KSYC-FM (103.9 FM) is a public

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting 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 rad ...

based in

Yreka, California Yreka ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Siskiyou County, California, United States, near the Shasta River; the city has an area of about , most of it land. As of the 2020 census, the population was 7,807, reflecting an increase from 7, ...

, owned by

Southern Oregon University Southern Oregon University (SOU) is a public university in Ashland, Oregon. It was founded in 1872 as the Ashland Academy, has been in its current location since 1926, and was known by nine other names before assuming its current name in 1997.Kre ...

and operated by

Jefferson Public Radio Jefferson Public Radio (JPR) is a regional public radio broadcasting network serving over a million potential listeners in Southern Oregon and the Shasta Cascade region of northern California. Owned by Southern Oregon University, the network ...

History

The station was founded in the 1970s by Dalmatian Enterprises, Inc., which also owned KSYC (1490 AM), the original country music station in

Siskiyou County Siskiyou County ( ) is a county located in the northwestern portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 44,076. Its county seat is Yreka and its highest point is Mount Shasta. It falls within the Casca ...

. The new station was given the call sign KYRE and licensed to operate at frequency 97.7 FM. It signed on the air on June 1, 1983, and played the

pop/rock Pop rock (also typeset as pop/rock) is a fusion genre and form of rock music characterized by a strong commercial appeal, with more emphasis on professional songwriting and recording craft, and less emphasis on attitude than standard rock musi ...

format with George Calvin Booth as the station's program director and main on-air talent. In the latter years of KYRE, it was promoted as "Hot Hits Y98". Y98 later became an affiliate of AT40 with

Casey Kasem Kemal Amin "Casey" Kasem (April 27, 1932 – June 15, 2014) was an American disc jockey, actor, and radio presenter who created and hosted several radio countdown programs, notably ''American Top 40'', as well as the weekly syndicated televi ...

on August 24, 1985. The station was purchased in 1995 by Siskiyou Radio Partners, Inc., and the call sign was changed to KSYC-FM as a way of moving the country music format over to the FM band and make way for the fast-growing

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. They may feature monologues, dialogues between the hosts, interviews ...

format on the AM station. The frequency was also moved from FM 97.7 to FM 103.9 that same year. The station's program director became Kevin Sponsler, who was PD of the AM station before the switch. KSYC-FM quickly replaced rival KWHO-FM as the county's ''only'' country music station when that station was sold to Huth Broadcasting in 1997 and KWHO's music format changed from country to

hot adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

. KSYC-FM was sold to Four Rivers Broadcasting in 2000, as were KSYC, KMJC, and KMJC-FM and later KWHO (from Huth Broadcasting) in 2001. It was then sold to Jamison-Wolf Broadcasting in 2008 along with sister station KNTK (now

KHWA KHWA (102.3 FM) is a radio station based in Mount Shasta, California (city of license is Weed, California), owned by Southern Oregon University and operated by Jefferson Public Radio, which also owns KSYC-FM in Yreka. KHWA broadcasts to the Sis ...

). The station's general manager was Lee Jamison and program director was once again Kevin Sponsler, who served that position previously from 1995 to 2003. Local news was featured hourly in the mornings with news director longtime news veteran Corky Small anchoring. The station was nearly sold to

in the fall of 2010 in hopes of improving its signal in the Yreka area. When rumors of the pending purchase were confirmed, the Siskiyou County Board of Supervisors voted against the sale and JPR withdrew its offer. The station was then acquired on March 1, 2011, by local and longtime residents of Siskiyou County, Mark and Cyndi Baird. The company is known as Buffalo Broadcasting, LLC.KSYC's official website
/ref> On October 1, 2021, KSYC-FM went silent. The station's license was up for renewal and was to expire on December 1, 2021. Effective July 19, 2022, KSYC-FM was officially purchased by Southern Oregon University and now broadcasts programming from Jefferson Public Radio.

Local sports

KSYC-FM had been the flagship station for Yreka High School football and basketball since the very beginning. They featured 30-plus-year veteran announcer Mark McAllister on the play-by-play and Al Reichenbach on the color commentary during the early 2000s. McAllister and Reichenbach have since retired.

Alumni

* George Calvin Booth (afternoon talent, 1995–2000) (formerly of KYRE-FM 97.7 "Hot Hits Y98") * Joe Kesterson (deejay from 6 p.m.-9 p.m., 2011–2017) (died of esophageal cancer on September 28, 2017) * Mark McAllister (voice of Yreka High School football and basketball) * Al Reichenbach (color analyst for Yreka High School football and basketball, now deceased) * Kevin Sponsler (morning on-air talent) * Susanna Fox (afternoon 12 noon-6 p.m., now of KZRO) * Adam Sizemore (mornings 7am-10am, 2019–2021) * Chris Stevens 2005-2021 Production manager/ air talent

Translators

KSYC-FM also broadcasts on the following

translators 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 ''transl ...

References

External links