HISTORY OF BROADCASTING IN WEST VIRGINIA

WVMR, Frost

The following was taken from the former WVMR website.

Owned and operated by the Pocahontas Cooperative Communications Cooperative, WVMR is a sole service non-commercial broadcast station, located in Pocahontas County, West Virginia. There are no other radio or television stations in the county, and WVMR was built to serve the residents of this isolated area with a full schedule of community oriented programming, produced locally by volunteers.

WVMR took to the air in 1982 at 1370 khz on the AM dial. Due to the restrictions imposed by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia (some 8 miles north of the WVMR transmitter), no FM broadcasting is allowed. The NRAO has very sensitive radio telescopes that would be overwhelmed by a local FM transmitter, and WVMR was only allowed to broadcast on the relatively low frequencies of the AM dial. Even so, WVMR has become integral to the Pocahontas County region, and is the sole source for news and information, as well as entertainment for the county.

In May of 1995, as part of a long term expansion, WVMR built two new FM stations in adjacent Highland and Bath Counties, Virginia. WVLS, Monterey and WCHG, Hot Springs, provide WVMR programming during the daylight hours, and then bring local programming to each of their listening areas after dark. As the volunteer base for these stations grow, so will the program schedule.

The elevation at WVMR is 2600 feet above sea level. The weather is quite mild in the summer, but can be pretty chilly in the winter. As of early November, WVMR has already recorded three snowfalls, and the temperature on November 4, 1995 (3:00 PM) was 28 degrees Fahrenheit (-1.5 C).

WVMR operates with 5000 watts, and can be heard over a wide area as far south as Lewisburg (on Interstate 64), as far east as Monterey, Virginia, and north into Franklin, West Virginia. WVMR's call letters stand for "West Virginia Mountain Radio".

Keith Miller, a former DJ at WVMR writes:

The station was established I think in the early 1980's to serve Pocahontas County and the surrounding mountainous areas. This area of the state was not covered by any other local media and being as secluded and mountainous as it is, receiving any radio or television signals was near impossible. The station provides better community programing and news than any station I have ever listened to. It is a nonprofit corporation and most of its operating revenue is provided by donations from local individuals and businesses. There are very few paid employees, maybe 3 or 4, and their salary is mostly a token. Almost all the air time DJ's are volunteers providing their time to keep the station on the air from sunrise to sunset daily every day of the year. Therefore, those of us who have worked or are working at this station also like " Where Volunteers Make Radio ".

Some local people who disagree with some of the ways the station provides coverage of the news have also coined " West Virgina Moscow Radio "

WVMR broadcasts on 1370 am, Sunrise to sunset, is located on State Route 28 10 miles north of Huntersville next to Pocahontas County High School which provides many local students the opportunity to experience broadcasting. Their building is three-quarters underground and is designed to be primarily solar heated in the winter and is cooled by the earth in the summer. Anyone traveling in the Pocahontas Co. area is always welcome to stop in and say Hi and see what goes on inside to bring us what we call radio. That's exactly how I got started ( Hijacked ) into being a volunteer DJ.

Information about the stations owned and operated by Pocahontas Comms Co-op Corp is at http://www.alleghenymountainradio.org/. The stations are WVMR (1370), Frost WV, WVLS (89.7), Monterey VA, WCHG (107.1) Hot Springs VA, and Radio Durbin (103.5) Durbin WV.

In a 2008 email, Allegheny Mountain Radio chief engineer Chuck Niday wrote that the company also had construction permits to build three new non-commercial FM stations in West Virginia: Franklin WV 91.1 FM (WVPC), Hillsboro WV 91.9 (WVMR-FM), and Marlinton WV 88.5 FM (call sign not yet reserved) He stated that all three stations will be programmed from the WVMR-AM studios in Frost and that WVMR-AM was broadcasting in stereo using the C-QUAM system.