WFUN (AM)

WFUN (970 AM) – branded ESPN 970 WFUN – is an commercial sports radio station in Ashtabula, Ohio. Owned by Media One Group, it serves Ashtabula County, Ohio and parts of the Erie, Pennsylvania region. It is one of four stations in the Media One Group's Ashtabula cluster, the others being WZOO-FM, WREO-FM, WYBL (FM) and WFXJ-FM—all of which were sold off by Clear Channel in September 2007.

This article is about AM radio station WFUN in Ashtabula, Ohio. For the former legendary station WFUN in South Miami, Florida, see WAXY (AM).
WFUN
CityAshtabula, Ohio
Broadcast areaAshtabula, Ohio
Erie, Pennsylvania
Frequency970 kHz
BrandingESPN 970 WFUN
SloganYour Sports Giant
Programming
FormatSports radio
AffiliationsCleveland Cavaliers Radio Network
Cleveland Indians Radio Network
ESPN Radio
Ohio State Sports Network
Ownership
OwnerMedia One Group
(Media One Holdings, LLC)
Sister stationsWFXJ-FM, WQGR, WREO-FM, WYBL, WZOO-FM
History
First air dateSeptember 21, 1937 (1937-09-21)
Former call signsWICA (1937–60)
WREO (1960–78)
Call sign meaning"The FUN spot on your dial"
Technical information
ClassB
Power5,000 watts (day)
1,000 watts (night)
Transmitter coordinates41°48′52″N 80°46′45″W
Links
WebcastListen live
Websiteespn970wfun.com

History

The station signed on the air in 1937 as WICA (its call letters having stood for "Industry, Commerce, Agriculture"). WICA started an FM sister station, WICA-FM, on 103.7 MHz around 1950. WICA-FM's frequency soon thereafter moved to 97.1 MHz, duplicating the programming of the AM station. Both AM and FM stations were owned by Richard D. and David C. Rowley since their inception.

WICA and WICA-FM later became WREO and WREO-FM, taking their calls from the company name Radio Enterprises of Ohio, Inc. (albeit being formally formed on October 7, 1986). WREO would change its call sign to WFUN on July 3, 1978, taking the call letters of a legendary AM Top 40 station in Miami, Florida while eventually adopting an oldies format. The call letters WREO were retained by the sister FM station, which continues today with a Soft AC format.

In May 2000 the Rowleys sold the stations and WZOO-FM to Clear Channel. WFUN's oldies format was dropped in February 2001 for a standard news/talk format (Rush Limbaugh's show was the only one retained, as WFUN aired it since the early 90s), adding Dr. Laura, Jim Rome, Coast to Coast AM and Fox Sports Radio. Morning drive on the station remained local throughout this time, evolving into basic a local news and political talk show hosted by Roger McCoy and later by John Broom.

logo prior to 2007

Clear Channel sold their Ashtabula cluster, including WFUN, in September 2007 to Media One Group (headed by Embrescia and dubbed "Sweet Home Ashtabula" as a placeholder). WFUN's programming changed on November 3, 2007 over to a sports/talk format affiliated with ESPN Radio, dropping all political talk programming and electing to go for a smaller, male dominated, core audience.[1][2][3]

Since 2012 WFUN has served as the ESPN Radio affiliate for Erie, Pennsylvania due to WRIE taking the CBS Sports Radio affiliation.

WICA-TV
Main article: WICA-TV

Richard D. and David C. Rowley, the founders of WICA AM/FM, also started WICA-TV on channel 15 in the 1950s. Hampered both by broadcasting on the (then relatively unknown) UHF dial, and with no network affiliation of any sort, WICA-TV had limited broadcast hours, a sparse and often overused film library, and a heavy amount of local programming (usually filmed with only one camera). WICA-TV started broadcasting on September 19, 1953, but quietly signed off around June 21, 1956.

The Rowley family then reactivated WICA-TV on April 4, 1966, with an intent of donating it as a non-profit educational license. As was in its first incarnation, WICA-TV was again hampered with no network programming, an often overused and limited film library of mediocre and low rental fare. In addition, WICA-TV still broadcast only in black-and-white when most stations already converted to color (WQEX in Pittsburgh was the last licensed television station to convert in 1986.) and still filmed local programming with only one camera.

WICA-TV signed off for good on December 26, 1967, with its license returned to the FCC. The UHF antenna is the sole remaining element of WICA-TV's existence, still affixed to the WREO-FM tower.

gollark: I put in `const raw = polynomial(seq([2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29]))`.
gollark: (x - 3) * -1 / 2.14708725e+8 * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) / 3.72736e+7 * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) * -1 / 1.3934592e+7 * (x - 3) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) / 1.01376e+7 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) * -5 / 3.5831808e+7 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) / 6.7584e+6 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) * -1 / 1.24416e+7 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 19) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) / 2.193408e+7 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 23) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) * -1 / 2.322432e+8 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 29) + (x - 2) / 7.685922816e+9 * (x - 3) * (x - 5) * (x - 7) * (x - 11) * (x - 13) * (x - 17) * (x - 19) * (x - 23)
gollark: What are your 10 favourite primes?
gollark: As far as I'm aware, this generates something like O(n²) output terms.
gollark: Fine, I'll... feed it some primes? How many primes?

References
  1. "WFUN/Ashtabula To Flip To Sports". AllAccess.com.
  2. "Making Moves: Morning Edition". Radio-Info.com. October 29, 2007. Archived from the original on March 22, 2012. Retrieved July 11, 2010.
  3. "WZOO goes oldies, WFUN to switch to all sports". starbeacon.com.
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