This weekend I was among the panelists on AETN’s “Arkansas Week” discussing the ongoing impeachment trial of President Trump in the U.S. Senate. I also talked about covering presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg’s visit to Little Rock on Monday, Jan. 20. He entered the race too late to take part in the first four states holding primary elections and is focusing efforts on Super Tuesday states like Arkansas.
In 1922, the first radio station in Arkansas was put on the air by Harvey Couch, creator of Arkansas Power & Light. The call letters for WOK stood for “Workers of Kilowatts.” Couch made his first broadcast using a tower at his home in Pine Bluff, with a group listening at the nearby Hotel Pines.
I was among those interviewed about this for the AETN documentary “Music in Arkansas: Origins 200 BC-1941 AD.” As I explained, the arrival of radio would have a tremendous impact on the state, especially by connecting those living in rural areas with the rest of the country. You can watch that segment of the program below.
I’m proud to have been asked by the Encyclopedia of Arkansas to write an entry on KBTM, which was one of the state’s early radio stations, while its FM frequency with the same call letters is believed to have been the first licensed FM in the state. The online encyclopedia is a project of the Central Arkansas Library System.
I had extensively researched the Jonesboro radio station in 2011, even interviewing many people who worked there, as well as members of the Patteson family, which owned the AM/FM combo for 35 years. My research was spurred by eventual corporate owner Clear Channel Communications killing off the powerful FM frequency to put a lower power station on the air in Memphis, which would make more money being in a larger market. It was a joy to revisit my research as I prepared the entry for the encyclopedia, following its style. The entry was published Nov. 23, 2019 and can be read here. If you’d like to read what I originally wrote for my website, which includes audio of my interviews, you can find it here.
