WNWR (1540 AM) is a

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

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 radio ...

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Since ...

owned by Aztec Capital Partners. Its studio is located at 200 Monument Road, Suite 6,

Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania Bala Cynwyd ( ) is a community in Lower Merion Township, Pennsylvania. It is located on the Philadelphia Main Line in Southeastern Pennsylvania, bordering the western edge of Philadelphia at U.S. Route 1 (City Avenue). It was originally two sep ...

and its

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which is applied to the ...

is located in the Roxborough neighborhood of Philadelphia, off Ridge Avenue. The station airs a simulcast of

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1340 AM airing Spanish music.

History

The station first signed on the air on July 11, 1947. Its

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 ass ...

was WJMJ which stood for "Jesus, Mary, Joseph." The station broadcast middle-of-the-road music and religious programming. It was owned by Patrick Joseph Stanton and had its offices and studios in the St. James Hotel. It was a

daytimer A clear-channel station is an AM radio station in North America that has the highest protection from interference from other stations, particularly concerning night-time skywave propagation. The system exists to ensure the viability of cross-co ...

, powered at 1,000 watts and forced to

sign-off A sign-on (or start-up in Commonwealth countries except Canada) is the beginning of operations for a radio or television station, generally at the start of each day. It is the opposite of a sign-off (or closedown in Commonwealth countries exce ...

at sunset to avoid interfering with other stations on 1540 kHz. In the late 1950s, the station got a boost to 50,000 watts, but it still had to stay off the air at night. One of the programs carried on WJMJ in the 1950s was

George A. Palmer George Augustus Palmer (February 14, 1895 – January 11, 1981) was an American Protestant clergyman from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who started the long-running ''Morning Cheer'' radio broadcast in 1931, which eventually had an international ...

's popular ''Morning Cheer'' daily broadcast. In 1965 it was acquired by Rust Craft Greeting Cards, which changed the call letters to WRCP, which stood for Rust Craft Philadelphia. In 1967, Rust Craft changed the

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country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

, a format not found on the Philadelphia radio dial. In 1981, after 560

WFIL WFIL (560 AM) is a radio station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, with a Christian radio format consisting of teaching and talk programs. Owned by Salem Media Group, studios and transmitter facilities are shared with co-owned W ...

adopted a country format, WRCP switched to

oldies Oldies is a term for musical genres such as pop music, rock and roll, doo-wop, surf music (broadly characterized as classic rock and pop rock) from the second half of the 20th century, specifically from around the mid-1950s to the 1980s, as w ...

. Later in 1985, the call sign was changed to WSNI to match

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

104.5 WSNI-FM (now

WRFF WRFF (104.5 FM, "ALT 104.5") is a commercial FM radio station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The station is owned by iHeartMedia, and broadcasts an alternative rock radio format. The studios are in Bala Cynwyd. WRFF has an effective radiated ...

). For a time, the AM broadcast an all-

Beatles The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, that comprised John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr. They are regarded as the most influential band of all time and were integral to the developm ...

-and-

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format. After two years, a more conventional oldies mix returned and the station became WPGR ("Philly Gold Radio"). In 1995, the station was sold to new owners operating as Global Radio LLC, becoming WNWR. The call letters stand for New World Radio. It switched to mostly ethnic

brokered programming Brokered programming (also known as time-buy and blocktime) is a form of broadcast content in which the show's producer pays a radio or television station for air time, rather than exchanging programming for pay or the opportunity to play spot comm ...

, where show hosts bought time on the station and sold advertising in their communities to pay for their broadcasts. On June 13, 2011, WNWR's entire brokered program schedule moved to AM 860

WWDB WWDB (860 AM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with its studios and offices in the "555 Building" on City Avenue in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania. It is owned by the Beasley Broadcast Group and broadcasts most ...

. The station was then leased to broadcast

China Radio International China Radio International (CRI) is the state-owned international radio broadcaster of China. It is currently headquartered in the Babaoshan area of Beijing's Shijingshan District. It was founded on December 3, 1941, as Radio Peking. It later ...

. Several years later, WNWR got authorization from the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdicti ...

to stay on the air around the clock with low power at night. WNWR has gone off the air and is listed as silent since June 14, 2018. As of Saturday November 17, 2018 WNWR returned on the air broadcasting a Spanish language format. On December 8, 2019, however, it was on the FCC's Silent AM Stations List. As of April 27, 2021, WNWR returned to the airwaves with 1,000 watts of power during the day and 7 watts at night according to their engineer, Dana Puopolo.

References

External links

FCC History Cards for WNWR
{{Daytime-only radio stations in Pennsylvania NWR Radio stations established in 1947 1947 establishments in Pennsylvania NWR