KWDZ

KWDZ
City of license Salt Lake City, Utah
Broadcast area Salt Lake City metropolitan area
Branding Radio Disney Salt Lake City
Slogan Your Music, Your Way
Frequency 910 kHz (also on HD Radio)
First air date 1945[1]
Format Contemporary hit radio
Power 5,000 watts (day)
1,000 watts (night)
Class B
Facility ID 2445
Transmitter coordinates 40°30′48″N 112°0′23″W / 40.51333°N 112.00639°W
Callsign meaning K Walt DiZney
Former callsigns 1945-2003: KALL
Affiliations Radio Disney
Owner The Walt Disney Company
(sale pending)
(Radio Disney Group, LLC)
Website www.radiodisney.com
The radio towers for KWDZ are located in Riverton, Utah.

KWDZ (910 AM) is a Children's Contemporary hit radio formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Salt Lake City, Utah, serving the Salt Lake City metropolitan area. The station is owned and operated by The Walt Disney Company. The KWDZ broadcast license is held by Radio Disney Group, LLC.[2]

History

Radio Disney AM 910 logo used from 2008-2010.

The station went on the air as KALL, broadcasting a sports talk format. KALL moved frequencies and its call sign to 700 kHz, and on April 30, 2003, the station changed its call sign to the current KWDZ.[3]

The station was originally founded in 1945 and owned by Mr. and Mrs. George C. Hatch and Mr. and Mrs. Robert H. Hinkley. In 1946, John F. Fitzpatrick, publisher of The Salt Lake Tribune (owned by the Kearns Corporation), representing the Tribune, purchased fifty percent interest in the station from the owners. The Tribune's interest (Kearns-Tribune, Corp.) sold its interest in 1954 to permit its owner (Kearns-Tribune, Corp.) to apply for a license to buy a television license and to purchase a fifty percent ownership in KUTV Channel 2.[4]

In June 2013, Disney put KWDZ and six other Radio Disney stations in medium markets up for sale, in order to refocus the network's broadcast distribution on top-25 markets.[5]

On August 17, 2013, KWDZ dropped the Radio Disney affiliation and went Silent.[6]

After almost 1 year, KWDZ resumed operations on August 14, 2014.[7] Initially broadcasting locally-originated automated programming upon its return to the air, Radio Disney programming returned sometime around October 2014. By that time, Disney had announced plans to unload all but one of Radio Disney's remaining 23 owned-and-operated stations. Originally planning to sign-off the stations on September 26, 2014, Disney later decided to keep the stations on the air until they were sold. So far, five have found buyers with one station having gone silent as a result of its sale to an ethnic broadcaster being approved by the FCC.

KWDZ is licensed by the FCC to broadcast in the HD (hybrid) format.[8][9]

References

  1. ↑ "KALL First Air Date" (PDF). Broadcasting Telecasting Yearbook. 1950. p. 305. Retrieved November 6, 2011.
  2. ↑ "KWDZ Facility Record". United States Federal Communications Commission, audio division.
  3. ↑ "KWDZ Call Sign History". United States Federal Communications Commission, audio division.
  4. ↑ Malmquist, O.N.:The Salt Lake Tribune-The First 100 Years, 1971, p. 389.
  5. ↑ Graser, Marc (June 4, 2013). "Radio Disney Stations Up for Sale (EXCLUSIVE)". Variety. Retrieved June 4, 2013.
  6. ↑ Notification of Suspension of Operations KWDZ - United States Federal Communications Commission
  7. ↑ "Resumption of Operations - KWDZ". CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. August 14, 2014. Retrieved August 18, 2014.
  8. ↑ http://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/pubacc/prod/sta_det.pl?Facility_id=2445
  9. ↑ http://www.hdradio.com/stations

External links