On December 1, 1987, the station signed on the air at 100.9 MHz, as a
Class A facility. The original call sign was KJAS, representing
Jasper, Texas, its original city of license. The station had a
country music format and was owned by Jasper County Broadcasting. The power was only 5,100 watts, a fraction of its current output. In 1996, the station was sold to Tichenor Broadcasting for $3.5 million. Tichenor specialized in formats targeting Hispanic listeners. The station also got permission from the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to move down the dial to 100.7 MHz and greatly increase power to 100,000 watts. The call letters switched to KRTX and the city of license became
Winnie, Texas. Tichenor gave the newly-powerful station a
Regional Mexican format, aimed at Spanish-speaking listeners in and around Houston, one of America's largest Latino
media markets. Tichenor was later acquired by
Univision Communications. In 2004, this station was traded from Univision to the
Salem Media Group in a deal involving six other stations in five U.S. cities. (See the
WPPN page for details.) At the time of sale, 100.7 played
Spanish-language contemporary hits as KOBT "Orbita 100-7". Once Salem acquired KOBT, it switched the station to
Christian talk and teaching, using the moniker "The Word." Co-owned 1070
KNTH had previously carried the Christian format and was called "The Word." With the FM station now known as "100.7 The Word," Salem launched a new format on AM 1070. KNTH flipped to a
conservative talk format as "AM 1070 KNTH", standing for News Talk Houston. ==References==