WHN

WHN was a radio station in New York City located at 1050 KHZ. It played country music from 1972 to 1987. This was the format WHN was best known for

Related Topics:
New York City - Country music - 1972 - 1987

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Before that they played Adult Standards from 1962-73. Prior to that thay played Rock & Roll as WMGM-AM radio from the mid 50's to 1962. They had a diversified format as WHN since the early days of radio until their change in calls to WMGM in the 50's.

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1050 has a long history. They began in way back when as WHN radio. They hada diversified format like most radio stations did back then. As TV became the medium for drama and comedy and kids shows WHN began playing Pop Records.

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Sometime in thw 1950's the station became WMGM radio. They played rock and roll records and were more uptempo than competition. They played ELvis, Fats Domino, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Frankie Lymon, Crystals, Tokens, ray Charles, Ricky Nelson, Bill haley, and more.

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By 1962 1010 WINS, 770 WABC, and 570 WMCA were also playing predominantly rock and roll music. At that point 1050 WMGM was sold to Storer Broadcasting (which owned mostly TV stations) which did not own any rock & roll radio stations. So in 1962 Storer immediately dropped Top 40 for Pop Standards. The station was renamed WHN.

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Through the 60's, unlike WNEW and WOR, WHN played no rock music whatsoever. They played artists like nat King Cole, Al Hirt, Perry Como, Frank Sinatra, Henry mancini, Bing Crosby, Peggy Lee, Patti page, Johnny Mathis, Percy faith, ray Conniff, etc. Ratings were decent.

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In the 70's they did add some soft rock to the mix. By then they had personalitys like Lee Arnold, Jack Spector, Del Demontroux, Dan Daniel, and others. The ratings were still low so in 1973 WHN became a Country Music station. New York City had never been a big Country Music town and only had a Country music station in the late 60's on 970 WJRZ (which became Top 40 WWDJ in 1971 and Religious in 1974).

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As a country music station they played artists like Johnny cash, WIlly Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Tanya Tucker, Lynn Anderson, Kenny Rogers, Mel Tillis, Charley Pride, Mickey Gilly, Ronnie Milsap, and many more. Also they mixed in non country artists that had country friendly songs such as The Eagles, Crosby Stills Nash, Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Anne Murray, Commodores, Olivia Newton John, Elton John, Linda Rondstat, and others.

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Usually they rated in the top 10 as New York's only country station. Air People like Mike Fitzgerald, Dan Taylor, and many others moved in. In the late 70's Mutual Radio would buy WHN from Storer. In 1980 they got some copmpetition when 106.7 WRVR was sold to Viacom and dropped Jazz for Country and became WKHK. As a result ratings went down for WHN but they stuck it out. They added Mets Baseball and other pro sports teams to their lineup in evenings.

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In 1984 WKHK 106.7 became Lite FM 106.7 WLTW playing a soft AC format which has evolved to a mainstream AC format today. WHN 1050 remained Country with decent ratings. In 1985 Doubleday Broadcasting would buy 1050 WHN. In 1986 Emmis bought WHN in a corporate deal. Emmis added Sports talk in the evenings. The kept the country format the rest of the day until 1987.

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In late April Emmis announced that on July 1, 1987 that WHN would drop Country for Sports Talk and pro sports play by play. They would drop the WHN calls and become WFAN. In May NBC announced that AC WYNY 97.1 would go country on July 1 the same day as WHN ended the format.

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The airstaff said their goodbyes at the end of June. Dan Taylor signed off at 3 PM with "For The Good Times" by Ray Price on July 1, 1987. Then at 3 PM WFAN made its debut on 1050.

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Ratings were low initially but slowly climbing. In 1988 NBC was leaving radio so they sold their stations to Emmis leaving them with 97.1 & 103.5 FM and 1050 & 660 AM. Emmis opted to sell 103.5 to Westwood One and the WYNY intellectual Country unit as well so Country 97 WYNY became Country 103.5 WYNY. Emmis kept 97.1 and moved their Dance/R & B format WQHT there.

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Emmis moved WFAN to 660 from 1050 that October. Infinity would later buy 66 WFAN in 1992. WFAN is still occupying 660 today with good ratings.

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As for 1050, Spanish Broadcasting would buy them. The problem though was that they already owned 620 AM. The FCC granted them a waiver to run 1050 asa commercial free station until it could be sold. In October 1988 when WFAN would move off 1050 to 660, 620 WQKQ flipped from Spanish AC to Spanish Oldies while 1050 became KQ 1050 WUKQ playing Spanish Adult Contemporary music commercial free.

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Shortly after Jewish Forward would swap 97.9 WEVD for 1050 WUKQ. Under the deal the Spanish AC format would move to 97.9 and the station would become KQ 98 WSKQ FM Sueve. This happened early in 1989. Eventually KQ 98 became Mega 97.9 and flipped to Tropical Spanish Music.

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WEVD's format though would move to 1050 in early 1989. 1050 WEVD had a brokered format with Jewish programming, Ethnic programs, talk shows,a nd a big band show with Danny Stiles. Ratings were very very low but the station made a profit selling blocks of airtime.

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By the mid 90's WEVD had a talk format on weekdays but ethnic programming nights and weekends. In 2001 WEVD enteretd into a time brokerage agreement with ABC/Disney and began running ESPN Radio 24/7. The station was renamned WEPN and eventually sold to ABC/Disney outright

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