WARH

WARH

City of license	Granite City, Illinois
Broadcast area	St. Louis, Missouri
Branding	106.5 The Arch
Slogan	It's all about the variety
Frequency	106.5 MHz FM (HD Radio) (also on HD Radio) 106.5-2 FM "Deep Rock Tracks" 106.5-3 FM "Mormon Channel"
First air date	April 18, 2005 (1965 as WGNU-FM)
Format	Adult Hits
ERP	90,000 watts
HAAT	313 meters
Class	C1
Facility ID	74577
Callsign meaning	The ARcH (taken from St. Louis' most famous landmark, the Gateway Arch)
Former callsigns	WGNU (1965-1976) WWWK (1976-1987) KWK (1987-1988) WKBQ (1988-1994) WKKX (1994-2000) WSSM (2000-2005)
Owner	Hubbard Broadcasting
Webcast	Listen Live
Website	1065thearch.com

WARH (106.5 MHz FM) is a radio station licensed to Granite City, Illinois. WARH serves the St. Louis, Missouri, metropolitan area.

WARH features a locally programmed adult hits format as "106.5 The Arch" using the primary slogan "It's All About The Variety" (formerly "70s, 80s, Whatever We Want"). The station's name pays tribute to the iconic Gateway Arch monument in downtown St. Louis on the western bank of the Mississippi River. The format is musically similar to the syndicated Jack FM stations in the U.S. & Canada. The major difference that distinguishes "The Arch" from the "Jack" branded stations is that "The Arch" uses a live and local airstaff around the clock, whereas "Jack" stations are for the most part without hosts.

WARH is currently owned by Hubbard Broadcasting and broadcasts from studios in the St. Louis suburb of Creve Coeur, sending out a signal of 90,000 watts effective radiated power from its transmitter located near Resurrection Cemetery in Shrewsbury, Missouri. Because of the high concentration of radio and television transmitters in this area, it is sometimes referred to as the St. Louis Master Antenna site.^{[citation needed]}

History

Originally, the station took to the air in 1965 as WGNU-FM under the ownership of the late Chuck Norman. The station was programmed with a country music format and was simulcast on WGNU 920 AM. Norman sold the station to Doubleday Broadcasting in 1976. Doubleday changed the station's call letters to WWWK (later KWK-FM) and the format to AOR (Album Oriented Rock) calling itself "Stereo WK", and later to Top 40. Eventually, KWK became WKBQ-FM, retaining the Top 40 format and rechristening themselves as Q106.5.

When the station was purchased by Zimmer Radio Group of Cape Girardeau, Missouri in the mid 1990s, the station flip-flopped dial positions with sister station WKKX (currently WHHL) on 104.1, which had a country format known as "Kix 104." The station became "New Country Kix 106.5", where it would remain until 2000 when it was purchased by Bonneville, when it adopted a Smooth Jazz/NAC format as "Smooth 106.5 WSSM" (later "106.5 Smooth Jazz"). In April 2005, the station adopted its current format and call letters and was initially programmed by Jules Riley.

Bonneville announced the sale of WARH, as well as 16 other stations in four markets (St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati and Washington, D.C.), to Hubbard Broadcasting on January 19, 2011. The sale was completed on April 29, 2011.

On-air personalities

WARH has a full lineup of local on-air personalities that do their shows live with no voice-tracking. Mornings are hosted by Van Lorenz and Rick Wallace, the midday host is Christy Swyers, afternoons are handled by Brando, evenings are hosted by Steph Duran who guides the listeners through the station’s nighttime feature “U Call It Live”, a 4 hour block of audience controlled radio where the listeners pick and vote on every song! Overnights are done by Jay Philpott, hosting one of the only live & local all-night shows in St. Louis radio. Weekend air talent includes Julie Tristan, Robert Fithen, Tom Settles and Katie Mankus. The voice of the station, Simon Archer, is the voice of John O'Hurley (Seinfeld, Dancing With the Stars, Family Feud) produced by Brendan Shanahan. The Program Director since 2008 is Kevin Robinson.

External links

• WARH official website
• MissouriRadio.net
• Query the FCC's FM station database for WARH
• Radio-Locator information on WARH
• Query Arbitron's FM station database for WARH
• Aerial photo of WARH transmitter from Google Maps
• KWK FM 106 AM 13.8 A tribute site for KWK "The Rockin' Best!"