WLRA (88.1 FM) or sometimes called WLRA Radio, or WLRA-FM, is a

college radio Campus radio (also known as college radio, university radio or student radio) is a type of radio station that is run by the students of a college, university or other educational institution. Programming may be exclusively created or produced ...

station broadcasting a

variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

format. Licensed to

Lockport, Illinois Lockport is a city in Will County, Illinois, United States, located 30 miles southwest of Chicago. Per the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 26,094. The city was incorporated in 1853. It is situated along the Illinois a ...

, USA, the station serves the

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

/greater Joliet region. The station is licensed to and owned by

Lewis University Lewis University is a private Lasallian university in Romeoville, Illinois, United States. It enrolls around 6,600 students in more than 80 undergraduate programs, 35 graduate programs, and accelerated programs for working adults. It is al ...

. Lewis University is a private

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

and Lasallian university with an enrollment of around 6,800 students. The station is a member of the

National Association of Broadcasters The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) is a Industry trade group, trade association and lobbying, lobby group representing the interests of commercial and non-commercial over-the-air radio and television broadcasting, broadcasters in th ...

, Illinois Broadcasters Association, and

Broadcast Education Association The Broadcast Education Association (BEA) is an international academic organization originating and operating mainly out of the United States. The BEA is devoted to multimedia research and teaching, and retains the historical purpose to prepare col ...

Lewis University's radio station history

* WFJL – (W – FJL – Frank J. Lewis) (93.1 FM Chicago) went on the air on May 22, 1949. WFJL is operated as a non-commercial station by Lewis College of Science and Technology (the previous name of Lewis College, now

).
1955 Broadcasting Yearbook–Marketbook
'',

Broadcasting Broadcasting is the data distribution, distribution of sound, audio audiovisual content to dispersed audiences via a electronic medium (communication), mass communications medium, typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum (radio waves), ...

, 1955. p. 128. Retrieved February 2, 2019. The station's license was cancelled in 1956. WFJL, under the leadership of

Auxiliary

Bishop A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of di ...

Most Rev. Bernard J. Sheil, D.D., of the

Archdiocese of Chicago The Archdiocese of Chicago () is a Latin Church ecclesiastical jurisdiction, an archdiocese of the Roman Catholic Church located in Northeastern Illinois, in the United States. The Vatican erected it as a diocese in 1843 and elevated it to an ar ...

and General Manager Jerry Keefe, radio format consisted of religious, educational, news, talk, and CYO

Boxing Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as boxing glove, protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing Punch (combat), punch ...

. WFJL's facilities were located at the Lincoln Tower Building, 75 East Wacker Drive,

, above the ground and had an ERP of 29,000 watts. * WLCL-AM – (W – LCL – Lewis College Lockport) AM

carrier current Carrier current transmission, originally called wired wireless, employs guided low-power Radio frequency, radio-frequency signals, which are transmitted along electrical conductors. The transmissions are picked up by receivers that are either conne ...

