#South Dakota
KGSS signed on from Sioux Falls, S.D., in 1937. At some point, it became KELO. The station moved from 1200 kHz to 1230 kHz in 1941. It moved to its current 1300 kHz dial position in 1948. KELO-TV signed on in 1953.
KELO was a Top 40 station from the 1960s into the 1980s. It evolved into an oldies format by the 1990s and flipped to the current talk format in 2000.
KELO simulcasts on an FM signal, as well. As of 2016, Midwest Communications owns the station.
Source: Wikipedia (KELO-AM)
South Dakota’s first television, KELO-TV, Channel 11, signed on from Sioux Falls in 1953 as the sister station of KELO-AM-FM. The TV station carried programming from all four networks of the era.
The FCC soon expanded the Sioux Falls, S.D., TV market, including the entire state of South Dakota, parts of North Dakota, southwest Minnesota and northwest Iowa into a single market. In the late 1950s, KELO owner Midcontinent Media signed on satellite stations around the region to serve its huge coverage area. Today, KELO-TV has three satellite stations and a low-power translator to provide TV coverage for the entire market.
KELO-TV switched its primary network affiliation to CBS in 1960. It also became South Dakota’s first color TV station in 1968.
“Captain 11″ was a popular children’s show that KELO-TV produced from 1955 to 1996, featuring longtime weatherman Dave Dedrick.
KELO-TV and its sister stations have experienced several tower collapses over the decades, largely due to fierce weather conditions. After each disaster, KELO-TV engineers usually were able to get the station back on the air within a few days from temporary transmission facilities.
Young Broadcasting acquired the station in 1996. Media General bought KELO-TV in 2013.
KELO-TV has long been the dominant local TV news operation in the region.
Here’s a 1993 KELO-TV sign-on:
SOurce: Wikipedia (KELO-TV), KELOLAND.com
Here’s an earlier entry about the history of Yankton, S.D.’s WNAX-AM.
This 1951 proclaims that in South Dakota, “TV means ‘tain’t visible.’” Radio was the only electronic means of reaching a mass audience.
WNAX launched from Yankton, S.D., in 1922. Gurney’s Seed and Nursery Company purchased the station in 1926, using WNAX to promote its products and services. It made Gurney’s a household name.
The station also launched the career of Lawrence Welk, who played daily on WNAX for a decade without pay. The station also carried a popular program called “Your Neighbor Lady,” which gave listeners a daily supply of household tips, recipes and stories. The late Wynn Speece hosted the program from 1941 to 2005 and won a Marconi Award in 1992. Unfortunately, 1983 fire destroyed WNAX’s archival recordings.
The flat landscape of the Upper Great Plains, near-perfect ground conductivity and WNAX’s low 570 kHz position on the AM band sends the station’s 5,000-watts signal over a wade section of the Midwest. It can be heard as far south as Kansas City and as far north as Fargo. It is second to KFYR, Bismarck, N.D., in having the largest daytime land coverage of a U.S. radio station.
Today, WNAX carries news/talk format with a heavy dose of farm-related program. Saga Communications owns the station, which calls itself “The Voice of the Midwest.”
Source: Wikipedia (WNAX-AM)
