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WQAM (560 AM, "AM 560 Sports") is a commercial radio station in Miami, Florida. It broadcasts a sports radio format and is owned by Audacy, Inc. The studios are in Audacy's Miami office on Northeast Second Avenue. Weekdays on WQAM begin with The Joe Rose Show, hosted by the former Miami Dolphins tight end. He's followed by Tobin & Leroy (Brendan Tobin and Leroy Hoard). In afternoon drive time, Hochman & Crowder (Marc Hochman and Channing Crowder) are heard. Nights and weekends feature syndicated shows from Infinity Sports Network and the BetQL Network.

By day, WQAM broadcasts at 4,100 watts. But to protect other stations on 560 AM from interference, at night power is reduced to 1,000 watts. The station uses a non-directional antenna. The transmitter site is on NE 71st Street near NE 4th Avenue in the Little River neighborhood of Miami.

History

WFAW

WQAM is one of Florida's oldest radio stations. According to Federal Communications Commission (FCC) records, the station was first licensed on January 23, 1923, corresponding with the first license issued with the WQAM call letters. However, multiple alternative dates have been stated for its founding, due to the opinion that WQAM's history should actually start with an earlier Miami station, WFAW. Moreover, although government records state that WFAW was licensed to The Miami Daily Metropolis from June 16, 1922 until its deletion on June 11, 1923, Fred W. Borton later claimed that WFAW had actually been first licensed to him, although there are no records supporting the existence of WFAW prior to the initial Metropolis grant.

In addition to its possible link to WQAM, WFAW's origin date in turn has been variously reported to actually be from 1920 to 1922, including:

• "WFAW, forerunner of WQAM, began operations with a 50 w transmitter in 1920".
• "The 50-watt transmitter that Mr. Borton put together out of odds and ends in 1920 was licensed for operation the following year. Its first call letters, WFAW, were changed to WQAM a year later."
• "It was in 1920, while a co-owner of the Electrical Equipment Co., that Borton cranked up the transmitter of Florida's first radio station, WFAW, the forerunner of WQAM... The call letters were changed to WQAM in 1922..."
• "Radio station WQAM was the first broadcasting station to be established in Florida. The license, issued to it by the department of commerce, to Fred W. Borton, was dated February, 1921, with the call letters WFAW. The original call letters were discontinued in 1922, and the new letters, WQAM, now in use, were adopted."
• May 1921 is listed as the WQAM start date in the 1972 edition of the Broadcasting Yearbook.
• ""Founded in 1922 as the pioneer broadcaster in Florida, and still the southernmost station in the United States, WQAM..."

WQAM

On December 9, 1922, the Miami Metropolis announced that broadcasts over its station, WFAW, were being suspended, pending a move to a new Electrical Equipment Company location, with the existing WFAW transmitter to be dismantled. On January 27, 1923, the Metropolis reported that a 100 watt transmitter to be used by the newspaper's broadcast service, that was designed and built by F. W. Borton of the Electrical Equipment Company and installed at Electrical Equipment's offices at Northwest Fourth Street, would make its debut broadcast the next evening. Two days later, the newspaper wrote: "With the completion of the enlarged radio plant of The Miami Daily Metropolis and Electrical Equipment Company, The Metropolis announces that the government has granted a new charter and also changed the station number to (WQAM). The station number until today was (WFAW)." However, WQAM was licensed to the Electrical Equipment Company, and WFAW to the Miami Daily Metropolis, and government regulators at the time considered them to be separate stations, so the two are reported individually in a March 1, 1923 government listing of active licenses. Thus, the FCC History Cards documenting WQAM's records list January 23, 1923 as its "Date First Licensed", corresponding with the first license issued with the WQAM call letters.

The president of the Electrical Equipment Company was W. W. Luce. WQAM was initially licensed for operation on the 360-meter (833 kHz) "entertainment" wavelength. The call letters were randomly assigned from a sequential roster of available call signs.

Fred W. Borton, who became president of the Miami Broadcasting Company, made many of the electrical parts himself. In 1926, the station increased its power to 500 watts. The station was the first in the United States to install a permanent remote pick-up from the U. S. Meteorological Department. Power was increased to 1,000 watts in 1928, and WQAM became a full-time affiliate of CBS. In 1947, it switched to ABC Radio. In 1948, Barton sold his interest in the station and The Miami Herald assumed entire ownership.

In the beginning, the young station was helped with programming by the newspaper, until the paper ended its participation.

Top 40 era

WQAM is famous for its ownership by Storz Broadcasting in the 1960s. Storz installed a Top 40 format on WQAM and the station competed vigorously with rival WFUN 790 AM (now WAXY). In February 1964, WQAM interviewed and heavily promoted The Beatles' second and third nationally televised appearances on CBS's The Ed Sullivan Show live from the Deauville Hotel in North Beach, Miami Beach.

