Origins of Broadcast Call Letters in West Virginia

This page was last revised on April 1, 2021

ADDITIONAL NOTES

WCAW. This page previously indicated that the call stood for "country and western." However, Mack Miles writes:

My dad, Paul Miles, ran WCAW and Capitol Broadcasting Corp. from 1959 until the late 80's or so. WCAW didn't program country music until around 1966, so it was just luck that CAW stood for County And Western. I believe that the name came from a tie-in with their on-air mascot "Maty" the crow or "Maty 680". Maty the crow would say "caw, caw!" They even had a crow living in the studio for years and my dad used it as the logo. Our cars all had WCAW and the Maty painted on them for years.

In 2004, Bob Moore wrote:

Bill Stone told me he was formerly an original partner in Capitol Broadcasting, owner of WCAW and it originally stood for 'Charleston And West virginia'. The bird of course, which came later only added to the station's stature.

In a 2009 email, Chambers Williams wrote:

I learned all about radio hanging out at WCAW in Kanawha City as a teenager, and spent many hours there on the weekend doing work for them for free just to learn the business. They told me then that the call letters were a combination of Charleston and West Virginia, and that someone realized later on that the "CAW" was the sound a crow makes, so they created "Matey the Crow" as the station mascot. They got a real crow -- and it sat in a cage in a corner of the control room. Ed Rabel was there for a while when I was hanging out at WCAW.

WCFC. A 1947 newspaper article stated: “The letters were selected first for ease in pronunciation, understandibility, and in being remembered. Then several slogans were selected which fit the call letters WCFC. West Virginia's Cleanest and Finest City or, for use during the summer months, West Virginia's Coolest and Finest City, which the Beckley Newspapers Broadcasting Service believes fits and describes Beckley; and WCFC, the World's Cleanest and Finest Coal, describing the famous Smokeless Coal for which the Beckley area is famous. Other call letter combinations were also considered. One of them was WVSC for West Virginia Smokeless Coal but this combination was not available. The firm also sought a combination of letters which would fit the two newspapers which it publishes but nothing satisfactory could be found due to the fact that there are two newspapers to be considered rather than one.”

WCIR. The original owner, Thomas Waldron, told me that WCIR could be interpreted as either "Christianity in radio" or "Christ is risen." The station originally carried Christian programming in the midddays and all day on Sundays. --jm

WCKV. This page previously stated that WCKV stood for Ceredo-Kenova Video. However, Vernon Stanfill, general manager and chief engineer of WFGH writes, "Here is a correction. There "was" a business Ceredo-Kenova Video, BUT there were not an over the air entity. WCKV Stood for Wayne Ceredo-Kenova Vinson, which were three of the high schools in the northern end of Wayne County. The station was to be affiliated with WFGH at Fort Gay and was actually given a Construction Permit with the WCKV call but never got on the air because there was no money for equipment at the time."

WCOZ. Chris Johnson, former General Manager of WKLC Rock 105 and WCOZ 1300AM writes, "The WCOZ call letter was "parked" on 1300 am by the current owner Lynn Martin. Originally it stood for "COZY" and used in conjunction with an easy listening format that Lynn had on one of his stations in the Lexington, KY market. When he changed the format on the Lexington station to adult contemporary he moved the WCOZ call to the St. Albans station. At the time, it was programmed with as a 100% simulcast of WKLC/ROCK 105 (105.1 FM, St. Albans). This was done so that the company could keep the WCOZ call letters and not have to release them (he felt they still had some value in the general radio market place). However, in doing so, he gave up the 1300 am call letters of WKAZ which had been on the station since Bristol Broadcasting gave them up for WQBE. In the long run the WCOZ letters are of no value because the easy listening formats that would have used a "Cozy" theme are long gone. The WKAZ call letter was immediately taken by West Virginia Radio Corp. and put on their "oldies" formatted 107.3 in Charleston. The WKAZ calls, because of their heritage in the market, proved in the long run, to be much more valuable."

WGYA. WGYA was the original call for WVOW Logan when it had a construction permit in 1950. I do not know whether the call was ever used.

WHAW. The original owner was the Lewis Service Corporation, whose pricipal was Harold A. McWhorter. Harold established WPAR Parkersburg in 1935, and WHAW Weston in 1948. Harold wanted his inititals as the call letters, WHAM, but Stromberg Carlson had those on 1180 in Rochester. He chose WHAW, telling some they stood for "Harold and (his wife) Wilda," others that he had just turned over the "M" in McWhorter.

WHLX. Chris Carmichael wrote in 2011: “The WHLX call letters were for WHLL. WHLX's owner Neal Fondas was the sales manager for WHLL. When he launched WHLX, he had wanted the WHLL calls, but they were unavailable. I worked for Neal from 1991 until the station was sold to Osborne Communications in 1996. Mr. Fondas passed away, from lung cancer, the same day that Osborne took over.”

WITB. A reader of ths page writes, "My roommate at Salem College West Virginia was our school's radio station manager. The radio station was located in the basement of the administration building. W In The Basement"

WKMM. This page previously stated that WKMM stood for "Kingwood Mountain Music." However, in May 2004 Mike Graham wrote, "I can tell you, as the first official advertising sales person at WKMM, back in the days before the the soundproofing was done in the studio in the original building (and, also being the brother-in-law of the original owners son), WKMM does not stand for Kingwood Mountain Music. During a discussion in the early days with Sandy Garlitz (the original owner), I had asked if the call letters had any special meaning and she told me no, the original call letters she wanted were WMAX (her husband's first name). WKMM were actually at the time the only call letters available that she liked. At that point, my mother (the station's first news director), Sandy, Greg Bolyard (the station's original morning DJ) and I spent about an hour coming up with phrases created from the call letters. The favorite at the time was We're Kingwood's Music Maker."

WMOD. John M. Taylor, whose father Jake Taylor who owned WMOD around the early to mid 1950's, writes, "The call letters were aired under the phrase 'Worth More On Daytime radio,' to emphasize both the call letters, and the radio station's marketing for Daytime Radio Advertising." I suspect this is a slogan later adopted to match the call letters, and that the call letters perhaps could have been an abbreviation for "Moundsville" or "modern."

WRNR. In 2007, Albert McGilvray, the WRNR news director, wrote, “When WRNR-AM went on the air 31 years ago, the call letters stood for We (are) Rock 'n Roll. With the advent of FM, AM740 began a gradual shift to the news/talk format. We are not related in any way to WRNR-FM in Annapolis, MD.”

WTCR. Judy Jennings of WTCR writes, "WTCR call letters actually stood for Town and Country Radio.. originated by the owner Connie B. Gay, an orginal founding member of the Country Music Association and the Country Music Hall of Fame of which he was inducted and has a bronze memorial plaque. Connie was instrmental in bringing the "pop" cross-over sound to country radio and he wanted to convey the music was for the town and the country audience. In the more recent decade, we began to use Tri-states Country Radio, in some instances.

WXCC. Harold Cremeans, former engineer and builder of the station, writes that WXCC was one of ten calls that became available early in 1977. The calls were retired Navy ship calls from the 1940s. He writes, "Not realizing what a jewel he had, owner Robert 'Bob' Harvit always regretted not registering the slogan 'Coal Country.' It was too expensive!"