830 On Radio Dial, Daytime Only

Local Radio Station Most Powerful In S.E. Mo.; 1,000 Watts

KBOA “Southeast Missouri’s Newest and Most Powerful Radio Station” went on the air at 5:30 o’clock Saturday morning with authority of the Federal Communications Commission to conduct program tests, preliminary to receiving its formal license.

The station, broadcasting on an authorized frequency of 830 kilo-cycles with a power of 1,000 watts, is following a schedule of 5:30 a.m. to 7:15 p.m., each day except Sunday when the station goes on the air at 7 a.m. and signs off at 6 p.m. Being authorized for daytime operation only on its cleared channel of 830 kc, the hours of operation will vary throughout the year, and during the winter months the operation will be limited to a much shorter day.

Response on the opening day far exceeded the expectations of the officials of the Kennett Broadcasting Corporation, owners of the station, and of the members of the staff of KBOA. From the time the station went on the air at 5:30 a.m., until the closing that night, telephone calls both local and long distance continued to pour in, telephone calls coming from as far as Memphis on the south to Cape Girardeau on the north.

Under normal operations the station should be plainly heard within a radius of 100 miles, according to the operators, though this range will be exceeded on occasions. In fact, on equipment tests made the early part of last week the station was picked up by “ham” operators as far away as New Jersey, Rhode Island, New York and Connecticut.

Mrs. Grover Wicker, who was visiting her son, Bud Wicker in Rolla last weekend, and who returned Sunday, said that she heard the station plainly in Rolla, which is 200 miles from Kennett by highway and approximately 150 air miles away.

While all of the equipment for the station has not arrived, that necessary for a satisfactory broadcast is in. Some of the testing equipment, such as a frequency monitor whereby the station can check its own wave-length is not installed, and consequently the station is having its wave-length checked by an engineering firm in Kansas City each day until the monitor arrives.

Because all of the furniture for the office and studio has not yet arrived, and although the grounds about the studio-transmitter building have not been cleaned up and landscaped, the station is carrying on business under severe handicaps, and it will probably be several days until everything is running as efficiently and smoothly as the management and staff hopes to have it.

The station does not yet have its remote control equipment in and all of the broadcasts have to be carried on from the studios, though it is planned to have remote broadcasts from churches and other public places within the next few months. One handicap at this time is the mobility of the telephone company to furnish additional transmitter or remote lines to the station. However, Paul C. Jones, manager of the station said Monday that the telephone company had extended every courtesy and had exerted every effort to make the operation of the station a success. It is merely a condition over which no one has any control at this time.

There are three lines to the station (6 wires), one of those carrying the telephone lines, one the automatic Teletype printer which brings the Associated Press News, and the other line for remote broadcasts, which include the St. Louis Cardinal ball games.

Source: The Twice-A-Week Dunklin Democrat, July, 1947