WFBR (1590 AM, "Famous 1590") is a

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 com ...

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 ...

licensed to

Glen Burnie, Maryland Glen Burnie is an unincorporated town and census-designated place (CDP) in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States. It is a suburb of Baltimore. The population was 72,891 at the 2020 census. History In 1812, Elias Glenn, a district attorn ...

, and serving the

Baltimore metropolitan area The Baltimore–Columbia–Towson Metropolitan Statistical Area, also known as Central Maryland, is a metropolitan statistical area (MSA) in Maryland as defined by the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB). It is part of the larger ...

. The station broadcasts an ethnic, multilingual format and is owned by Way Broadcasting Licensee, LLC. The studios and transmitter are on 8th Avenue, Northwest in Glen Burnie. WFBR broadcasts at 1,000

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), quantify the rate of Work ...

s around the clock. To protect other stations on 1590 AM, as well as avoiding interference to

WLXE WLXE is a radio station broadcasting on 1600 kHz in the medium wave AM band. Its studios and transmitters are located in Rockville, Maryland, and it serves the Washington metropolitan area. WLXE broadcasts music programming in the Spanish ...

Rockville, Maryland Rockville is a city in and the county seat of Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, and is part of the Washington metropolitan area. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census tabulated Rockville's population at 67,117, making it the fourth ...

, WFBR uses a directional antenna with a five-tower array.

History

On May 15, 1963, the station first

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

the air. Its call letters were WISZ, powered at 500 watts and owned by Butch Gregory, a Vice-President at Westinghouse. He built much of the equipment including an antenna phaser unit, and the main studio control console. R. J. ("Bob") Bennett was the first station manager. The Program Director was Matt Edwards. The initial format was what is now called

Adult Standards Adult standards (also sometimes known as the nostalgia or Big Band format) is a North American radio format heard primarily on AM or class A FM stations. Adult standards started in the 1950s and is aimed at "mature" adults, meaning mainly tho ...

but was identified by the station as a "

Big band A big band or jazz orchestra is a type of musical ensemble of jazz music that usually consists of ten or more musicians with four sections: saxophones, trumpets, trombones, and a rhythm section. Big bands originated during the early 1910s and ...

Sound". Within two years the format switched to

Country music Country (also called country and western) is a popular music, music genre originating in the southern regions of the United States, both the American South and American southwest, the Southwest. First produced in the 1920s, country music is p ...

with the addition of legendary country

disc jockey A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include Radio personality, radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at nightclubs or music fes ...

Ray Davis, whose show was broadcast as a remote from Johnny's New and Used Cars (the "Walking Man's Friend). WISZ-FM on 95.9 MHz was added as a

simulcast Simulcast (a portmanteau of "simultaneous broadcast") is the broadcasting of programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time (that is, simultaneously) ...

in 1962, broadcasting from a 90-foot tower in

Brooklyn Park, Maryland Brooklyn Park is a census-designated place (CDP) in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States. The population was 14,373 at the 2010 census, and 16,112 at the 2020 census. Geography Brooklyn Park is located at (39.224857, −76.612655) on ...

. The transmitter was in a garden shed. WISZ-FM is today WWIN-FM. WISZ's AM antenna was in a swamp off Crain Highway in Glen Burnie and consisted of seven towers (4 daytime, and four nighttime, with a common base tower). The directional pattern protected WXLE (formerly WINX) in suburban Washington, D.C., on 1600 kHz, as well as other 1590 stations to the northeast. The "null" towards Washington was so pronounced that at certain points only a mile away, the towers could be seen but not heard. The station's mascot was an owl: "The WISZ Old Owl," pronouncing the call sign as "WISE." The call letters were changed to WJRO on May 11, 1977. The station was assigned the WFBR

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 ...

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 ...

(FCC) on November 30,

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...

WFBR call sign history

From 1924 to 1990, the WFBR call letters had been assigned to a Baltimore station (now WJZ). This call sign was randomly assigned from the sequential list of available call signs; other new stations licensed the same month included WFBK (Hanover, New Hampshire), WFBL (Syracuse, New York), WFBM (Indianapolis, Indiana), WFBN (Bridgewater, Massachusetts),

WFBQ WFBQ (94.7 FM, "Q95") is a radio station in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States, owned by iHeartMedia. The studios are located at 6161 Fall Creek Road on the northeast side of Indianapolis. The transmitter and antenna are located on the north ...

(Raleigh, North Carolina), WFBT (Pitman, New Jersey) and WFBU (Boston, Massachusetts)."New Stations"
''Radio Service Bulletin'', November 1, 1924, page 3. A tradition later developed that WFBR could be rendered as "World's First Broadcasting Regiment"."What's in a Station's Call"
by Madeleine Moschenross, ''Western Electric Pick-Ups'', May 1936, page 9. Another slogan, also derived from the call letters, was "First Baltimore Radio".

References

External links

History Cards for WFBR
(covering 1961-1981 as WISZ / WJRO) {{Authority control 1963 establishments in Maryland Glen Burnie, Maryland Radio stations established in 1963 FBR Brokered programming Multicultural Broadcasting stations