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WOLI (910 kHz) is a Spanish Tropical AM radio station located in Spartanburg, South Carolina. The station is licensed by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to broadcast with power of 3,600 watts in the daytime and 890 watts at night under separate directional signal patterns.

History

WSPA 950 AM signed on the air on February 17, 1930, as South Carolina's first radio station, beating out WCSC/Charleston and WIS/Columbia by several months. Programming was mostly local, but national shows included those of Gene Autry, Fats Waller and Wayne King. The station was owned by Virgil Evans during its first 10 years on the air. WSPA was sold on June 1, 1940, to the Spartanburg Advertising Company, a group that was formed with the intention on starting a second radio station in Spartanburg, WORD 910 AM, which signed on in September of that year utilizing studio and office space from WSPA.

In 1944 the FCC ordered the WSPA-WORD combo to be broken up due to ownership regulations which forbid an owner from having no more than one AM station per market. This was completed on March 17, 1947, when WSPA and WSPA-FM were sold to Liberty Life Insurance and WORD was sold to Spartan Radiocasting (WSPA-FM 98.9 signed on as South Carolina's first FM station on August 29, 1946).

Well-known personalities included Cliff "Farmer" Gray, "Children's Theater" host Jane Dalton and Grover "Cousin Bud" Golightly who hosted "Hillbilly Hit Parade", and "Go with Golightly" with big band music.

In 1952, a dispute erupted between both Spartan Radiocasting and Liberty Life over the Spartanburg allocation for television channel 7 (which was won by Spartan and went on the air as WSPA-TV in 1956. It was settled in 1958 when Spartan Radiocasting bought back WSPA and WSPA-FM from Liberty Life Insurance and spinning off WORD and their FM sister WDXY 100.5 to different ownership.

A fire in May 1960 resulted in new offices being needed for the radio and TV stations.

Bill Drake joined WSPA and became its leading personality during its last two decades.

In 2002, Entercom (then owners of WORD/WYRD) swapped WORD's programming and call letters from 910 AM over to its newly acquired sister, WSPA's signal at 950 AM to gain better coverage. Then in 2005, WSPA as well as the FMs WOLI/WOLT were spun off to Davidson Media Group. The WSPA call letters were dropped per an agreement with WSPA-TV to surrender the WSPA calls if the radio station ever changed hands. With new calls of WOLI the station simulcasted parts of WOLI-FM programming with brokered programming. In 2007, the simulcasting with the FM ended and the station switched to Spanish Religious programming, but retained the brokered programming, which then switched to black gospel January 2011 through August 2011, a few months of which were simulcast from Davidson-owned WRJD (then known as "Rejoice 1410" in Durham, North Carolina).

September 1, 2011, WOLI relaunched as Yahoo! Sports Radio 910 until January 2012.

In August 2012, WOLI once again became Spartanburg's home to Wofford Terrier sports. After the Terriers left WOLI after the 2004 season, they returned to 910 AM as well as 105.7 FM.

On January 7, 2013, WOLI was relaunched as Earth 105.7 FM with an Oldies format.

On March 1, 2013, the Earth FM oldies format moved to WOLT (since renamed WLTS). WOLI was relaunched as The Source @ 105.7/AM 910 with an adult standards and brokered programming format. The station also airs local sports.

On July 13, 2015, Davidson Media sold WOLI and eleven other stations to TBLC Holdings, with the sale to be completed on September 30, 2015. The sale was consummated on November 5, 2015, at a purchase price of $3.5 million.

On November 5, 2015, WOLI changed their format to regional Mexican, branded as "Activa 103.9" (at the time simulcasting WTOB-FM 103.9 FM).

Effective June 26, 2020, TBLC Media sold WOLI to Norberto Sanchez's Norsan Media LLC for $150,000.

On March 15, 2024, Norsan Media - the parent company of WOLI (AM) - bought WSPA-FM (Magic 106.3) as part of their exit plan from chapter 11 bankruptcy after it was placed under a divestiture trust, for $700,000. On April 1, 2024 at just after midnight, the 106.3 FM frequency started simulcasting WOLI as an effort to provide a stronger signal for listeners. The last song played on Magic 106.3 was You and Me by Lifehouse.

References

1. "Facility Technical Data for WOLI". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
2. ^ Neely, Emily Crow (September 14, 2005). "The ups and downs of WSPA's 75 years". Spartanburg Herald-Journal. Retrieved March 31, 2023.
3. Taylor, Tony J. (December 8, 2001). "WSPA-AM narrows focus on city". Spartanburg Herald-Journal. Retrieved March 31, 2023.
4. Orr, Susan (June 18, 2005). "WSPA stations to get new ownership". Spartanburg Herald-Journal. Retrieved March 31, 2023.
5. "WOLT/Greenville,SC Debuts Earth FM" Oldies from Radio Insight (March 1, 2013)
6. "Davidson Media Sells 12"

External links

• Facility details for Facility ID 34388 (WOLI) in the FCC Licensing and Management System
• WOLI in Nielsen Audio's AM station database
• Facility details for Facility ID 156110 (W289BS) in the FCC Licensing and Management System
• W289BS at FCCdata.org

• Radio stations in South Carolina
• Radio stations established in 1940
• 1940 establishments in South Carolina
• Spanish-language radio stations in South Carolina