City | Hamilton, Ontario |
---|---|
Branding | AM 900 Hamilton's News Talk Leader |
Slogan | Your #1 Choice For News! |
Frequency | 900 kHz (AM) 95.3-3 CING-HD3 |
First air date | 1927 |
Format | News/Talk |
Power | 50,000 watts |
Class | B |
Transmitter coordinates | 43°19′59.88″N 80°7′14.16″W / 43.3333000°N 80.1206000°W |
Callsign meaning | C HaMiLton |
Owner |
Corus Entertainment (Corus Premium Television Ltd.) |
Webcast | Listen Live |
Website | www.900chml.com |
CHML is a radio station, broadcasting at 900 AM in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. CHML's transmitter power is 50,000 watts using an eight-tower directional antenna array with a signal oriented largely west-northwest to east-southeast, covering the Niagara Peninsula and Western New York, USA strongest; the array is located between Peters Corners and Cambridge. Its studios are located on West Main Street (next to Highway 403) in Hamilton. The station airs a news/talk format branded as AM 900. CHML is owned by Corus Entertainment.
CHML began operations in 1927 as a response to censorship of political discussions by Hamilton's first radio station, CKOC. The original owner was Maple Leaf Radio Company, operated by George H. Lees, a former mayor of Hamilton. The "HML" in the call-sign stood for "Hamilton Maple Leaf". CHML made its debut on Wednesday September 28, 1927. In those early years, CHML operated at 341 meters, or 880 kHz, on the AM band. In early December 1934, George Lees sold the station to Senator Arthur Hardy. At that time, CHML was operating with only 50 watts of power, and the new owner hoped to increase it to 100 watts. In 1936, Hardy asked local broadcaster Ken Soble to become the station's manager. By 1944, Soble was able to purchase the station. Shortly after Soble's death in 1966, his estate sold the station to Western Broadcasting, later known as Western International Communications. Corus took over Western's radio assets in late 1999; this included twelve radio stations, among which was CHML.
CHML's 1927 debut broadcast was typical of its era. Hamilton's mayor gave a brief talk, and then a series of local artists performed live from the new station's studios; the evening's master of ceremonies was tenor Fred Trestrail, who had become well known as a vocalist on CFRB in Toronto. Throughout CHML's early years, the station's programming was a combination of music, news, sports and stock market reports, and religious sermons from area clergy. The music was provided by local performers: one frequent guest was contralto Olive Barlow, and other guest entertainers came from the Tivoli Theatre in downtown Hamilton.