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| Broadcast area | Austin metropolitan area |
|---|---|
| Frequency | 590kHz |
| Branding | News Radio KLBJ |
| Programming | |
| Format | News/Talk |
| Network | Fox News Radio |
| Affiliations | |
| Ownership | |
| Owner |
|
| KBPA,KGSR,KLBJ-FM,KLZT,KROX-FM | |
| History | |
First air date | August 1, 1939 (86 years ago) (1939-08-01) |
Former call signs | KTBC (1939–1973) |
Call sign meaning | Lyndon Baines Johnson (The Johnson family once owned the station.) |
| Technical information[1] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 65791 |
| Class | B |
| Power | 5,000watts days 1,000 watts nights |
| Translator | 99.7 K259AJ (Austin) |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Webcast | Listen Live |
| Website | www |
KLBJ (590kHz) is acommercialAMradio station inAustin, Texas, airing anews/talkradio format. It is owned by Sinclair Telecable Inc. and operates under the name Waterloo Media. It isCentral Texas' primary entry point station for theEmergency Alert System.
The station has studios and offices alongInterstate 35 in Austin. Itstransmitter site is off North Farm to Market Road 973 inTravis County, near theColorado River.[2] By day, KLBJ operates with 5,000wattsnon-directional. To protect other stations on590 AM from interference, at night it reduces power to 1,000 watts and uses adirectional antenna with a four-tower array. It alsosimulcasts its programming onFMtranslator stationK259AJ at 99.7MHz.
Weekdays on KLBJ start withThe Todd and Oz Show, a local news and interview program with Todd Jeffries and Patrick Osborn. In the afternoondrive time, another local program,The Mark and Melynda Show is heard, featuring Mark Caesar and Melynda Brant. The rest of the weekday schedule isnationally syndicated programs:Brian Kilmeade and Friends,The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show,The Will Cain Show,Fox Across America with Jimmy Failla,Coast to Coast AM withGeorge Noory andAmerica in The Morning with John Trout.[3]
Weekends feature shows on financial advice, real estate, health, cars, gardening, and food, some of which are paidbrokered programming. Syndicated weekend programming includesThe Kim Komando Show,Rich DeMuro on Tech,Somewhere in Time with Art Bell andThe Weekend News with Gordon Deal. One of its weekend shows,Retire Smart Austin, also airs on Thursday evenings.Fox News Radio supplies hourly updates. KLBJ has a local news-sharing agreement with theFox TV Network'sKTBC Channel 7, its formersister station.
The station firstsigned on the air on August 1, 1939.[4] The originalcall sign was KTBC, standing for the Texas Broadcasting Company. It originally broadcast on 1150kilocycles, with 1,000 watts.
The station was restricted todaytimer status, required to go off the air at night. It also had to share1150 AM withWTAW, which was owned by theA&M College of Texas inCollege Station.[5] The two stations had to work out a schedule where only one of them could broadcast while the other was silent.
KTBC was acquired by the family of futurePresidentLyndon B. Johnson. In 1943, the futureFirst Lady, known asLady Bird Johnson, invested an inheritance of $17,500 to purchase KTBC.[6] She hired new on-air talent, found commercial sponsors, kept all the financial accounts, and maintained the facility. Using her formal name, Mrs. Claudia T. Johnson served as manager, and then as chairman of what later came to be known as KLBJ for some four decades. In later years, the president and Lady Bird's children ran the media company.[7]
Although Mrs. Johnson was the owner in papers filed with theFederal Communications Commission, then-Congressman Lyndon Johnson used his influence with theFCC to permit KTBC to relocate toAM 590, increasing its coverage area and broadcasting around the clock with nighttime authorization.[6] With its new fulltime status and stronger signal, KTBC became aCBS RadioNetwork affiliate. It carried the CBS schedule of dramas, comedies, news, sports,soap operas,game shows andbig band broadcasts during the "Golden Age of Radio."[8]
The Johnson family put Austin's first TV station on the air in 1952, Channel 7KTBC-TV. The co-owned station 93.7 KTBC-FM (nowKLBJ-FM) signed on the air in 1960. In the 1950s, as network programming moved to television, 590 KTBC began playingmiddle of the road (MOR) andeasy listening music, while still airing CBS News on the hour.
In 1973, the Johnson family sold KTBC-TV to theTimes Mirror Company, a newspaper and broadcasting company that published theLos Angeles Times and theDallas Times Herald. Channel 7 kept the KTBC call sign.[9] Today KTBC is owned byFox Television Stations. The radio stations' call letters were changed to KLBJ and KLBJ-FM, to match the initials of former President Johnson, who had died earlier that year.[10] The AM station continued its format of MOR music with news, talk, and sports. The year before, the FM station had switched to aprogressive rock sound.
In 1997, KLBJ-AM-FM came under the ownership of the LBJS Corporation.[11] The new company was a merger of LBJ Broadcasting, which also ownedKAJZ, with Sinclair Telecable's two stations in the market:KROX-FM andKGSR.[12] 590 KLBJ had already shifted from MOR music to an all-talk format. 93.7 KLBJ-FM continued itsalbum-oriented rock format.
At the time, Sinclair Telecable Inc. was a minority stakeholder in the stations, with LBJ Holdings Co. as the 51-percent controlling stakeholder. In 2003, theIndianapolis-basedEmmis Communications acquired the controlling stake in the stations;[13] the $150 million sale, completed on July 1, marked the Johnson family's exit from broadcasting.[14]
On October 30, 2009, 590 AM begansimulcasting its programming onFMtranslator station K259AJ at 99.7MHz. That gave listeners in Austin and its adjacent suburbs the opportunity to hear KLBJ's programming on FM.
In June 2019, Emmis announced that it would sell its controlling stake in the Austin cluster back to Sinclair Telecable for $39.3 million. KLBJ-AM-FM operates under the licensee name "Waterloo Media".[13]
| Call sign | Frequency | City of license | FID | ERP (W) | HAAT | Class | FCC info |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| K259AJ | 99.7 MHz FM | Austin, Texas | 82261 | 250 | 252 m (827 ft) | D | LMS |
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
30°14′16″N97°37′47″W / 30.23778°N 97.62972°W /30.23778; -97.62972
