WIXE

WIXE
City Monroe, North Carolina
Broadcast area Charlotte metropolitan area
Branding The Mighty 1190
Slogan "The Best Local Talk and Country Favorites"
Frequency 1190 kHz
Format Country/Talk
Power 5,000 watts (Daytime)
70 watts (Nighttime)
Class D
Owner Monroe Broadcasting
Webcast WIXE Live Feed
Website wixe.com

WIXE (branded as The Mighty 1190) in Monroe, North Carolina is a radio station at 1190 AM. It broadcasts a local talk format as well as a Classic Country & Classic Rock format and is currently under ownership of Monroe Broadcasting Co., Inc. The station has been continuously on the air since 1968.

WIXE is not automated during the daytime hours and still uses local announcers. Currently the Night-time format is the John Tesh radio show with Country Music.

History

Ray Atkins became co-owner of WIXE in 1971 after rock and roll did not work, switching to country, the second Charlotte-area station to do so after WSOC-FM. Atkins had previously played country music as a DJ on WMAP in Monroe, As a musician, he played steel guitar with Arthur Smith and Bill Hefner.

In Summer 1988, for the first time in its 20 years on the air, WIXE ranked second only to WBT among AM radio stations in the Charlotte market.[1]

On July 10, 2008, a truck accidentally backed into one of the guy wires of the station's nearly-190-foot-tall tower, bringing the tower down and knocking the station off the air. While the AM broadcast signal was off, WIXE continued streaming online.

Monroe Broadcasting owner Archie Morgan and his team began the construction of a new tower for the station.[2] By 11 pm that same night, the broadcast signal was back on the air thru the use of a horizontal dipole antenna. The plan was for this antenna to be used until the new tower could be built.

As of September 21, 2008, WIXE was back up to full power with the new tower, as well as a new ground system. The station already reached 9 counties, but the replacement of the 40-year-old ground system made a vast improvement in coverage into Mecklenberg and surrounding counties.

WIXE, The Mighty 1190 is an old-school local radio station with strong ties to the community since 1968.

References

  1. Gene Stowe, "No. 2 with a Bullet: WIXE Climbs AM Radio Survey with Hot Country," The Charlotte Observer, October 30, 1988.
  2. "Truck brings down tower of WIXE "Mighty 1190" in NC". Radio-Info.com. July 11, 2008.

Coordinates: 34°57′41″N 80°32′40″W / 34.96139°N 80.54444°W / 34.96139; -80.54444


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