WKAV
| City | Charlottesville, Virginia |
|---|---|
| Broadcast area |
Charlottesville, Virginia Albemarle County, Virginia |
| Branding | "94.1 Hank FM" |
| Frequency | 1400 kHz |
| First air date | October 31, 1957 |
| Format | Classic country |
| Power | 1,000 watts day and night |
| Class | C |
| Facility ID | 10651 |
| Transmitter coordinates | 38°1′49.0″N 78°29′22.0″W / 38.030278°N 78.489444°W |
| Callsign meaning | "K"avalier |
| Former callsigns | WBFY (1954-1956) WELK (1956-1980) WXAM (1980-1984) |
| Former frequencies | 1010 kHz (1954-1974) |
| Owner |
Monticello Media (Monticello Media, LLC) |
| Sister stations | WCHV, WCHV-FM, WCYK, WHTE, WZGN |
| Webcast | WKAV Webstream |
| Website | http://www.wkav.com |
WKAV is a Classic Country formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Charlottesville, Virginia, serving Charlottesville and Albemarle County, Virginia. WKAV is owned and operated by Monticello Media.
In 1954, a construction permit was issued to Lawrence Lee Kennedy for WBFY, a 1000-watt daytimer on 1010 kHz. After several extensions and a callsign change to WELK, Charlottesville's fourth radio station signed on October 31, 1957. WELK was Charlottesville's first strictly top 40 station; its competitors, WINA and WCHV, both ran older-skewing middle-of-the-road formats.
In 1966, WINA moved from 1400 kHz to 1070 kHz, opening up a valuable channel that allowed for 24-hour operation. WELK and WUVA, which was then a carrier current AM station broadcasting only in University of Virginia residence halls, both filed for the 1400 kHz allocation the following year. The competing applications required arbitration by the FCC, who first recommended denial of both as neither proposed transmitter site provided a listenable signal to both the university and downtown Charlottesvile at night. Asserting that a third nighttime station was needed, WELK found an adequate site and paid WUVA and another applicant $10,000 in exchange for withdrawing their applications. WUVA would later build an FM station on 92.7 MHz after winning another mutually-exclusive application competition in 1976.
WELK was sold to Richard Latora in late 1979. Under the new callsign WXAM, the station remained top-40, with programming from ABC's American Contemporary Network.
Failing to regain ratings traction during this time due to competition from FM, the station was sold to Charles Wilson's Cavalier Country Broadcasting in 1984, who changed the callsign to the current WKAV and instituted a country music format. Top-40 radio would not return to the market until the launch of WHTE-FM (101.9 MHz) in 2001.
...
Wikipedia