The station originally began broadcasting in 1962, as a
carrier current station broadcasting on 850 KHz. By 1966, KALX (then known as Radio KAL, the
call letters being derived from Berkeley's nickname "Cal") had moved from Berkeley's
dormitories to Dwinelle Hall on campus, and Berkeley administrators began investigating the possibility of applying for a
broadcast frequency for the station. KALX received its broadcast license and made its first FM broadcast, with 10 watts of power, in 1967. The studio in the basement of Dwinelle was modest, a small chamber sequestered off from a sizable library of albums. In the 1970s, KALX was taken off the air for a short period by the faculty oversight Radio Policy Board after the station manager and friends had abused their use of university automobiles for private use and run up large bills for long distance phone calls to their contacts in Los Angeles and elsewhere. After an investigation, the station was put back on the air in 1975 under new management, led by Andrew Reimer who had previously been manager of
KUCI, the radio station at UC Irvine. The station progressed from a 10-watt part-time operation to continuous operation in 1977, to a higher transmitter site in the
Berkeley Hills in 1978. KALX became the official radio station for the
Oakland Athletics just days before the season opener in April
1978.
Larry Baer, a junior
political science major who was the station's sports director and
business manager, negotiated the agreement with team owner
Charlie Finley. The situation was made possible because of the Athletics' subpar on-field performance and attendance and the uncertainty surrounding Finley's threats to move the ballclub to
Denver. Sophomore
mass communications major
Bob Kozberg and station
producer/
engineer Steve Blum also worked on the broadcasts. The arrangement lasted only sixteen games. One month into the season, Finley decided to keep the Athletics in Oakland and awarded the broadcast rights to
KNEW. Nonetheless, the setup made the A's a laughingstock in the Bay Area. At the time, KALX only operated at 10 watts, rendering it practically unlistenable more than 10 miles from
Oakland Coliseum. This led one fan to joke about the A's radio network stretching all the way to Hawaii by asking, "
Honolulu? How about
here?" In 1981, the station began a successful
fundraising drive to boost its power level to the present-day 500 watts, a level that was reached in 1982. As part of the A's 50th anniversary celebration in 2018, Baer was invited back to do play-by-play for one inning of an A's/Giants game. ==Format==