radio station on Lewis College, Lockport, Illinois campus. Located in the Sheil Hall dormitory basement from its inception until 1970, the station broadcast on 600 kHz to Sheil, Fitzpatrick, and Founders Halls. Robert Feustal and Norb Bora are credited with the inception of WLCL-AM and introducing college radio at Lewis. In 1969, the Sheil Hall basement facility was upgraded with new QRK professional turntables replacing the old Garrard consumer models. A used Gates Sta-Level compressor was installed, giving the station a much more professional technical sound. News, weather, and sports information now came to the station via a United Press International teletype machine. A direct feed to the PA system in the Lewis cafeteria was also added. * WERA-AM – picked up where WLCL left off in the Fall of 1970. It was at this time that the merger with the College of St. Francis in Joliet was announced (the combined school would be called Lewis-St. Francis of Illinois) and the campus radio station at Lewis (the "North Campus") would now serve the two dorms at the "South Campus" (CSF) as well. A direct feed was installed in the newly remodeled Student Union. A second studio was constructed for production use with the turntables and mixer module able to be easily removed for "remote" broadcast origination from anywhere on the "twin campuses." Most of the carpentry work during the upgrade was done by Station Manager Dennis Stork and the studio wiring was done by Mike Berlak. One very late night, while station staffers discussed plans for the new incarnation of the station (around a table at the Pure Oil truckstop on 55), they noticed a dry cleaners' van in the parking lot with the name "New Era" on it. It was a "new era" for both the college and the campus radio station...and that was the inspiration for the new call letters, WERA. At that time, the station also changed the transmitter frequency to 590 kHz. At the start of the Fall 1971 semester, the station conducted its biggest promotional push, "weraweek!" Highlights included the WERA YesterHop (a live broadcast/50s style "sock hop" in the Union) and a flight of the WERA Beer Bomber (a live broadcast from an airplane over the campus which dropped certificates good for six-packs to the assembled multitudes below.) During the 1971–72 school year, General Manager Mike Berlak began the process of applying for an FCC FM license, which would allow over-the-air broadcasts. In anticipation of this expansion, a completely new broadcast facility was built in the former Fitz Hall Lounge area, opening in the Spring of 1972. * WLRA-FM – (W – LRA – Lewis RAdio) went on the air March 4, 1973, on 88.1 in mono, 250 watts of

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 ...

at HAAT. WLRA is licensed as a non-commercial educational radio station. In 1976 WLRA added stereo. Lewis University was annexed from Lockport to Romeoville, Illinois, and WLRA's license reflected the change.

Programming

As with most colleges, WLRA included the

music industry The music industry are individuals and organizations that earn money by Songwriter, writing songs and musical compositions, creating and selling Sound recording and reproduction, recorded music and sheet music, presenting live music, concerts, ...

, and the musical tastes of the station's staff and the listening audience change over time. The college's radio station has the obligation to meet these challenges. As Cardinal

John Henry Newman John Henry Newman (21 February 1801 – 11 August 1890) was an English Catholic theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer, and poet. He was previously an Anglican priest and after his conversion became a cardinal. He was an ...

wrote: ''"to live is to change... and to be perfect is to have changed often"''. College radio stations pride themselves on promoting underplayed and under-represented forms of music, the obscure and unique – versus the mainstream. The college radio stations achieve this with

independent music Independent music (also commonly known as indie music, or simply indie) is a broad style of music characterized by creative freedoms, low-budgets, and a DIY ethic, do-it-yourself approach to music creation, which originated from the liberties aff ...

labels and the CMJ Online
WLRA Radio's diverse programming reflects a traditional

format known as

presented in block style (2–4 hour show). WLRA Radio has hosted many innovative radio programs over the years. These include eclectic and Freeform (radio format)">Freeform, experimental

programming, weekly live radio talk shows, Lewis University Flyer sporting events from around the country, remote broadcasts, and community service events. WLRA's current programming includes news and sports talk radio, coverage of

Flyer Sports, local high school football and basketball; music genre formats including

adult album alternative Adult album alternative (also triple-A, AAA, or adult alternative) is a radio format. See pages 9 and 10Mills, Joshua. "A New Radio Music Format: Rock for Prosperous Adults" New York Times, Feb 28 1994, p. 2. ProQuest. Web. Accessed September 4, ...

alternative rock Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...

hip hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hip- ...

, rap,

rock and roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock-n-roll, and rock 'n' roll) is a Genre (music), genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It Origins of rock and roll, originated from African ...

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...

reggae Reggae () is a music genre that originated in Jamaica during the late 1960s. The term also denotes the modern popular music of Jamaica and its Jamaican diaspora, diaspora. A 1968 single by Toots and the Maytals, "Do the Reggay", was the first ...

religious Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural ...

country A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. When referring to a specific polity, the term "country" may refer to a sovereign state, state with limited recognition, constituent country, ...

, seasonal

Christmas music Christmas music comprises a variety of Music genre, genres of music regularly performed or heard around the Christmas and holiday season, Christmas season. Music associated with Christmas may be purely instrumental, or in the case of Christmas ...

