WMBL (740 AM) was a

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 ...

Morehead City, North Carolina Morehead City is a port city in Carteret County, North Carolina, Carteret County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 8,661 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census. Morehead City celebrated the 150th anniversary of its foundi ...

. Its call letters stood for "Where Morehead Beaufort Link". The station went on the air in 1947. The entry for WMBL in a booklet from August 1957 to commemorate Morehead City's centennial states: the "radio station is heard from Maine to Florida, and has been heard all the way to Nebraska. Particularly, this is true during hurricane season, when friends and relatives at distant points want information on conditions in this locale." WMBL was one of the few stations to play

beach music Beach music, also known as Carolina beach music, and to a lesser extent, beach pop, is a regional genre of music in the United States which developed from rock/ R&B and pop music of the 1950s and 1960s. Beach music is most closely associate ...

in the 1950s and 1960s. A listener of the station noted that an afternoon

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

of that time, Bobbie Dennis, "was bold enough to play records by

The Drifters The Drifters are an American pop and R&B/soul vocal group. They were originally formed as a backing group for Clyde McPhatter, formerly the lead tenor of Billy Ward and his Dominoes in 1953. The second group of Drifters, formed in 1959 and ...

Clyde McPhatter Clyde Lensley McPhatter (November 15, 1932 – June 13, 1972) was an American rhythm and blues, soul, and rock and roll singer. He was one of the most widely imitated R&B singers of the 1950s and early 1960sPalmer, Robert (1981)"Roy Brown, a Pio ...

and

Big Joe Turner Joseph Vernon "Big Joe" Turner Jr. (May 18, 1911 – November 24, 1985) was an American blues shouter from Kansas City, Missouri. According to songwriter Doc Pomus, "Rock and roll would have never happened without him". Turner's greatest fa ...

, to name a few." A sister

FM station FM broadcasting is a method of radio broadcasting that uses frequency modulation (FM) of the radio broadcast carrier wave. Invented in 1933 by American engineer Edwin Armstrong, wide-band FM is used worldwide to transmit high fidelity, high-f ...

using the WMBL-FM callsign went on the air in October 1972 at 95.9 MHz, later moving to 96.3). In 1986, the stations were acquired by Great American Media (now Curtis Media Group); they were part of the Great American Media group until the early 1990s. WMBL-FM changed its call letters to WMBJ on October 13, 1981, according to

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) records. On June 4, 1986, the station adopted its current call sign, WRHT-FM.Call Sign History in FCC database
/ref> WMBL broadcast a popular standards format at "Unforgettable 740" in its last few years. The station was bought by a subsidiary of Clear Channel Worldwide and permanently taken silent in February 2000 to allow for WSCC, 730 in Charleston, South Carolina, to make an upgrade.

References

External links

History of WMBL
{{Greenville-New Bern Radio Defunct radio stations in the United States MBL Radio stations established in 1947 Radio stations disestablished in 2000 1947 establishments in North Carolina 2000 disestablishments in North Carolina MBL