Information about Wulm

WULM
Broadcast area	Springfield, Ohio
Slogan	Springfield's Community Station
First air date	1946
Frequency	1600 (kHz)
Format	Talk/Sports
Power	1,000 watts daytime, 34 watts nighttime
Class	ND1
Owner	Urban Light Ministries [1]
Website	[2]]

WULM (1600 AM) is an American commercial radio station licensed to (and still originating in) Springfield, Ohio. It operates at 1,000 watts daytime (coming in on any radio crystal clear in Clark, Champaign, Greene, Miami, and Montgomery counties) and 34 watts nighttime 24/7 along with an audio stream on its website.

History

WULM's history dates back to 1946 when it was founded as WJEL. At the time of its founding, the station was licensed to nearby Dayton, Ohio. Country music singer Donnie Bowser, a Springfield resident performed frequently on WJEL's live Saturday night program. In 1954, the station was moved to Springfield and was given new call letters: WBLY (for Bob L. Yountz), which previously had been used by the present-day WIMA in Lima, Ohio. This move was nearly coincidental with the move of Springfield station WWSO to Dayton, where it became WAVI (now known as WDAO)

The station used the call letters WBLY from 1954 to 2002. It was operated by Champion City Broadcasting (later RAY Broadcasting) before being sold to Urban Light Ministries, a local non-denominational Christian charity in April of 2002 which adopted the WULM call letters in August of that same year. Urban Light's purchase of the station kept it a locally owned and operated community citizen and helps provide operating funds and a medium for the local ministry to reach out to pre-believers and to families in need. WULM remains the last locally owned/operated commercial radio station licensed by the FCC to Springfield still operating with studios and offices in Springfield.

John Hall made his mark at WIZE as a Top 40 DJ and much sought-after voice talent. Hall, also a veteran of WKSW Urbana, WLW Cincinnati, WBNS Columbus and WCLR Piqua later became WULM's first program director and general manager in 2002 before his death in August of 2004. The renovated studio facilities have been named in his memory.

WBLY FM

Now WDHT (Hot 102.9), WBLY-FM was founded in 1958 and broadcast at 102.9 on the dial. It was a simulcast of WBLY-AM from 1958-1979 and played the same middle of the road format as WBLY-AM. It was owned by Champion City Broadcasting. In 1979 they changed the call letters to WAZU and stopped simulcasting WBLY-AM and began playing album oriented rock and occasionally some adult contemporary. WAZU had the nickname "The Big Wazoo". At that time it was licensed to Springfield and had the same studios as WBLY. In 1992 Champion City Broadcasting sold the station to Osborne Communications and moved the studios to Dayton. From 1988-1995 the station competed with WTUE-FM but in 1995 it was sold to Great Trails Broadcasting and its call letters where changed to WING and it played classic rock from 1995-2001. It was known as WING-FM and had the same format until 2001 when it changed to it current format, "Blazin Hip Hop and R&B". The WING call letters are in use (and where in use before WING-FM) by "ESPN Radio 1410", or WING-AM

Past Programming

WULM has had many different formats over since it started broadcasting. Originally country when it was founded, when it was sold to Bob Yontz (and became known as WBLY) he took over and left his mark on the entire Miami Valley. The format was changed to talk in the morning along with music, with its host Smilin' Bob (Bob Yontz) and was a MOR station (Middle of the Road) the rest of the day. Smilin Bob remained a personality on the station through the 70's and into the 80's. He became greatly known all around the valley. He was famous for giving all of his callers a nickname, and he handed out many. WBLY also aired a big band program that was the top rated program in its time slot for the Dayton area. In 1987 WBLY changed its format to oldies and the following year it was "sold" to Yontz's son Ron, who operated RAY broadcasting.

Ron switched the format to a news/sports/talk format but its broadcasting power was toned down to 250 watts and it could not be heard that far out of Clark County, and was famous for being "the most staticy station east of the Mississippi" at night, although it came in perfectly clear during the day. Although it lost many of its former listeners, it picked many up from it sports coverage. WBLY did mostly Catholic Central games until WIZE went under and then began airing all teams in Clark County. It was famous for not only having 1 game but in football and basketball it aired one game live and one game on tape delay. It also did Wittenberg football and basketball games along with a show during the week. It also had a high school sports talk show during the week and a popular show on Saturday morning called "Sports Scene". During the tournament it would air all local teams' games, and sometimes there would be so many teams playing that they would go until 2:00 am in the morning. They also had great news coverage, and the news director was Darrel Bauer, who is now at WHIO.

