KVTO
| City of license | Berkeley, California |
|---|---|
| Broadcast area | San Francisco Bay Area |
| Slogan | "The Voice of the Orient" |
| Frequency | 1400 kHz |
| First air date | 1922 |
| Format | Chinese/Korean/Hindi/Tagalog |
| Power | 1,000 watts |
| Class | C |
| Facility ID | 28681 |
| Transmitter coordinates | 37°50′58″N 122°17′44″W / 37.84944°N 122.29556°WCoordinates: 37°50′58″N 122°17′44″W / 37.84944°N 122.29556°W |
| Former callsigns | KBLX (1986–1989) KBFN (1989–1990) KBLX (1990–1993) |
| Affiliations | Sing Tao Chinese Radio |
| Owner | Inner City Broadcasting Corporation (Urban Radio III, LLC) |
| Sister stations | KBLX, KVVN |
KVTO (1400 AM) is a radio station broadcasting a World Ethnic format. Licensed to Berkeley, California, USA, the station serves the San Francisco Bay Area. The station is currently owned by Urban Radio III, L.L.C.[1]
Its sister stations are KVVN and KBLX and it is owned by Inner City Broadcasting Corporation.
It is affiliated by Sing Tao Chinese Radio in Cantonese.
Prior to the late 1990s when KVTO was launched, the 1400 AM frequency was a simulcast of KBLX 102.9 FM, which is now a sister station of KVTO as both are owned by Inner City Broadcasting Corporation.
The station began in Berkeley in 1922 as KRE, the former callsign of a marine radio station aboard a World War I merchant marine steamship, Florence H.,[2] destroyed in an April 17, 1918, explosion at Quiberon Bay, France.[3] Later programming was simulcast on KRE-FM and there were occasional AM-FM stereo broadcasts, including some classical music programming. KRE's call letters changed to KPAT in 1963, then back to KRE in 1972. The call letters KBLX were adopted in 1986, then changed to KBFN in 1989 and back to KBLX in 1990. The current call letters, KVTO, were adopted in 1994.[4]
The Maxwell Electric Company put KRE on the air on March 11, 1922, with studios and transmitter at the Claremont Resort Hotel. In May of that year, KRE was sold to the Berkeley Daily Gazette. It was bought in January 1927 by the First Congregational Church of Berkeley, which moved the studios and built a new transmitter. In January 1930, the Chapel of the Chimes (an Oakland funeral home) bought KRE. Ownership passed in December 1936 to Central California Broadcasters, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Chapel of the Chimes. New studios and transmitter were built at 601 Ashby Avenue from 1937 to 1938. KRE-FM went on the air on February 14, 1949, with a transmitter on Round Hill Mountain, which was moved to the Ashby Avenue near Berkeley's Aquatic Park site in 1950. In March 1963, KRE was taken over by the Wright Broadcasting Company of Paterson, New Jersey.[5]
[edit] References
- ^ "KVTO Facility Record". United States Federal Communications Commission, audio division. http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/fmq?call=KVTO.
- ^ Broadcast Station Calls With a Past, WILLIAM FENWICK, Radio Broadcast, July 1928, pg 150
- ^ http://www.naval-history.net/WW1Book-USOnTheCoast.htm
- ^ San Francisco Radio Dial - 1922-1941
- ^ The History Of Radio Station KRE - KPAT - KBLX - KVTO
[edit] External links
- Sing Tao Chinese Radio (Chinese)
- Query the FCC's AM station database for KVTO
- Radio-Locator Information on KVTO
- Query Arbitron's AM station database for KVTO
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
