WCMI (AM)
| City | Ashland, Kentucky |
|---|---|
| Broadcast area | Huntington, West Virginia |
| Branding | Cat Sports 93.3 |
| Frequency | 1340 kHz |
| Translator(s) | 93.3 W227CI (Catlettsburg) |
| First air date | 1935 |
| Format | Sports |
| Power | 1,000 watts |
| Class | C |
| Facility ID | 21588 |
| Affiliations |
Cincinnati Bengals Radio Network Cleveland Cavaliers Radio Network ESPN Radio |
| Owner | Fifth Avenue Broadcasting Company, Inc. (dba Kindred Communications) |
WCMI is an ESPN Radio affiliate. It broadcasts on AM frequency 1340 kHz and is under ownership of Kindred Communications.
WCMI broadcasts University of Kentucky football, men's basketball and women's basketball, as well as Cincinnati Bengals football.
The station changed its call letters from WMPF in March 1935. It broadcast at 1310 kcs, with 100 watts. That year, out-of-town football games of Ashland High School were sponsored on WCMI by the Boyd County Democratic Campaign Committee. Permission was granted in July 1936 to increase daytime wattage to 250. In mid-1939, the station was sold to J. Lindsay Nunn and Gilmore N. Nunn, father and son, by B. F. Forgey and J. T. Norris, and became affiliated with the Mutual Broadcasting System on September 24. The station was reassigned to 1340 kcs on March 29, 1941 by the Federal Communications Commission under the Havana Treaty.
On June 15, 1945, WCMI switched affiliations from Mutual to CBS, an event highlighted by a day's cele- bration, including a downtown parade in Huntington and a dedicatory program on which heads of the three city governments served by the station — Ashland, Huntington and Ironton, Ohio, — appeared. The three city mayors simultaneously proclaimed the week June 15–22 as "CBS Week". A month-long promotion campaign leading to the network affiliation included front page newspaper ads and stories, sales letters to agencies and billboards and car cards in the three cities. Among the staff members at the time were Clay Dopp, Louis Lageman, Whitney Richard (Dick) Martin and women's director Sara Fisher.
In August 1953, the FCC approved the sale of the station by the Nunns to Great Trails Broadcasting for $140,000. Great Trails was controlled by Charles Sawyer, ex-U.S. Commerce Secretary, which also took over WCMI's application for a television station to broadcast on Channel 13 from Huntington, which was withdrawn in March 1954. The station was sold again on June 20, 1956 to Edwina Broadcasting Corp., owned by George H. Clinton, for $165,000, and then to WCMI Radio Inc., owned by Frederic Gregg, Jr., in October 1958 for $69,285. WCMI dropped its CBS affiliation in February 1958, resuming it on February 29, 1960.
The station changed hands in December 1959, sold to WOMP, Inc., run by Donald J. Horton and G.D. Kincaid, for $163,000. By June 1962, the station increased its power from 250 to 1,000 watts during the daytime.
Coordinates: 38°28′02″N 82°35′49″W / 38.46722°N 82.59694°W
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