Contemporary hit radio station in Roswell, New Mexico
KBCQ-FM (97.1 FM) is a radio station broadcasting a contemporary hit radio music format licensed to Roswell, New Mexico, United States. The station is currently owned by Majestic Communications.[2]
History
Troy Raymond Moran received the construction permit for a new radio station in Roswell on June 29, 1976.[3] The new station, designated KRSY-FM and an adjunct to KRSY (1230 AM), went on the air October 5, 1977.[1][4] A year later, on October 15, 1978,[3] the station changed its call letters to KRIZ and began airing an album-oriented rock format.[4] Two years later, Gary Acker and his Good News Broadcasting Company acquired KRIZ,[3] resulting in a flip to contemporary religious music and other programming from local churches.[5] The sale of KRIZ to Acker formed half of a transaction by which Moran acquired the construction permit for channel 14 in Amarillo, Texas and Acker received the radio station as well as $325,000 in cash.[6]
Gary L. Acker sold KRIZ to Ronald Strother for $550,000 in 1984.[7] On June 1 of that year, the station changed its call letters to KCKN and ditched its religious programming, which had not been very profitable, to adopt a 24-hour country music format; KRIZ, in contrast, only operated from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m.[8] A year later, Strother sold the station to Sudbrink Broadcasting of New Mexico for $500,000.[9] Sudbrink traded KCKN and KBCQ (1020 AM) to National Capital Christian Broadcasting the next year in order to acquire WTLL, a television station it owned in Richmond, Virginia; National Capital Christian then sold the Roswell radio pair to Ardman Communications for $600,000.[10]
In April 1987, Ardman flipped the formats of the two stations: KBCQ and its contemporary hit radio format moved from 1020 AM to 97.1 FM, while KCKN's country programming moved to 1020 AM.[11] In 1990, the group agreed to sell its Roswell stations and WVSR-AM-FM in Charleston, West Virginia, for $5.75 million to ML Media.[12]
KCKN-KBCQ were spun off to Roswell Radio, owned by John and Trisha Dunn, in 1993 for $600,000.[13]
In 2010, Roswell Radio went into receivership. Receiver Tasha Ingalls ultimately acquired Roswell Radio's six stations in Roswell and Tucumcari in 2010 for $340,000, after having been the only bidder in the bankruptcy proceedings.[14] A year later, the Ingalls family sold the stations for $260,000 to Majestic Communications, owned by the Matteucci family.[15]
