City | Terre Haute, Indiana |
---|---|
Branding | The Talk Station 1230 & 1440 |
Slogan | The Talk Station |
Frequency | 1230 kHz |
First air date | 1958 (at 1300) |
Format | News/Talk |
Power | 1,000 watts day 1,000 watts night |
Class | C |
Facility ID | 136105 |
Transmitter coordinates | 39°29′21.00″N 87°25′10.00″W / 39.4891667°N 87.4194444°W |
Former callsigns |
1300 AM: WBOW (2002-2014) WSJX (2000-2002) WJSH (1991-2000) WYTL (1987-1991) WPFR (1983-1987) |
Owner | Duey E. Wright (Midwest Communications, Inc.) |
Sister stations | WWVR, WVIG, WDWQ, WMGI, WBOW |
Webcast | Listen Live |
Website | wibqam.com |
WIBQ (1230 AM, "NewsTalk 1230") is a radio station broadcasting a news/talk format. Licensed to Terre Haute, Indiana, the station serves the Terre Haute area. It first began broadcasting in 1983 under the call sign WPFR. The station is currently owned by Duey E. Wright, through licensee Midwest Communications, Inc.
The station went on the air as WPFR-AM on March 17, 1983, as a sister station to WPFR-FM (now WDWQ). On November 9, 1987, the call sign was changed to WYTL. The company that owned WPFR, WPFR-AM, and WYTL went into bankruptcy and both stations went off the air in 1991.
In 1992, current WAXI morning personality Ronn Mott purchased the station with the help of banker Terry Tevlin, the call sign had been changed to WJSH prior to the sale on October 22, 1991. The station was again sold to an individual in Connecticut which eventually led to the station going off the air for a second time in 1996.
The station was again sold in late 1996, this time to current owner Crossroads Communications. They brought the station back on the air in January 1997, simulcasting new sister station WSDM-FM. In 1998 the simulcast ended and the format was changed to Southern Gospel with some programming coming from Reach Network out of Nashville, Tennessee.
The format was again changed in 1999 to Sports radio ("The X") prompting the call sign to be changed to WSJX on March 1, 2000. The call sign was finally changed to WBOW on August 1, 2002, utilizing the legendary call sign that had been used on 1230 AM and 640 AM in the Terre Haute metropolitan area from 1927 until 2001 when 640 AM went dark. The WBOW call sign was later picked up by sister station 102.7 FM in 2003 as WBOW-FM. The station continued to broadcast a Sports radio format along with sister station WSDX, simulcasting "ESPN Sports Radio" featuring programming from ESPN Radio, until September 18, 2012, when AM 1300 changed their format to news/talk.