WXTK

WXTK is the direct descendant of Cape Cod's first commercial radio station, WOCB. The AM radio station WOCB first signed on the air on October 2, 1940.[2] It was originally owned by the Cape Cod Broadcasting Company.[3] It originally operated at 1210 kHz, but moved to 1240 in 1941 as a result of the North American Regional Broadcasting Agreement (NARBA).[2]

WOCB shut down in May 1943 after running out of money, resulting in its license being canceled by the FCC on November 30.[2] E. Anthony and Sons, owner of WNBH in New Bedford and publisher of the New Bedford Standard-Times and the Cape Cod Standard-Times, bought the station's equipment and relaunched WOCB under a new license on May 6, 1944, as an affiliate of the NBC Blue Network.[2] WOCB carried the Blue Network's dramas, comedies, news, sports, soap operas, game shows and big band broadcasts during the "Golden Age of Radio." WOCB stayed with the Blue Network as it became ABC. When ABC broke into four sub-networks in 1968, WOCB AM and FM became affiliated with ABC's American Entertainment Network.

WOCB-FM signed on the air on May 2, 1948, on 94.3 MHz.[1] It was the Cape's first commercial FM station as well, mostly simulcasting the AM station. In 1962, it moved to 94.9 MHz.[4] (The 94.3 frequency is now used on Cape Cod by WZAI, the Brewster repeater for WCAI.)

By the 1970s, WOCB-FM broke away from simulcasting the AM during midday and evening hours to broadcast easy-listening music while still simulcasting the AM's format (then adult contemporary, with a heavy news commitment. It stayed with the AM station during weekday drive times and hourly newscasts the rest of the broadcast day. The FM call letters were changed to WSOX-FM in 1978.[5] WRZE in 1984,[6] WJFK in 1985,[7] back to WOCB-FM in 1987,[8] WJIB in 1990 (shortly after the call sign was dropped by 96.9 FM in Boston, now WBQT), and then WOCB-FM once more in 1991.[9]

In the summer through winter of 1981, the afternoon drive announcer on WOCB was Edd Hall, who subsequently did voice work for Late Night with David Letterman from 1982–1990 and was the announcer on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno from 1992–2004.

In 1991, Hurricane Bob blew down WOCB's transmitter tower, and the damage suffered was so severe that the owners could not afford to rebuild. The station was then sold to Ernie Boch Sr., an automobile dealer in the Boston suburb of Norwood, Massachusetts, who turned WOCB-FM into the flagship station for his new Boch Broadcasting company. The station's first news director, Hal Lamb, applied to the FCC to change the station's calls to WXTK, or "X-Talk," a reference to the rarity of the news/talk format on the FM dial at the time.

WXTK initially planned to brand as "Extreme Talk," but did not do so, though a few station IDs were produced using the branding (as late as 1998, the unused IDs were still in the station archives). Despite this, WXTK went through with the change to news/talk, and secured several syndication agreements, including the right to broadcast The Rush Limbaugh Show. Limbaugh himself acknowledged his newest affiliate by remarking on-air, "I am now beaming into Kennedy compound." Over the next few years, the station also became the Cape's home of G. Gordon Liddy (cancelled from the station as of July 2006) and Howie Carr, and longtime local morning hosts Ed Lambert and Don McKeag.

Concurrent with the WXTK relaunch, WOCB's AM 1240 facility became WUOK.[10] Under those call letters it programmed CNN Headline News,[11] sports radio,[12] and finally a WXTK simulcast.[13] In 1997, Boch donated WUOK to Boston University for use as a relay of WBUR-FM in Boston, under the call sign WBUR (AM).[14] 1240 AM now broadcasts as WBAS.

WXTK's first logo after the frequency switch. Before the switch its branding was simply "94.9 WXTK" with no actual logo.

In July 1996, WXTK filed an application with the FCC to change frequencies from 94.9 to 95.1 MHz. The application was granted May 20, 1997.[15] The move was in response to listener complaints of co-channel interference (when two stations on the same frequency interfere with each other) from WHOM on Mount Washington.

The move took effect on-air on September 18, 1997;[16] to ease people into the new frequency, there were two weeks of promotional material over-the-air, and after the switch its branding was changed to "95.1 is 95 WXTK", putting stress on the word "is". When WXTK moved to 95.1, it had to operate "directionally" with a signal limited towards WHRB in Cambridge.

WXTK's logo under Qantum Communications ownership

In 2005, Boch Broadcasting sold WXTK and its sister stations to Qantum Communications, owner of WRZE (now WEII, a simulcast of sports radio WEEI-FM) and WCIB, though Qantum had to sell WTWV/WDVT (now WHYA and WFRQ) to Nassau Broadcasting in order to stay within FCC regulations. Until that sale, WOCB/WXTK had been broadcasting from the same studio building for over 60 years.

On May 15, 2014, Qantum Communications announced that it would sell its 29 stations, including WXTK, to Clear Channel Communications (now iHeartMedia), in a transaction connected to Clear Channel's sale of WALK AM-FM in Patchogue, New York, to Connoisseur Media via Quantum.[17] The transaction was consummated on September 9, 2014.