KTUR 1390 KHz Turlock, CA History
Turlock Tribune June 14, 1946
Eight Turlock area men have filed an application with the FCC for a commercial AM broadcast station for Turlock. The group comprises the Turlock Broadcasting Group and include chairman , Wallace N. Lindskoog. Luther G. Boone, Gordon E. Mowrer, Elmer A. Heyer, August Lindbom, C.H. Lindgren, secretary, Wilbur Merrill and Gilbert Moody, legal adviser. The station manager H. Ansel McMillian said the group is a general partnership.
Mowrer and Lindblom are Turlock merchants, Moody an attorney and the others turkey raisers, farmers and dairymen.
According to McMillen. a 5 acre tract of ground has been purchased on Colorado Ave. a half mile northeast of the Turlock city limits. The transmitter will be placed 2112 feet due south of Minnesota avenue and 330 feet due east of Colorado at 107 feet above sea level. The studios will at the same location.
The tentative call letters will be KTUR with a power of 250 watts at 1450 Kcs with expected "blanket" coverage of 25 miles in any direction from Turlock. The total range would encompass approximately 50 miles.
McMillian said a competing application from a Modesto group for a station in Modesto on the same frequency may delay the granting of a license by the FCC for several weeks and may require a hearing.
The initial investment of the Turlock group will amount to approximately $30,000 according to McMillian.
Turlock Tribune 5-20-49
Country Planners have approved the site for Turlock's own commercial radio station which will on t he air within 100 days according to H.A. McMillen, spokesman for the owners. The station's application to erect towers and a studio on the W.J. Glaze residence on Quincy Road between Tuolumne and Hawkeye has been approved by the Stanislaus County planning commission.
The towers have been purchased and delivered to the Quincy Road site and bids are now being accepted to erect them. Preliminary plans have also been completed for the construction of a studio at the same location.
The FCC has granted the local group a license to operate an AM station on 1390 Kcs. The group has also received an FM station license. It will be simulcast with the AM station programming if the group decides to put it on the air.
Others connected with the station besides McMillen include Gilbert Moody, Wallace Lindskoog, Herbert Lindgren, Wilbur Merrill, Luther Boone, August Lindblom, Gordon Mowrer and Ralph Hyer.
Turlock Tribune 10-7-49
KTUR Goes on the Air Next Week
Turlock's radio station, KTUR, will go on the air during the early part of next week according H.A. McMillian, station manager. All test have been completed and the station has been inspected by the FCC. All that remains is for formal approval from the FCC in Washington, D.C. which is routine.The approval should be telegraphed by the FCC by early next week and the station will go on the air as soon as it is received. Formal opening ceremonies will be aired on the following night. The station's frequency is 1390 Kcs.
During the building of KTUR in Turlock, CA. that went on the air last month, station officials were approached by a prominent local resident to be the station's first sponsor. Reason for the request dates back to 1913.
At that time, the same man, then in his teens, participated in the earliest transmission of voice and music by radio. Transmissions occurred regularly between the National Wireless Telephone Co. in the Garden City Bank building in San Jose and a similar station in San Francisico. One of the operators was C.K. Sanders, now the Turlock Cadillac-Oldsmobile dealer.
Mr. Sanders realized his wish to be a sponsor and also was the first person to push the switch when KTUR went on the air Oct 7, 1949. It was his first close contact with commercial radio since he retired from the field following service in the Navy.
After serving in the Navy Signal Corp. during the first world war, Mr. Sanders retired from radio until a year ago when he acquainted himself with vacuum tubes, crystal oscillators, Class B modulators and similar modern terms and was issued amateur license, W6DVS.
KTUR operates full time on 1390 kcs with 1 KW and is licensed to the Turlock Broadcasting Corp.
Present as KTUR Turlock, CA switch is thrown are (L-R) H.A. McMillian, Station Manager; Emile J. Rome, Raytheon San Francisco sales engineer, C.K. Sanders (hand on the switch) ; Maxon B. Sayre, Chief Engineer; Carl Pendergraft, Assistant Engineer.
Shown in the insert, (r) Mr. Sanders as a young man sits at a transmitter with another station operator, Emile Portal.
Pioneer Radioman is Outlet's First Sponsor
(November, 1949 Newspaper Article)
Came on the air October 7, 1949. KTUR owned by the Turlock Broadcasting Group, a group of Turlock business people and later sold to a subsequent group of owners, including the producer of the Beverly Hillbillies. The switch was thrown to put the station on the air by local businessman C.K. Sanders.
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Original KTUR studios on Quincy Ave. in Turlock taken in 1972 when the station was known at KCEY.
Photo courtesy of Steve Pacheco
Assistant Chief Engineer Carl Pendergraft (seated) and KTUR General Manager H.A. McMillian The control board was built by Max Sayre, KTUR Chief Engineer and Carl Pentergraft, Asst. Chief.
L-R Unknown, Unknown and H.A. McMillian KTUR station manager.
Cecil Lynch announcer and engineer
L-R Unknown and H.A. McMillian KTUR station manager
Carl Pendergraft, assistant Chief Engineer KTUR
Unknows in front of KTUR's 1,000 watts Raytheon transmitter.
Can you help? There are a few people in the photos above that we have not been able to identify. If you know there names please contact us with the information.
(Photos courtesy of Cecil Lynch)
KTUR booth at the Stanislaus County Fair in the '50s.
References and sources:
Turlock Tribune newspaper May 20, 1949.
Turlock Tribune June 14, 1946
Turlock Tribune 10-7-49
Backyard reception for Governor Goodwin Knight in backyard of the Enoch Christofferson home on Berkeley Ave. in Turlock between 1953 and 1959. L-R Governor Knight, seated Mrs. Knight.