, and Latina-American cultural immersion. In the Fall 2008 semester, WLRA staffed 24 hours with students on air. The station also introduced a Trop Rock format called "The Island" which features calypso, reggae, and Caribbean rock music. WLRA has broadcast many radio remotes from as far away as Florida to cover Lewis University Flyer Baseball, Las Vegas to broadcast "The Practice Squad" sports talk show; and also, the National Association of Broadcasters Convention at the Comrex booth. The radio station has also broadcast from The

House of Blues House of Blues is an American chain of live music concert halls and restaurants. It was founded by Isaac Tigrett, the co-founder of Hard Rock Cafe, and Dan Aykroyd, co-star of the 1980 film ''The Blues Brothers (film), The Blues Brothers''. The ...

in Chicago, LaLaPalooza, Jimmy Buffett pre-concert, Ditka's Restaurant in Chicago, and ESPN Zone in Chicago. WLRA, with a commitment to community service, has produced marathon broadcasts for a local children's hospital and

programming with the

United Way United Way is an international network of over 1,800 local nonprofit organization, nonprofit fundraising affiliates. Prior to 2015, United Way was the largest nonprofit organization in the United States by donations from the public. Individual Un ...

of Will County. In March 2011, broadcasting student Jodi Steinberg set a WLRA broadcasting record with a 76-hour non-stop on-air marathon during "To Kill A DJ".http://media.www.lewisflyer.com/media/storage/paper638/news/2006/11/24/News/real-World.Brad.Returns.To.Lewis-2471284.shtml

Specialty radio shows

"The Island" features calypso, reggae, and Caribbean rock music (Friday Midnight – Sunday 3am)
"Route 53 Country" features country music (Sunday 6 am-6 pm)
"Friday Night Lights" features local high school football games from the Joliet region (weekly – Friday 6pm-10pm)
"United Way of Will County's Christmas Memories for you and your Family" features religious and secular Christmas music (Thanksgiving until January, 24 hours a day)

Technical achievements

Lewis University's WLRA Radio was the first college radio station in the country to become digital. Lewis University received a $350,000 digital broadcasting project grant in the 1990s from the philanthropy of The Andrew Corporation, a leading worldwide communications corporation. The studios, music archives, music scheduling system, audio storage and retrieval systems (including an AES/EBU Broadcast Electronics – Audiovault serial number 001 and 002), digital audio consoles, CD players & recorders,

minidisc MiniDisc (MD) is an erasable magneto-optical disc-based data storage format offering a capacity of 60, 74, or 80 minutes of digitized audio. Sony announced the MiniDisc in September 1992 and released it in November of that year for sale i ...

players and recorders, and DAT),

ISDN Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) is a set of communication standards for simultaneous digital transmission of voice, video, data, and other network services over the digitalised circuits of the public switched telephone network. ...

digital phone system,

and IP remote broadcast

codec A codec is a computer hardware or software component that encodes or decodes a data stream or signal. ''Codec'' is a portmanteau of coder/decoder. In electronic communications, an endec is a device that acts as both an encoder and a decoder o ...

s, Optimod 8700 AES/EBU audio processing, AES/EBU

broadcast delay In radio and television, broadcast delay is an intentional delay when broadcasting live material, technically referred to as a deferred live. Such a delay may be to prevent mistakes or unacceptable content from being broadcast. Longer delays las ...

, Harris Digit AES/EBU FM exciter, and transmitters were upgraded from analog to digital

AES3 AES3 is a technical standard, standard for the exchange of digital audio signals between professional audio devices. An AES3 signal can carry two channels of pulse-code modulation, pulse-code-modulated digital audio over several transmission medi ...

type I balanced and type II optical. The entire digital project was a joint venture with the Freberg Communications Corporation of Illinois,

Harris Corporation Harris Corporation was an American technology company, defense contractor, and information technology service (economics), services provider that produced wireless equipment, tactical radios, electronic systems, night vision device, night visi ...

of Florida, Pacific Research and Engineering of California, A-Ware Corporation ( Musicmaster) of Wisconsin, and Broadcast Electronics Corporation of Illinois. WLRA also added RDS

Radio Data System Radio Data System (RDS) is a communications protocol standard for embedding small amounts of digital information in conventional FM broadcasting, FM radio broadcasts. RDS standardizes several types of information transmitted, including time, sta ...

to the FM transmission allowing information about the artist and song to be displayed on a radio tuned to 88.1 FM. Lewis University installed a new self-standing radio tower and new digital

IBOC In-band on-channel (IBOC) is a hybrid method of transmitting digital radio and analog radio broadcast signals simultaneously on the same frequency. The name refers to the new digital signals being broadcast in the same AM or FM band (in-band) ...

