Behind the Scenes

WFIW

Many of our affiliate radio stations have websites.  WFIW has a great website.  WFIW also has a great leader.  Dave Land is President and General Manager. 

Dave’s father, Tom Land, set a pretty good example.  You can read all about the station’s history on the website.  Here’s a taste:

How did it all start?  In July 1952 Tom Land of Carmi, IL, and Bryan Davidson of Princeton, IN, formed an equal partnership known as Wayne County Broadcasting Co.  Land was General Manager of WROY in Carmi and Davidson was General Manager of WRAY in Princeton when the application was filed for a Construction Permit to build an AM Daytime Only Radio Station to be located 1 ? miles east of Fairfield on Highway 15 known as Campbell Hill.  Operating power of 500 watts was requested, utilizing a non-directional 197 ft. antenna tower, with operation on 1390 kilohertz.

Call letters W F I W were requested.  The first letter “W” is required of radio stations located east of the Mississippi River.  The “FIW” stood for Fairfield-Illinois-Wayne.  It is interesting to note the original W F I W call letters were utilized at Hopkinsville, KY, for a station owned by Acme Mills that went on the air in 1927, and went silent in 1933.  The station was known as the “Veribest and Blue Wing Flour Station,” and the call letters stood for “Whitest Flour in the World.”

Radio Station WFIW in Fairfield began regular commercial broadcasting at 1:00 p.m. August 21, 1953, from studios in a newly constructed concrete block building containing about 1,500 square feet of floor space.  Davidson signed the station on that afternoon with a prayer of dedication by Kenneth Brooks, minister of Fairfield?s First Christian Church.  Davidson played 78 RPM records the rest of the afternoon, interrupted only by the 3 o?clock and 5 o?clock news from the Associated Press, read by Tom Land.

Let’s fast forward to the part where Dave joins the team:

In January 1975, David H. Land, son of Mr. and Mrs. Tom Land, accepted a position as Account Executive and announcer with WFIW, following two years service in the Army.  He graduated from SIU-Carbondale with a degree in Radio-TV in 1972, and held radio announcing positions while in college at WGGH, Marion, IL and WJPS, Evansville, IN; at WGOM, Marion, IN following college graduation; and at KCCO, Lawton, OK while in the Army.  He had also performed announcing duties at WFIW while in high school.