KAVE (New Mexico)
Radio station in Carlsbad, New Mexico, United States
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
KAVE (1240 AM) was a radio station located in Carlsbad, New Mexico. The station went on the air in 1937 as KLAH, became KAVE in 1941, and lost its license in 1974.
- 1210 kHz (1937–1941)
- 1240 kHz (1941–1974)
| |
| Frequencies |
|
|---|---|
| Ownership | |
| Owner | Western States Broadcasters Inc. |
| History | |
First air date | September 15, 1937 |
Last air date | October 10, 1974 |
Former call signs | KLAH (1937–1941) |
| Technical information | |
| Power |
|
History
On July 22, 1936, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) authorized the Carlsbad Broadcasting Company to construct a new station on 1210 kHz in Carlsbad.[1] The company's principals were Barney Hubbs, A. J. Crawford, Jack Hawkins, and Harold Miller;[1] Hawkins and Hubbs also owned the Pecos Enterprise and KIUN in Pecos, Texas.[2] The station, which was assigned the call sign KLAH,[2] went on the air September 15, 1937.[3] In 1941, the station's call sign was changed to KAVE,[4] a nod to the caves at nearby Carlsbad Caverns;[5] it also moved to 1240 kHz under the terms of the North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement.
Carlsbad Broadcasting Company sold KAVE to the unrelated Carlsbad Broadcasting Corporation for $22,000 in 1944, after Hawkins and Hubbs decided to focus on KIUN; most of the new owners' principals—Val Lawrence, Gene Rethmeyer, Norman R. Loose, and Edward Talbott—were associated with KROD in El Paso, Texas.[6] On May 16, 1955, Carlsbad Broadcasting Corporation applied to the FCC for a construction permit to build a television station on channel 6 in Carlsbad.[7] Carlsbad Broadcasting had been planning for three years to build a TV station and had purchased a site on "C" Mountain in 1950.[8] Before construction for the TV station began, negotiations were concluded to sell KAVE radio and the television station permit to Voice of the Caverns, a company of the Battison family consisting of Nancy Hewitt and John Battison, so that Val Lawrence could dedicate himself to managing KROD-TV in El Paso;[9] the Battisons put KAVE-TV on the air August 24, 1956.[10]
In 1958, the KAVE stations were sold to Ed Talbott, the chief engineer of KROD radio and a minority stockholder in Voice of the Caverns.[11] Talbott's death in 1963[12] was followed by the $250,000 sale of the stations to John Deme, owner of WINF in Manchester, Connecticut.[13] In 1966, Deme sold KAVE radio and television to separate, but related owners. The manager of radio station KVKM in Monahans, Texas, Ross Rucker, acquired KAVE radio for $118,000. At the same time, John B. Walton, whose Walton Stations group owned KVKM and its television adjunct KVKM-TV, spent $325,000 to purchase KAVE-TV.[14]
J. Ross Rucker agreed to sell KAVE to Western States Broadcasters—owned by Frank Cooke, Meyer Rosenberg, Dick A. Blenden, Herman H. Ljnneweh, and Jack Rosenberg—in 1970;[15] the new owners took control on January 14, 1971.[3] Western States programmed a middle of the road (MOR) and rock music format on the station.[3] In 1974, KAVE was fined $5,000 for copyright infringement, as it had played ASCAP-licensed music without paying royalties; the violations had been inherited from the station's previous owner, who had been in a six-year dispute with ASCAP.[16]
On November 7, 1974, the FCC announced that the KAVE license had been deleted for failure to file a renewal application;[17] the renewal had been rejected on October 10 for having been filed late.[18][19] In February 1975, Western States reapplied for 1240 kHz in Carlsbad, proposing a contemporary rock and MOR station; their application competed against one by James B. Hughes and Gerald M. Hanners for a pop, country and western, and rock station that requested use of the former KAVE facilities.[18] Hughes and Hanners would receive the construction permit in 1978; their new station, subsequently transferred to Hughes alone,[20] went on the air as KAMQ on June 25, 1979.[21]