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KABC (AM)

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KABC
File:790KABC.png
Broadcast areaGreater Los Angeles Area
Frequency790 kHz (HD Radio)
Branding"TalkRadio 790 KABC"
Programming
FormatNews/Talk
AffiliationsABC News, Los Angeles Dodgers Radio Network
Ownership
Owner
KLOS
History
First air date
April 14, 1925 (as KFVF)
Call sign meaning
K American Broadcasting Company
(former owner)
Technical information
Facility ID33254
ClassB
ERP5,000 watts
Transmitter coordinates
34°01′41.00″N 118°22′22.00″W / 34.0280556°N 118.3727778°W / 34.0280556; -118.3727778
Links
WebcastListen Live
Websitewww.kabc.com

KABC 790 AM is a Los Angeles radio station, and a West Coast flagship station for the Citadel Broadcasting company. A pioneer of the talk radio format, the station went "all-talk" in 1960 and was one of the first stations to do so. KABC is one of many Disney/ABC Radio stations that has now merged with Citadel Broadcasting but remains an ABC affiliate.

KABC first went on the air on April 14, 1925 as KVFV. On November 15, 1929 the station was sold to Earle C. Anthony, a local car dealer who already owned KFI-AM 640. In the early 1940s, new FCC rules prohibited any entity from owning more than one radio station. While he owned the station, Anthony changed the call letters to reflect his initials, KECA. ABC bought the station in 1944, changing the call letters to KABC in 1954.

KABC has been the base of operation for many influential radio hosts, including early talk polemicists Joe Pyne and Louis Lomax, Ira Fistel, Michael Jackson, whose talk show attracted celebrities, politicians, and newsmakers of all types, pioneering radio psychologists Dr. Toni Grant and David Viscott, and more recent syndicated hosts including Dennis Prager (now with NewsTalk 870 KRLA and the Salem Radio Network), John and Ken (on KFI before their stint on KABC and now currently back on KFI) and Larry Elder. In the 1980s, Jackson, Grant and Viscott were also heard nationwide on ABC Radio's Talkradio network.

From 1974-97, it was also the station of the Los Angeles Dodgers and their hall-of-fame broadcaster Vin Scully. In 2008, the Dodgers Radio Network returned to KABC.

Though still a prominent Los Angeles signal, KABC, since the Disney takeover in December 1996, has declined dramatically in the ratings. Disney's "coup" included the immediate replacement of longtime management personnel (such as 16-year General Manager George Green, who started as a KABC Salesman in 1959), with Disney corporate selections embodying questionable competence. It now consistently ranks far behind KFI, the other major talk station in Los Angeles.

In April 2007, administrators at Academia Semillas del Pueblo (ASDP) in the El Sereno community of North East Los Angeles filed a defamation lawsuit against KABC 790 AM and Doug McIntyre, claiming that the host of "McIntyre in the Morning" "targeted the school for destruction because the children were Latino, the teachers were Latino, the principal director was Latino," as stated in the lawsuit.[1] The lawsuit alleges that school employees received death threats and that the school was the target of a bomb threat because of McIntyre's extensive on-air criticism of the school, in which he accused ASDP of espousing a racist and separatist Anti-American philosophy.[2]

On November 6, 2007, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Ralph W. Dau took the case under submission, and it is currently pending in his courtroom.[3]


Current programming

Current personalities on KABC include Doug McIntyre, Joe Scarborough, John Phillips, and Don Imus, whose Imus in the Morning came to KABC in December 2007. (A complete list of shows is in the next section below.)

KABC is the flagship station of the Los Angeles Dodgers. It carried games from 1974 to 1998, when the station was outbid by KXTA (now KTLK). After some years on KFWB, the team returned to KABC in 2008.[4]

Although KABC and KSPN no longer have the same ownership, "710ESPN" reached out to KABC to air Games 3 and 5 of the 2008 World Series because KSPN was committed to other live sports events on its schedule. (KABC carried the last 3½ innings of the suspended Game 5.)

Talking about hosts, KABC was the home of one of the best, in Steve Allison, "The man who midnight," in the late 1960's

Diversity

KABC is notable for having a diverse set of conservative talk show hosts including openly gay right-leaning hosts Al Rantel and Tammy Bruce.

Logos

References

  1. ^ Academia Semillas del Pueblo and Marcos Aguilar v. Douglas McIntyre, ABC, Inc., et al., Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, Case No.: BC 369626
  2. ^ Los Angeles Times, Apr. 19, 2007, page B4
  3. ^ Los Angeles Daily News, November 6, 2007, http://www.dailynews.com/search/ci_7385574?IADID
  4. ^ Los Angeles Times, Oct. 24, 2007, page D8


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