Used to listen to KOMA when I was in Las Cruces, NM, back in the 1970's.
Top rock then. Now it's News-talk? Like gag me with a spoon, man!

Mike Freeman

On Fri, 2 Apr 2004, Martin McCormick wrote:

>         Yes.  They tried everything once during the eighties.
> Actually, at that time, KOMA was only AM.  They bought out a so-called
> beautiful music station on FM in the early nineties or maybe late
> eighties--I forget exactly when and then simulcast until February of
> 2003 when KOMA AM became a news/talk station.  I believe they have
> been heard as far away as New Zealand.  I knew a guy whose brother was
> in the Navy on the aircraft carrier Kearsarge.  He said they could get
> KOMA almost up to the coast of Japan.  Just think.  That's almost 160
> metres.
>
>         Years ago, the Oklahoma City City Counsel had passed one of
> those really dumb ordinances aimed at trying to stop criminals from
> listening to police radio while driving around and committing crimes.
> They passed a law forbidding anyone from having a car radio capable of
> tuning wavelengths shorter than 200 metres.
>
>         Guess what.  The top end of the AM broadcast band fits right in
> to that description.  KOMA at 1520 is on a wave length of 197.37
> Metres.  In the mid sixties, somebody caught on to that at KOMA and a
> campaign started to make a laughing stock of the OKC City Counsel.
> KOMA would frequently bring up the point that it was technically
> illegal to listen to them in your car in Oklahoma City.
>
>         I believe the counselscrapped the law right away.
>
> Buddy Brannan writes:
> >But...but...but...but...but...didn't KOMA used to be country? At least
> >the AM station did, way back when I was a kid in the early '80's when
> >I first discovered that AM really stretched out at night! :)
>