WFHB Bloomington Community Radio
The history of Bloomington’s community radio station; a continuing series.
December 1991: Winter was descending on Bloomington. The phone rang at Jim Manion’s house. It was Brian Kearney bearing great news: the FCC had approved Bloomington Community Radio’s construction permit application. That meant BCR could begin building its antenna tower 11 miles south of the city. The permit in hand, securing its license to begin broadcasting on 91.3 FM would be, essentially, a formality.
Manion wiped tears of joy from his eyes as he hung up.
In the summer of 1992 — the date of the summer solstice, to be exact — with construction work just about to begin at the tower site, Jeffrey Morris, Richard Fish, Kearney, Manion, and one or two others gathered around a bonfire at the tiny square of land in the middle of a cornfield off Rockport Road. They tossed old tape machines into the fire and passed around a copy of Lorenzo Milam’s Sex and Broadcasting: A Handbook for Starting a Radio Station for the Community. Several of them read passages from the book. It was a spiritual and mystical ceremony, a very Bloomington celebration.
Morris then went to work building a modest, 12′ x 15′ cinder block shed that would house the station’s transmitter and be its on-air studio while the BCR worked out details for a permanent home. The location would become known as Radio Ridge.
Kearney was deep into negotiations with the Bloomington Area Arts Council to secure a lease on the city’s old main firehouse on 4th Street; after renovations, it would be the home of WFHB. The call letters would stand for Fire House Broadcasting. He then announced a $150 prize to the public for a winning station logo. Morris suggested it be reminiscent of the RCA dog listening to a Victrola.
Community radio station WFHB was speeding toward its first official on-air date.
NEXT POST: HERMAN WELLS’ CHINESE GONG
Come back for more tales from the WFHB genesis story in this space as we celebrate our 31st year as Bloomington’s home of community radio.
