AM Technical Profile: WFEB

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Frequency:
1340
Format:
Variety Hits
Transmitter Location:
[map] [street view]  On AL-148 (Millerville Highway) east of Sylacauga near the intersection with Vanduesen Drive, in the Talladega National Forest.
Power (ERP):
Day: 1 kW
Night: 1 kW
Antenna:
1 tower
Other Information:
0.5 mV/m Daytime Groundwave Service Contour from the FCC's Public Files
[FCC]
[FCCdata.org]
[Radio-Locator]
[Wikipedia]
[Facebook]
[Studio] Street View imagery of the station's studio house on Highway 148 in Sylacauga.
Owned by Lake Broadcasting, Inc.
// W265DV Sylacauga
History:
This station first signed on in 1945.  Put on the air by E. E. Forbes Sr's Alabama Broadcasting Company, it initially ran 250 watts day and night from a shunt-fed antenna powered by a Gates 250 C-1 transmitter.  The station transmitted from the same tower and studio location it has today, although the antenna was converted to a series fed design in 1971.  Early on, the station had affiliations with both the Keystone and Mutual radio networks.

Forbes passed away in 1959 and ownership of the station fell to his son, Earnest E. Forbes, Jr., Mallory Forbes and W. Kenneth Forbes.  They increased the station's power to 1 kW full time in 1964 with a Gates BC-1G transmitter.  Control of Alabama Broadcasting Company was transferred to George and Nerine Carr in 1966.  George would remain president of the company well into the 2000s!

By the mid-70's, the station was known to have a Middle of the Road (MOR) music format.  It kept that until the early 80's, when it veered into contemporary country.  That lasted a few years, and by 1986 the station was doing Adult Contemporary programming.  By 1992 it was oldies.  The format changed in 1996 to news/talk and sports programming, basically a full-service outlet.  They even play some oldies at noon on Fridays. 

Powers Broadcasting Company bought the station in March 2008 for $184,310; George Carr was still general manager through this time.  (Note: other sources say the sale price was just $50,000.)

The station acquired a construction permit for a new FM translator companion on 100.9 MHz in April, 2018.

The station was sold by Powers Broadcasting for $150,000 to John F. Kennedy's Lake Broadcasting, in August 2018.  Lake owns WKGA Goodwater, just up the road.  It appears that a format change may be in the future, as their Facebook page is teasing a "greatest hits of all time - B 101" image.  That format changed in the last week of August 2018, to an Variety Hits format.