1922.^[3] Wisconsin Public Radio still uses the former 9XM calls in a marketing sense, enshrining network donors who give more than $500 in a year into the 9XM Leadership Circle.^[6]

The popular Canadian television series The Friendly Giant was created in 1953 on WHA. The show starring Bob Homme later moved to local sister station WHA-TV before making its way to Canadian television on the CBC Television network.^[7]

Translators

WHA must gradually power down to 51 watts at sunset in order to protect CBW in Winnipeg at adjacent 990 AM, rendering it all but unlistenable even in Madison. WHA is relayed by a translator station within the city of Madison at 107.9 FM to serve downtown and eastern Madison, including the UW-Madison campus.^[8][9] That translator had been operated for years by sister station WHAD in Milwaukee, but in 2012 was transferred to the license of WHA.

A translator of WHHI in nearby Dodgeville, located at 90.9 FM, serves western Madison.

References

External links

• A Chronology of AM Radio Broadcasting 1900-1960 Jeff Miller (editor)
• 9XM Talking: The Early History of WHA Radio Portal Wisconsin.org Randall Davidson

• Query the FCC's AM station database for WHA
• Radio-Locator Information on WHA
• Query Nielsen Audio's AM station database for WHA

Coordinates: 43°02′30″N 89°24′31″W / 43.04167°N 89.40861°W / 43.04167; -89.40861