- WCST
Infobox Radio station
name = WCST
city =Berkeley Springs, West Virginia
area =Berkeley Springs, West Virginia Morgan County, West Virginia
branding = "92-9 Down Home Country"
slogan =
airdate =September 7 ,1958
frequency = 1010 kHz
format = Country
Bluegrass
Americana
power = 250Watt s daytime
17Watt s nighttime
erp =
class = D
callsign_meaning = W Charles S. Trump
see note
former_callsigns =
owner = Capper Broadcasting Co.
sister_stations =WDHC
webcast =
website = [http://groups.myspace.com/country929fmwdhc WCST Online]
affiliations =ABC Radio News
West Virginia Metro NewsWCST is a Country, Bluegrass, and Americana formatted broadcast
radio station licensed toBerkeley Springs, West Virginia , serving Berkeley Springs andMorgan County, West Virginia . WCST is owned and operated by Massanutten Broadcasting Co., Inc.History
WCST signed on the air on September 7, 1958. WCST started Dale Brooks, Tom Butcher, Kenny Robertson and Gary Daniels. They offered local programming, advertising and rock n' roll music. The call letters of the station were a tribute to Charles S. Trump, a major force behind getting the station on the air.
WCST adopted FM in 1965 and changed its genre to country music with the frequency 93.5 - It was sold in the 1980s to Sam and Mary Lou Trump and later to Emmett Capper in 1995.
For many years WCST played country music, 23 hours a day, why they went off the air for just one hour remains a mystery. AM1010 was reported to be dark several times, but is just a tough catch even within town limits due to a bad tower location and tower ground system.
WCST has applied for a construction permit to raise their daytime wattage to 267 watts, up from 250 and to get a better ground system. WCST operates for the time being from dawn to dusk, even though they are allotted 17 watts at night.
In the Summer of 2006, Berkeley Springs High School games and other local programming, which were heard on sister station
WDHC were moved to WCST when WDHC moved to 92.9.Also in 2006, WCST and
WDHC finally made a presence on the internet of sorts, with a MySpace Group operated by employees of the station. This, to date, is the only online presence WCST andWDHC have had.Footnote
WCST does hold a tragic footnote in the history of radio. In 1974, a member of their staff, a newly hired DJ from WSHP in Shippensburg, PA, died in the Berkeley Springs/Washington Hotel fire, along with 11 other victims. The fire, to this day, remains the most deadliest fire to happen in this region.
External links
* [http://groups.myspace.com/country929fmwdhc 92-9 Down Home Country Online]
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