WIBQ (1230 AM, "NewsTalk 1230") is a

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radi ...

broadcasting a

news/talk Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues and consisting entirely or almost entirely of original spoken word content rather than outside music. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often featur ...

format. Licensed to

Terre Haute Terre Haute ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Vigo County, Indiana, United States, about 5 miles east of the state's western border with Illinois. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 60,785 and its metropolitan area had a ...

Indiana Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th s ...

, the station serves the Terre Haute area. It first began broadcasting in

1958 Events January * January 1 – The European Economic Community (EEC) comes into being. * January 3 – The West Indies Federation is formed. * January 4 ** Edmund Hillary's Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition completes the third ...

under the

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assign ...

WMFT. The station is currently owned by Duey E. Wright, through licensee

Midwest Communications Midwest Communications is a Wausau, Wisconsin-based radio broadcasting company. It owns 82 radio stations located primarily within the Midwest United States, in Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Illinois and ...

, Inc.

History

WIBQ's history combines a now-defunct 1300 AM intellectual unit with a newer license on 1230 kHz.

AM 1300 history

The Mobley and Ford families, organized as the Citizens Broadcasting Company, received the construction permit for WWVR on 1300 kHz. Before going on air, the call letters changed to WMFT. After several sales within Citizens, the station relaunched as WAAC on May 1, 1963. By 1977, ownership was concentrated in Martha Foulkes, doing business as Marchild, Inc. Foulkes sold WIBQ in 1982 to the Oak Ridge Boys Broadcasting Corporation of Indiana. The new owners relaunched the station as WPFR on March 17, 1983, simulcasting WPFR-FM (now WBOW). On November 9, 1987, the call sign was changed to WYTL. The company that owned WPFR, WPFR-FM, and WYTL went into bankruptcy and both stations went off the air in

1991 File:1991 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Boris Yeltsin, elected as Russia's first president, waves the new flag of Russia after the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, orchestrated by Soviet hardliners; Mount Pinatubo erupts in the Phi ...

. In 1992, current WAXI morning personality Ronn Mott purchased the station with the help of banker Terry Tevlin, the call sign had been changed to WJSH prior to the sale on October 22, 1991. The station was again sold to an individual in Connecticut which eventually led to the station going off the air for a second time in 1996. The station was again sold in late 1996, this time to current owner Crossroads Communications. They brought the station back on the air in January 1997, simulcasting new sister station WSDM-FM. In

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

the simulcast ended and the format was changed to Southern Gospel with some programming coming from Reach Network out of Nashville, Tennessee. The format was again changed in 1999 to Sports radio ("The X") prompting the call sign to be changed to WSJX on March 1, 2000. The call sign was finally changed to WBOW on August 1, 2002, utilizing the legendary call sign that had been used on 1230 AM and

640 AM 640 AM - The following radio stations broadcast on AM frequency 640 kHz: 640 AM is a North American clear-channel frequency. KFI in Los Angeles, California, KYUK in Bethel, Alaska, and CBN in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada share ...

in the Terre Haute metropolitan area from 1927 until 2001 when 640 AM went

dark Darkness, the direct opposite of lightness, is defined as a lack of illumination, an absence of visible light, or a surface that absorbs light, such as black or brown. Human vision is unable to distinguish colors in conditions of very low lu ...

. The WBOW call sign was later picked up by sister station 102.7 FM in 2003 as WBOW-FM. The station continued to broadcast a Sports radio format along with sister station WSDX, simulcasting "ESPN Sports Radio" featuring programming from ESPN Radio, until September 18, 2012, when AM 1300 changed their format to news/talk.

WIBQ moves to 1230 AM

On June 14, 2011, the Bott Broadcasting Company obtained the construction permit for 1230 AM in Terre Haute as WYGJ, bringing the frequency back to life in the city since the demise of WBUZ, the station that had replaced WBOW when it moved to a new 640 AM facility in the early 1990s. With three months before the permit was to expire, in March 2014, Bott sold the permit to Midwest to relocate WIBQ from 1300 to 1230. The WYGJ call letters moved to 1300 AM, which went silent and was turned in to the FCC.WIBQ Terre Haute Completes Move
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Previous logo

References

External links

*
FCC History Cards for WIBQ at 1300 (Facility ID 65242)
{{Midwest Communications News and talk radio stations in the United States IBQ Midwest Communications radio stations