By far Miami and South Florida's predominant radio station at the time, baby boomers from Jupiter to Key West, and even in Havana, listened to WQAM for the latest in local and American pop music from the 1960s well into the late 1970s. At that time, WQAM was one of the many AM radio stations airing Casey Kasem's American Top 40, and Cuban youngsters used to gather at friends' houses to listen to the countdown of America's most popular songs, especially the 8-hour-long year-end show of Billboard's top 100 songs of the year in which the syndication company that owned the show had put out on vinyl records at a speed of 33 RPM.

Country and Oldies music

WQAM It ended its run as a Top 40 station on February 28th 1980 which was a leap year and Dan Halyburton signed them off with a montage of music, soundbites and jingles from PAMS. WQAM then switched to a country music format. The station was known as Sun Country WQAM

On September 23rd 1985, Sunshine Wireless bought WQAM from Storz broadcasting. At that time, AM radio was getting heavy competition from FM competitors and young people were increasingly tuning in FM stations for their hit music. Sunshine Wireless now had an AM country station, with personality DJs, NBC News, and local information. WQAM was then known as "56 Country WQAM" in the mid 80's and was successful in the ratings under the direction of program director Jon Holiday. WQAM had many veteran DJ's for the country format like Mike Bell, Mitch Lewis, Johnny Dolan, and George Sheldon- who had his start in radio at WQAM in 1986, WQAM shared studios with then-WKQS at 9881 Sheridan Street in Cooper City. In 1986, WQAM would add sports talk programming in the evening hours with Ed Kaplan.

By 1989, WQAM had been unable to achieve a full share point in the Arbitron surveys with its mix of country music and sports. In 1990, the station abandoned its country music format in favor of the satellite-fed "Kool Gold" service, which aired 1950s and '60s oldies.

All-Sports

Around 1992, WQAM became an all-sports station. WQAM is the flagship station for Miami Dolphins football, Florida Panthers hockey, and University of Miami Hurricanes athletics. WQAM was sold to Beasley Broadcasting in 1996.

At first, WQAM aired programming from the Yahoo! Sports Radio network. On January 2, 2013, the station switched its affiliation to CBS Sports Radio for after-hours programming.

Audacy ownership

On October 2, 2014, Beasley Broadcast Group announced that it would trade five radio stations in Philadelphia and Miami (including WQAM) to CBS Radio in exchange for 14 stations located in Tampa, Charlotte and Philadelphia. The swap was completed on December 1, 2014.

On December 23, 2015, WQAM was granted a construction permit to move its transmitter tower approximately 10 miles (16 km) north from Virginia Key to the transmitter site at 360 NE 71st Street in the Little River neighborhood of Miami. The move was coupled with a decrease in daytime power from 5,000 watts to 4,100 watts. The move allowed WQAM to use only one tower for its broadcasts instead of multiple towers on expensive South Florida real estate.

On February 2, 2017, CBS Radio announced it would merge with Entercom (now Audacy, Inc.). The merger was approved on November 9, 2017, and was consummated on November 17, making WQAM a sister station to fellow sports station 790 WAXY.

ESPN and CBS Sports Radio

On August 2, 2019, Entercom announced that WQAM would re-launch as 560 The Joe on August 5, as part of a re-alignment of its sports talk lineups. WAXY's ESPN Radio affiliation was swapped to WQAM, clearing The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz (as its new flagship station), Stephen A. Smith, and the network's overnight and weekend programming (notwithstanding conflicts with sports play-by-play). In turn, some of WQAM's local hosts were moved to WAXY's lineup, while Marc Hochman and Channing Crowder's afternoon program would be simulcast by both stations (but with an opening hour exclusive to WAXY).

As part of a larger realignment of ESPN Radio's schedule on August 17, 2020 (which saw Dan Le Batard cut to two hours, and the premiere of Greeny with Mike Greenberg), WQAM began to simulcast Hochman and Crowder from WAXY in full.

On October 26, 2021, Audacy realigned WQAM and WAXY's programming once again. WQAM rebranded as 560 Sports and regain its CBS Sports Radio affiliation. Some local WAXY programming was also switched to WQAM. Meanwhile, WAXY replaced much of its local programming with sports betting-oriented shows from Audacy's BetQL Network. WAXY later flipped to Spanish-language oldies and talk. So WQAM began airing BetQL programming in the evening and CBS Sports Radio shows overnight and on weekends.

