KLTY Celebrates 35 Years!
Happy Birthday 94.9 KLTY/Dallas celebrating 35 years on the air… KLTY launched August 2, 1985.
KLTY programmed by Mike Prendergast is currently enjoying some of it’s biggest ratings with a number 1 showing in recent Nielsen PPM reports. Congratulations to the entire KLTY team including Frank Reed, John Hudson, Starlene Stringer, Bonnie Curry, Tony Lopez, MaryRose Hamilton….
KLTY history from Wikipedia:
KLTY began playing a mix of Adult Contemporary Christian music (CCM) in August 1985.
In September 1986 station owner Scott K. Ginsburg changed the call letters to KHYI and changed the format to Top 40 as “Y-95”. The transmitter site was not at Cedar Hill the primary antenna farm for Dallas radio, but instead transmitted from Lillian, Texas with over 30,000 watts of effective radiated power.
Marcos A. Rodriguez was a fan of the original KLTY and saw potential in the format – especially if a radio station could play it 24 hours a day. He purchased the music library from Ginsburg and began planning the conversion of 94.1 to all CCM. However, he was unable to make a deal for the KLTY call letters (because they were held by an FM station in Liberty, Missouri.
Before it became 94.1 KOJO, the frequency was used by then-sister station KESS.
KOJO was notable for its commitment to being a “full service” radio station, including a solid news commitment. Morning and afternoon drive newscasts were anchored by former KVIL news director Bob Morrison and Calvin Whitman, and later, Dave Tucker. Morrison moved up to a national network news management position as News and Sports Director of the USA Radio Network, based in Dallas, for 8 1/2 years (until USA was sold and moved to Memphis).
In the spring of 1989, with a free Michael W. Smith concert, Rodriguez created the first Celebrate Freedom-style event and relaunched the KLTY call letters. Marcos A. Rodriguez went on to produce Celebrate Freedom festivals at Southfork Ranch and build the event into one of the biggest Christian Music festivals in America. Rodriguez sold KLTY to Sunburst Media L.P. in 1999 for $63.3 million and retired.
KLTY was on 100.7 MHz from January 2000 to December 2000, and was owned by Sunburst until it was sold to Salem. Salem swapped the Christian talk format that had been on 94.9 for nearly two and a half years known as “The Word”, and placed KLTY on 94.9 while “The Word” went to 100.7. This placed the KLTY calls back on its original frequency.
KLTY now transmits with 100,000 watts ERP from Cedar Hill, Texas.
The National Association of Broadcasters has awarded KLTY a Marconi Award for being a “Top Major Market Station Of the Year” in 2005, 2007, 2009, and 2012. In 2014 and 2016 KLTY was awarded the Marconi Award for “Religious Station of the Year”.
In 2004 KLTY earned the GMA Awards for Major Market Station of the Year and the Music Station of the Year award from National Religious Broadcasters.
