KMST is a radio station licensed to

Rolla, Missouri Rolla () is a city in and the county seat of Phelps County, Missouri, United States. Its population in the 2020 United States Census was 19,943. It is approximately midway between St. Louis and Springfield along I-44. Its micropolitan sta ...

, and operated by the University of Missouri at St. Louis as an extension of St. Louis Public Radio. The station broadcasts at 88.5

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), often described as being equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose formal expression in terms of SI base u ...

FM with an

effective radiated power Effective radiated power (ERP), synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency (RF) power, such as that emitted by a radio transmitter. It is the total power in watts that would ha ...

of 100,000 watts, making it the most powerful

public radio Public broadcasting (or public service broadcasting) is radio, television, and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service with a commitment to avoiding political and commercial influence. Public broadcasters receive ...

station in south-central

Missouri Missouri (''see #Etymology and pronunciation, pronunciation'') is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it border ...

. Historically, the station's programming has consisted of several genres of music such as classical and jazz as well as several popular

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...

programs such as ''

All Things Considered ''All Things Considered'' (''ATC'') is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio (NPR). It was the first news program on NPR, premiering on May 3, 1971. It is broadcast live on NPR affiliated stations in the United ...

'', ''

A Prairie Home Companion ''A Prairie Home Companion'' was a weekly radio variety show created and hosted by Garrison Keillor that aired live from 1974 to 2016. In 2016, musician Chris Thile took over as host, and the successor show was eventually renamed ''Live from He ...

'', '' Car Talk'', and '' Michael Feldman's Whad'Ya Know?'' show. The station originated a weekly science talk show, titled ''We're Science'', which was syndicated nationwide for several years in the mid-1990s. The station originally broadcast under the call letters KUMR, from the abbreviation of the station's home, the University of Missouri–Rolla, through 2006. On January 1, 2008, the University of Missouri–Rolla changed its name to

Missouri University of Science and Technology Missouri University of Science and Technology (Missouri S&T or S&T) is a public research university in Rolla, Missouri. It is a member institution of the University of Missouri System. Most of its 6,456 students (2023) study engineering, busin ...

. As a result, the station's original

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 as ...

, KUMR, was changed to KMST on July 16, 2007, as a reflection of the university's forthcoming name change. Until 2017, KMST broadcast from studios in the basement of the Curtis Laws Wilson library on the UMR/Missouri S&T campus. Effective July 1, 2017, the station (including its Lebanon

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''trans ...

) was transferred to the University of Missouri-St. Louis and became part of the St. Louis Public Radio network, airing the same broadcast as the St. Louis frequency. The only local programming retained through the changeover was Wayne Bledsoe's ''Bluegrass for a Saturday Night'', a local staple for many decades, which continued until Bledsoe's August 2017 retirement. Missouri S&T opted to end KMST's local operations after the University of Missouri system suffered a massive budget cut that led school officials to conclude KMST was no longer part of the school's "academic core." KMST was also heard in

Lebanon, Missouri Lebanon is a city in and the county seat of Laclede County, Missouri, Laclede County in Missouri. The population was estimated at 15,013 at the time of the 2020 census. It is the county seat of Laclede County. The Lebanon Micropolitan Statistical ...

via translator K242AN on 96.3 MHz FM, until the translator went silent in August 2020; its license was cancelled by the

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

on March 28, 2022. On February 10, 2025, St. Louis Public Radio announced UMSL will be transferring the licenses for KWMU, KMST, and WQUB to Friends of KWMU, Inc.

References

External links

www.stlpublicradio.orgwww.kmst.org
{{coord, 37.7989, N, 91.7246, W, type:landmark_region:US_source:FCC, display=title Missouri University of Science and Technology NPR member stations MST (FM)

See also

References

External links