Former sports and talk show hosts

• Scott Ferrall – now at SportsGrid
• Hank Goldberg – The Hammer former host
• Michael Irvin – "The Playmaker" host; now an analyst at NFL Network
• Jim Mandich – The Mad Dog' former host
• Neil Rogers - former morning host
• Sid Rosenberg – now morning host on WABC New York
• Jon Sciambi – now at ESPN.

Sports properties

• Miami Dolphins (1997–2004, 2007–2009, 2016-2023; the 2016 tenure was co-held with WKIS)
• Miami Heat (1988–1993, 2022–present)
• Miami Marlins (1993–2007, was on 790 WAXY/104.3 WAXY-FM, but is now on 940 WINZ as of November 6, 2013)
• Florida Panthers (1993–2007, 2010–present)
• University of Miami Hurricanes (1999–present)

References

1. Radio Service Bulletin, February 1, 1923, "New Stations: Broadcasting Stations", page 3. Other stations first licensed that month included WQAJ, Ann Arbor, Michigan, WQAN Scranton, Pennsylvania, and WQAO New York City.
2. "Facility Technical Data for WQAM". Licensing and Management System. Federal Communications Commission.
3. FCC Public Inspection File
4. Radio-Locator.com/WQAM
5. ^ "Date First Licensed", History Cards for WQAM (covering 1923-1979)
6. "WQAM-FM Miami Now In Operation on Tests", Broadcasting, September 23, 1946, page 56.
7. "Frederick Borton, radio pioneer" (obituary), St. Petersburg Times, July 20, 1976, page 11b
8. "Uridge Named New Manager of WQAM", Miami Herald, January 14, 1948, page 4-A
9. "Tower Transmitter Completed By WQAM", Miami Herald, December 7, 1934, page 15.
10. "Florida: Miami: WQAM", Broadcasting Yearbook (1972 edition), page B-44.
11. "Miami Station Tries to Diversify Program", Miami Herald, January 15, 1928, page 8.
12. "Powerful Station To Broadcast Metropolis Programs", Miami Metropolis, December 9, 1922, second section, page 1.
13. "Metropolis Radio Resumes Broadcasting", Miami Metropolis, January 27, 1923, fourth section, page 1.
14. "Metropolis Radio Station Code is Changed to WQAM", Miami Metropolis, January 29, 1923, page 1.
15. "Stations Broadcasting Market or Weather Reports and Music, Concerts, Lectures, Etc. Alphabetically by Call Letters, Licensed Up to March 1, 1923", Radio Service Bulletin, April 2, 1923, pages 18, 21.
16. "New Stations", Radio Service Bulletin, February 1, 1923, page 3. Limited Commercial license, serial #1026.
17. ^ Hollingsworth 1949. p. 56.
18. Stortz station WQAM (advertisement), Broadcasting, March 3, 1958, page 8.
19. "WQAM joins CBS Radio | Sportscasters Talent Agency of America". staatalent.com. Archived from the original on 2015-03-21.
20. CBS And Beasley Swap Philadelphia/Miami For Charlotte/Tampa from Radio Insight (October 2, 2014)
21. Venta, Lance (December 1, 2014). "CBS Beasley Deal Closes". RadioInsight. Retrieved December 1, 2014.
22. "Application for Construction Permit for Commercial Broadcast Station". CDBS Public Access. Federal Communications Commission. December 23, 2015. Retrieved May 8, 2017.
23. CBS Radio to Merge with Entercom
24. Venta, Lance (November 17, 2017). "Entercom Completes CBS Radio Merger". Radio Insight. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
25. "Entercom Makes Major Lineup Changes To WQAM & WAXY Miami; Rebranding 560 As The Joe". RadioInsight. 2019-08-02. Retrieved 2019-08-03.
26. "WQAM Revises Schedule". RadioInsight. 2020-08-14. Retrieved 2020-08-15.
27. "Audacy Shuffles Miami Sports Programming As Local Emphasis Shifts To WQAM". RadioInsight. Retrieved 2021-10-28.
28. "WAXY Moves to Spanish Oldies". RadioInsight. Retrieved 2024-04-08.
29. Miami Marlins Move to 940 WINZ Radio Insight, November 6, 2013.

Bibliography

• Hollingsworth, Tracy. History of Dade County Florida. Coral Gables, FL: Glade House, 1949.

External links

• Official website
• Facility details for Facility ID 64002 (WQAM) in the FCC Licensing and Management System
• WQAM in Nielsen Audio's AM station database
• FCC History Cards for WQAM (covering 1923-1979)
• WQAM Tribute Site

• 1923 establishments in Florida
• Audacy, Inc. radio stations
• Radio stations established in 1923
• Radio stations in Miami
• Sports radio stations in the United States