WULM-AM

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WULM
Broadcast area	Springfield, Ohio
Slogan	Springfield's Community Station
First air date	1946
Frequency	1600 (kHz)
Format	70's Music/Sports & Talk
Power	1,000 watts daytime, 334 watts nighttime
Class	ND1
Callsign meaning	Urban Light Ministries
Owner	Urban Light Ministries [1]
Website	[2]]

WULM (1600 AM) is an American commercial radio station licensed to (and still originating in) Springfield, Ohio. It operates at 1,000 watts daytime (coming in on any radio crystal clear in Clark, Champaign, Greene, Miami, and Montgomery counties) and 334 watts nighttime 24/7 along with an audio stream on its website.

1 History
2 Past Programing
3 Programming
4 External links

[edit] History

WULM's history dates back to 1946 when it was founded as WJEL. At the time of its founding, the station was licensed to nearby Dayton, Ohio. Country music singer Donnie Bowser,a Springfield resident performed frequently on WJEL's live Saturday night program. In 1954, the station was moved to Springfield and was given new call letters: WBLY (for Bob L. Yountz), which previously had been used by the present-day WIMA in Lima, Ohio. This move was nearly coincidental with the move of Springfield station WWSO to Dayton, where it became WAVI (now known as WDAO)

The station used the call letters WBLY from 1954 to 2002. It was operated by Champion City Broadcasting (later RAY Broadcasting) before being sold to Urban Light Ministries, a local non-denominational Christian charity in April of 2002 which adopted the WULM call letters in August of that same year. Urban Light's purchase of the station kept it a locally owned and operated community citizen and helps provide operating funds and a medium for the local ministry to reach out to pre-believers and to families in need. WULM remains the last locally owned/operated commercial radio station licensed by the FCC to Springfield still operating with studios and offices in Springfield.

John Hall made his mark at WIZE as a Top 40 DJ and much sought-after voice talent. Hall, also a veteran of WKSW Urbana, WLW Cincinnati, WBNS Columbus and WCLR Piqua later became WULM's first program director and general manager in 2002 before his death in August of 2004. The renovated studio facilities have been named in his memory.

[edit] Past Programing

WULM has had many different formats over since it started broadcasting. Originally country when it was founded, when it was sold to Bob Yontz (and became known as WBLY) he took over and left his mark on the entire Miami Valley. The format was changed to talk in the morning along with music, with it's host Smilin' Bob(Bob Yontz) and was a MOR station (Middle of the Road) the rest of the day. Smilin Bob remained a personality on the station through the 70's and into the 80's. He became greatly known all around the valley. He was famous for giving all of his callers a nickname, and he handed out many. WBLY also aired a big band program that was the top rated program in it's time slot for the Dayton area. In 1987 WBLY changed it's format to oldies and the following year it was "sold" to Yontz's son Ron, who operated RAY broadcasting.

Ron switched the format to a news/sports/talk format but it's broadcasting power was toned down to 250 watts and it could not be heard that far out of Clark County, and was famous for being "the most staticy station east of the Mississippi" at night, although it came in perfectly clear during the day. Although it lost many of it's former listeners, it picked many up from it sports coverage. WBLY did mostly Catholic Central games until WIZE went under and then began airing all teams in Clark County. It was famous for not only having 1 game but in football and basketball it aired one game live and one game on tape delay. It also did Wittenberg football and baketball games along with a show during the week. It also had a high school sports talk show during the week and a popular show on saturday moring called "Sports Scene". During the tournament it would air all local teams games, and sometimes there would be soo many teams playing that they would go until 2:00 am in the morning. They also had great news coverage, and the news director was Darrel Bauer, who is now at WHIO.

In 2002 it was sold to Urban Light Ministries. They toned up the broadcasting power to 1,000 watts. After they changed the call letter to ULM they continued to have a news/sports/talk format but added more programing including a local morning talk show and a late-morning talk show that talked sbout the issues in Clark County. After that sports director Marty Bannister continued his "Sports Scene" show that he aired during the week and had done before when it was WBLY. They also added more popular network programing, including Bill O'Riley. The station became more popular but ULM decided to switch back to music in the summer of 2003.

They went to a unique "Rock n' Soul Classic's" format. It spotlighted the vintage hits from the first generation of the Top 40 and R&B genres. During this time,its weekend programs along with NASCAR coverage included The Motown Show,Dennis Mitchell's Breakfast With The Beatles,Oldies Coast To Coast,Little Walter's Time Machine,Glenn Sauter's Hits of Yesteryear and Cool Bobby B's Doo Wop Stop. That format ran from the summer of 2003 to the spring of 2006.

[edit] Programming

1600 WULM "Springfield's Community Station" current format is "The Fun Hits of the 70's; from Top 40 hits of those eras. They also have USA Radio Network News updates at the top of the hour.

Besides music WULM continues providing great sports coverage. It airs a sports program on saturday morning from 9:00-10:30, which is hosted by long time WULM sports personalities Dave Williams, (The Coach) Jim Scoby, and John Derr. The "Saturday Morning Sports Show" (formally The Springfield Sports Show) has local high school sports talk along with Ohio State and Wittenberg talk in college sports. In professional, the Cleveland Browns and the Cincinnati Bengals are covered in the NFL and the Cleveland Indians and the Cincinnati Reds are covered in the MLB. The program also has interviews with local sports personalities(most recently Doug Harris). During Ohio State football, they have an Ohio State football show live on Thursday nights from Joe's 40 US Highway Grille in Springfield. And of course, as they have for over 15 years, WULM has live play-by-play coverage of local high school sports(mainly South, North, and Catholic Central, but other counties schools are covered) with Williams doing the play-by-play calling and Scoby covering the commentator duties.

WULM has a history of sending there sports department people a long way. Former sports director Marty Bannister is now the voice of the Columbus Destroyers and a sideline reporter on the Ohio State Football Radio Network. He also is the voice of Ohio State Women's basketball. Scott Leo, a former play-by-play man and talk show host for four years at WULM, is now the voice of the Columbus Clippers and does play-by-play high school football for WONE/WIZE in the fall. He also covers Wittenberg football, basketball, and baseball for Wittenberg's student staion.

WULM and Urban Light Ministries president Rev. Eli Williams hosts mid-morning talk program "Crossing Over" dealing with local people and issues from a Christian and local community perspective. Rev. Williams is also the host of "Urban Light Radio" a Sunday morning contemporary gospel music program.

WULM also serves the community with Speak Out a locally produced community forum/on air town meeting on Saturday mornings after The Saturday Morning Sports Show for 10:30 to 12:00 which invites listeners input to local issues. The show is hosted and moderated by Larry Spicer. It has had guests such as political figures such as Steve Austria and Ross Megregor and countless others as well as people from local events ranging from the Enon Apple Butter Festival to Shawnee's High School Band Festival.

Station's studios and offices are located on Miracle Mile in Springfield, at the transmitter site and former studios of WIZE (now simulcasting the programming of WONE in Dayton; which itself is now a relay for WCKY in Cincinnati). Its transmitter is located on Miller Road off of State Route 41 West which is also the transmitting site of WDHT-FM..originally the site of the former WBLY-AM and WAZU-FM when both stations were owned by Champion City Broadcasting. The WBLY calls are currently used by a low-power FM station in Sycamore,Georgia.