Hot adult contemporary radio station in Hartford, Connecticut
WTIC-FM
(96.5
MHz
) is a
commercial
radio station in
Hartford, Connecticut
. It is owned by
Audacy, Inc.
and broadcasts a
hot adult contemporary
radio format
. The station's studios and offices are located on Executive Drive in
Farmington
.
WTIC-FM has an
effective radiated power
(ERP) of 20,000 watts, with its signal heard throughout most of
Connecticut
and into
Western Massachusetts
. Its
transmitter
is located off Deercliff Road in
Avon
, the same site as
sister station
WTIC (AM)
and former co-owned TV station
WFSB
.
[2]
WTIC-FM broadcasts in the
HD Radio
(hybrid) format.
[3]
The HD2 subchannel carries the
news/talk
format of WTIC (AM).
History
[
edit
]
Early years
[
edit
]
WTIC-FM is the second oldest FM station in Hartford, after
WHCN
. They were the only pre-
World War II
FM
stations in Connecticut, with WTIC-FM
signing on
the air originally as W1XSO on February 5, 1940, and using a frequency of 43.5 MHz.
[4]
In December 1941, it became a commercial operation using the
call sign
W53H. In 1943, the call letters were changed to WTIC-FM, representing its original owner,
The Travelers Insurance Company
. On April 17, 1948, the station moved to 96.5 MHz where it has remained to this day.
[5]
It mostly
simulcast
WTIC in its early years, carrying WTIC's local shows and
NBC Radio Network
programming, during the 1940s and 1950s. Just like their AM sister station, it carried NBC's dramas, comedies, news, sports, soap operas, game shows and
big band
broadcasts during the "
Golden Age of Radio
". As network programming moved from radio to television in the 1950s, WTIC-AM-FM switched to a
full service
,
middle of the road
format of popular music, news and sports. During the 1960s, WTIC-FM broke away from its AM counterpart for most of the day, playing classical music. In the early 1970s, it ran
beautiful music
by day and classical music at night.
Hot Hits
[
edit
]
In 1974, Travelers Insurance sold the TV station to
Post-Newsweek Stations
while the radio stations were sold to a group of their managers, going by the name "The 1080 Corporation".
[6]
On May 12, 1977, WTIC-FM made a dramatic switch by flipping to a
Top 40
?
CHR
format, as "
Hot Hits
".
[7]
The station was consulted by Mike Joseph who installed a
playlist
of all current hits, the 30 to 40 songs on the current charts were repeated frequently, with upbeat DJs and numerous jingles by the legendary TM Studios. Once a Hot Hit fell off the charts, even million-sellers, it was not played anymore. After a couple of years, WTIC-FM moved to a more conventional Top 40/CHR direction.
Hot AC
[
edit
]
From the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, WTIC-FM was locked in a Top 40/CHR battle with
WKSS
, which had converted from an
easy listening
station. WTIC-FM management decided not to aim as young as WKSS, removing the
rap music
and other harder edged songs from its playlist, switching to its current
hot AC
format on June 15, 1994.
[7]
Initially, the station's playlist moved a bit softer; since then, the hot AC format as a whole has embraced more upbeat music, and so has the station. Since its days as a Top 40/CHR station in 1977, WTIC-FM has referred to itself on the air variously as "Your Music Connection 96 TICS WTIC FM", "96 TICS WTIC-FM", "Hot Hits! 96 TICS WTIC-FM", "96 TIC-FM", and "The New 96.5 TIC-FM".
In 1998, WTIC-AM-FM were acquired by
Infinity Broadcasting
, which was renamed
CBS Radio
in December 2005. CBS also acquired then-
adult contemporary
station
WZMX
(now
rhythmic contemporary
) and
adult contemporary
WRCH
. On February 2, 2017, CBS Radio announced it would merge with
Entercom
.
[8]
The merger was approved on November 9, 2017, and was consummated on November 17.
[9]
[10]
References
[
edit
]
External links
[
edit
]
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