In 2002 it was sold to Urban Light Ministries. They toned up the broadcasting power to 1,000 watts. After they changed the call letter to ULM they continued to have a news/sports/talk format but added more programming including a local morning talk show and a late-morning talk show that talked about the issues in Clark County. After that sports director Marty Bannister continued his "Sports Scene" show that he aired during the week and had done before when it was WBLY. They also added more popular network programming, including Bill O'Riley. The station became more popular but ULM decided to switch back to music in the summer of 2003.

They went to a unique "Rock n' Soul Classic's" format. It spotlighted the vintage hits from the first generation of the Top 40 and R&B genres. During this time, its weekend programs along with NASCAR coverage included The Motown Show, Dennis Mitchell's Breakfast With The Beatles, Oldies Coast To Coast, Little Walter's Time Machine, Glenn Sauter's Hits of Yesteryear and Cool Bobby B's Doo Wop Stop. That format ran from the summer of 2003 to the spring of 2006. They then switched to "Springfield's Sunshine Station" with a format of is "The Fun Hits of the 70's; from Top 40 hits of those eras from April of 2006 until February of 2007 when they changed the slogan to "Springfield's Community Station", keeping the 60's/70's music format until September of 2007.

Current Programming

1600 WULM "Springfield's Community Station" current programming is News/Talk from the USA Radio Network. They carry their talk programming as well as their news and sports updates.

Besides the USA Radio Network WULM continues providing great local sports coverage. It airs a sports program on Saturday morning from 9:00-10:30, which is hosted by long time WULM sports personalities Dave Williams, (The Coach) Jim Scoby, and John Derr. The "Saturday Morning Sports Show" (formally The Springfield Sports Show) has local high school sports talk along with Ohio State and Wittenberg talk in college sports. In professional, the Cleveland Browns and the Cincinnati Bengals are covered in the NFL and the Cleveland Indians and the Cincinnati Reds are covered in the MLB. The program also has interviews with local sports personalities (most recently James Laurnitis of the Buckeyes). During Ohio State football they have an Ohio State football show live on Thursday nights from Joe's 40 US Highway Grille in Springfield as well as carrying all the Buckeye games through The Ohio State Football Radio Network. And of course, as they have for over 15 years, WULM has live play-by-play coverage of local high school sports with Williams doing the play-by-play calling and Scoby covering the commentator duties.

WULM has a history of sending there sports department people a long way. Former sports director Marty Bannister is now the voice of the Columbus Destroyers and a sideline reporter on the Ohio State Football Radio Network. He also is the voice of Ohio State Women's basketball. Scott Leo, a former play-by-play man and talk show host for four years at WULM, is now the voice of the Columbus Clippers and does play-by-play high school football for WONE/WIZE in the fall. He also covers Wittenberg football, basketball, and baseball for Wittenberg's student station.

WULM also has local programming. One program they have is Urban Light Ministries president Rev. Eli Williams' mid-morning (10:00) talk program "Crossing Over" dealing with local people and issues from a Christian and local community perspective. Rev. Williams is also the host of "Urban Light Radio" a Sunday morning contemporary gospel music program on WULM.

WULM also serves the community with Speak Out a locally produced community forum/on air town meeting on Saturday mornings after The Saturday Morning Sports Show for 10:30 to 12:00 which invites listeners input to local issues. The show is hosted and moderated by Larry Spicer. It has had guests such as political figures such as Steve Austria and Ross Megregor and countless others as well as people from local events ranging from the Enon Apple Butter Festival to Shawnee's High School Band Festival to the Farmer's Market at the Heritage Center.

Station's studios and offices are located on Miracle Mile in Springfield, at the transmitter site and former studios of WIZE (now simulcasting the programming of WONE in Dayton; which itself is now a relay for WCKY in Cincinnati). Its transmitter is located on Miller Road off of State Route 41 West which is also the transmitting site of WDHT-FM..originally the site of the former WBLY-AM and WAZU-FM, which was the former WBLY-FM, when both stations were owned by Champion City Broadcasting. The WBLY calls are currently used by a low-power FM station in Sycamore, Georgia.

See also

WDHT

External links

• Official WULM site (with streaming audio)
• WULM's technical information from Radio-Locator website
• Query the FCC's AM station database for WULM.
• Urban Light Ministries website