HD Radio HD Radio (HDR) is a trademark for in-band on-channel (IBOC) digital radio broadcast technology. HD radio generally simulcast, simulcasts an existing analog radio station in digital format with less noise and with additional text information. HD R ...

ready ERI Rototile
Broadcast Solutions™, Antennas, Towers – Electronics Research Inc , Chandler, IN
single bay fm antenna in 2000 adjacent to DeLaSalle Hall. WLRA increased the antenna height to HAAT and had to reduce the

to 140 watts. WLRA moved from the basement of the Fitzpatrick Hall dormitory basement to the new studios and broadcasting center in December 2005. The new broadcasting facility was named the Andrew Center of Electronic Media at

. The broadcasting studios and transmitters are located in DeLaSalle Hall on the

Romeoville Romeoville is a village in Will County, Illinois, United States. The village is located southwest of Chicago on the Gateway Wetlands, directly west of the Des Plaines River. Per the 2020 census, the population was 39,863. It is located in the s ...

campus. In 2005 WLRA began

streaming Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a network for playback using a media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of packets from a server to a client and is rendered in real-time; this contrasts with file downl ...

a simulcast of the station over the Internet and in 2008

mobile media Mobile media has been defined as: "a personal, interactive, internet-enabled and user-controlled portable platform that provides for the exchange of and sharing of personal and non-personal information among users who are inter-connected." The no ...

apps for the Apple

iPhone The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at ...

and

iPod Touch The iPod Touch (stylized as iPod touch) is a discontinued line of iOS-based mobile devices designed and formerly marketed by Apple Inc. with a touchscreen-controlled user interface. As with other iPod models, the iPod Touch can be used as a po ...

. Simultaneously Apple added WLRA as one of their iTunes Radio Stations under the College format. WLRA uses an AES3 Orban Opticodec audio processing/encoder for their 128kbs and 64kbs bit streams. In 2010, WLRA and Broadcast Electronics, Inc. integrated social media automation and

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

with the newest generation of Broadcast Electronics AudioVault (FLEX) and Message Manager (TRE)

RBDS Radio Data System (RDS) is a communications protocol standard for embedding small amounts of digital information in conventional FM radio broadcasts. RDS standardizes several types of information transmitted, including time, station identificat ...

data. The automation allows listeners to be notified of their favorite artists being played through tagging. WLRA was the first station to have Broadcast Electronics integrate customer-supplied computers, paving the way for other stations to upgrade to new-generation Audiovault FLEX. In the Spring of 2012, WLRA was among the first 15 colleges selected to be part of Clear Channel Communication's

iHeartRadio iHeartRadio (often shortened to just "iHeart") is an American freemium broadcast, podcast, radio streaming and Music Streaming platform owned by iHeartMedia. Founded in August 2008, iHeartRadio serves as the national umbrella brand for iHeart ...

for both internet streaming and mobile media apps.

WLRA's memberships

* NAB (

br>NAB: The Voice for America's Radio and TV Broadcasters
member station * ILBA (Illinois Broadcaster's Association
Illinois Broadcasters Association
* BEA (Broadcast Education Association
BEA – The Broadcast Education Association , Educating Tomorrow's Media

References

External links

* * * Official

websit
Lewis University
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wlra Sports radio stations in the United States Adult album alternative radio stations in the United States Freeform radio stations LRA LRA Will County, Illinois Education in Will County, Illinois Romeoville, Illinois Radio stations established in 1972 1972 establishments in Illinois