Checking In From The Road

Greetings, OMW readers!

We're on the road, as mentioned, traversing much of the Upper Midwest with some friends until early next week. We've had some form of high-speed Internet access along the way each night, though "high-speed Internet" in hotels is becoming much like the advertised "continental breakfast"...your mileage, and speed, may vary.

One brief note which we'll expand upon later:

We're hearing that there may be a dispute behind the recent shuttering of Beacon Broadcasting's WGRP/940 Greenville PA, which returned to the air a while back simulcasting Youngstown market rimshot WLOA/1470 Farrell PA and its "Wexy 107" oldies format. The format, as any regular OMW reader could easily answer as a game show question, is the former oldies format from Beacon's WEXC/107.1 Greenville PA, now rimshotting the Youngstown market as Christian rocker "Freq 107".

The details are still not confirmed, so we won't go into much detail on what we've heard. But it appears that Beacon and new owner Harold Glunt, and WMVL/101.7 Linesville PA's Vilkie Communications, may not seeing eye to eye on some issues related to WGRP's return. WMVL operated WGRP in an LMA, and had filed to purchase it from Beacon late last year. The sale was approved by the FCC, but never consummated...but even after that, WMVL programmed the Greenville PA AM station until just a few weeks ago, at one point with an ABC satellite-delivered 24/7 AC format, and then with a simulcast of WMVL (oldies "Cool 101.7") itself. 940 then went off the air, until returning recently with the WLOA-based "Wexy 107" simulcast.

We'll have more news that's NOT from the World of Glunt later this week...