WALE
Encyclopedia
WALE is a radio station
Radio station
Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...

 licensed to the community of Greenville, Rhode Island
Greenville, Rhode Island
Greenville is a village and census-designated place in the town of Smithfield in Providence County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 8,626 at the 2000 census...

, and serving the Providence, Rhode Island
Providence, Rhode Island
Providence is the capital and most populous city of Rhode Island and was one of the first cities established in the United States. Located in Providence County, it is the third largest city in the New England region...

, area. The station is owned by Cumbre Communications Corp. The station is currently silent
Dark (broadcasting)
In the broadcasting industry, dark is a term used to describe a radio station or television station that has gone off-the-air for an indefinite period of time, or as defined by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission , a "silent" station...

.

WLKW

WLKW began official broadcasting on April 12, 1961 as Rhode Island's only 50 kW radio station during daylight hours only. This fact was noted in the calls as "LKW" really reads as "50 (L in Roman Numerals) KiloWatts" (sic). For most of its life the station's format was easy listening, which is how the calls are associated today (now the calls exist on 1450-West Warwick).

As WALE

The station acquired the current WALE call sign from the Federal Communications Commission
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President. The FCC works towards six goals in the areas of broadband, competition, the spectrum, the...

 on July 24, 1989.. The original WALE callsign was held for some 25 or so years by a different company operating out of the basement of an abandoned theater in Fall River, Massachusetts. Colonel Milton Mittler (formerly of WADK
WADK
WADK is a radio station licensed to serve Newport, Rhode Island. The station is owned by Astro Tele-Communications Corp. It airs a News/Talk format....

) was the owner.

When Francis Battaglia's North American Broadcasting Company bought WEAN, they attempted to program a talk format. The top rated show at this time was hosted by rhode island talk show legend Steve White. In the summer of 1991, WALE host Bob Giammarco was recognized by Arbitron as having the top rated evening program (After Hours with Bob Giammarco) in the market. This was no small feat considering the evening signal was quite low and the listening area was limited. As the 1990s wore on, the station added more & more brokered programming until the station aired nothing but brokered programming. WALE earned a reputation in the Providence area as having fringe programming, such as American Dissident Voices program of the neo-Nazi National Alliance
National Alliance
The National Alliance is a white separatist political organization. It was founded by University physics teacher Dr. William Luther Pierce in 1974, and is based in the Pierce family's compound in Hillsboro, West Virginia. Although it operates primarily in the United States, the National Alliance...

, which aired from 16:00-16:30 on Saturdays to nearly no listeners. WALE was also the home of Rick Adams, a follower of Willis Carto's
Willis Carto
Willis Allison Carto is a longtime figure on the American far right. He describes himself as Jeffersonian and populist, but is primarily known for his promotion of antisemitic conspiracy theories and Holocaust denial.-Influences on Carto:...

 Liberty Lobby
Liberty Lobby
Liberty Lobby was an American political advocacy organization founded in 1958 that went bankrupt in 2001. It was founded by Willis Carto. In their own words,-Antisemitic world-view:...

, who aired discussions promoting Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...

.

WALE was sold at a bankruptcy auction in 2003 to Cumbre Communications, where it reemerged as "Supermax 990", a Spanish-language format.

Cumbre Communications declared bankruptcy in 2004 to try to avoid completing their purchase of the station - after they learned the transmitter site had serious environmental issueshttp://www.fybush.com/NERW/2004/040223/nerw.html.

WALE went silent on December 29, 2006 & returned to the airwaves in late 2007 at half power. In January 2008, the station requested permission to go silent again based on a technical problem causing the transmitter to consume too much power that made the station "economically unfeasible" to operate. The FCC rejected that request.http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/cdbsmenu.hts?context=25&appn=101167700&formid=910&fac_num=49128. According to the filing, Cumbre Communications is still in bankruptcy, as a "debtor in possession
Debtor in possession
A debtor in possession in United States bankruptcy law is a person or corporation who has filed a bankruptcy petition, but remains in possession of property upon which a creditor has a lien or similar security interest...

".

The station was most recently airing a Spanish-language adult contemporary format as "Amor 990" (Love 990).

The station was an affiliate of the Red Sox
Boston Red Sox
The Boston Red Sox are a professional baseball team based in Boston, Massachusetts, and a member of Major League Baseball’s American League Eastern Division. Founded in as one of the American League's eight charter franchises, the Red Sox's home ballpark has been Fenway Park since . The "Red Sox"...

 Beisbol Network in 2005 & 2008.

In 2009, it went back on the air as WALE ABC Radio News Now 990 & became an affiliate of ABC. For a brief period, they broadcast an audio feed of WLNE-TV
WLNE-TV
WLNE-TV is the ABC-affiliated television station for Rhode Island and the South Coast of Massachusetts. It is licensed to New Bedford, Massachusetts, but is headquartered in and operates from studios at 10 Orms Street in downtown Providence, Rhode Island. It is one of two major Rhode Island...

's 24-hour
24-hour news cycle
The 24-hour news cycle arrived with the advent of television channels dedicated to news, and brought about a much faster pace of news production with increased demand for stories that can be presented as news, as opposed to the day-by-day pace of the news cycle of printed daily newspapers...

 cable news
United States cable news
Cable news refers to television channels devoted to television news broadcasts, with the name deriving from the proliferation of such networks during the 1980s with the advent of cable television. In the United States, early networks included CNN in 1980, Financial News Network in 1981, and CNN2 ...

 television channel, NewsChannel 5, in various timeslots. On Labor Day
Labor Day
Labor Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September that celebrates the economic and social contributions of workers.-History:...

, WALE carried WLNE's entire broadcast of the Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon
Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon
The MDA Labor Day Telethon is an annual telethon in the United States to raise money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association . The first MDA telethon was during the Thanksgiving Day weekend of 1952 and titled Party for MDA. It has been held annually since 1966...

, which was being simulcast on NewsChannel 5.

As of August 18, 2010, WALE is once again silent.

External links





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