Easy listening and Jesse Helms A
construction permit authorizing the station was initially given the
call sign WCOY. It changed to WRAL-FM before it
signed on for the first time on September 6, 1946, on 95.3 with an
ERP of 1,000 watts. It was the second FM station to operate in North Carolina after
Christian radio station
WMIT, and the first to operate on the new 88–108 MHz band (FM stations had previously used the 42–50 MHz band.). WRAL-FM was a sister station to WRAL 1240 AM (now
WPJL). WRAL-AM-FM were owned by A.J. Fletcher's Capitol Broadcasting, which added a TV station in 1956,
WRAL-TV channel 5. The studios were located at 130 Salisbury Street, with the transmitter on Davie Street Extension. Beginning in the 1960s, WRAL-FM offered its own programming, ending the
simulcast with its AM sister station. It played
easy listening music and provided extensive agricultural reports. Together with
WCEC in
Rocky Mount and
WGBR in
Goldsboro, WRAL-FM helped establish a statewide radio network named the
Tobacco Radio Network, which connected communities throughout North Carolina. It became the precursor to today's
North Carolina News Network, originally based at the WRAL studios (and sold to Curtis Media Group in 2009). WRAL-FM moved to 101.5 MHz in 1947.
Jesse Helms became the news director of the radio stations in 1948, adding TV duties when channel 5 signed on. From 1960 until his election to the
U.S. Senate in 1972, the station offered the audio portion of commentaries by Helms which aired as the "Viewpoint" segment on WRAL-TV. The station increased its ERP to 250,000 watts in 1963, which was
grandfathered one year later after the FCC imposed new tower height and power restrictions. That made WRAL-FM an FM "superpower station". A new, taller tower was built in 1977 near
Auburn, with an ERP of 100,000 Watts. On December 10, 1989, an early morning winter ice storm caused the tower it shared with WRAL-TV near
Auburn, North Carolina, to collapse, along with a separate tower for WPTF-TV (now
WRDC). The station moved its transmission signal to WPTF's former tower near
Apex until a new tower was built at the same site the following year. With the new tower, the station had an effective radiated power of 96,000 watts to conform to FCC standards, since its antenna was situated farther up the tower than before. and only the second commercial station in the nation (
WUSN in Chicago was the first The broadcast rights to football and basketball games belong to Wolfpack Sports Properties, which is jointly owned by Capitol Broadcasting and Learfield Sports. The weekly coaches' shows with
Dave Doeren and
Kevin Keatts air separately on sister station
WCMC-FM.
Delilah and Rick Dees WRAL-FM was the second station in Raleigh to air the
nationally syndicated Delilah nighttime radio show, which it carried from November 2007 until October 2009.
WRSN ("Sunny 93.9") had carried the program before that station flipped to Rhythmic AC as "
93.9 Kiss FM". On August 22, 2009, WRAL-FM started to air the
Rick Dees Weekly Top 30 Countdown show on Saturdays from 7–10 am. It also replaced the Delilah program with the
John Tesh Radio Show beginning October 5, 2009. Both Dees and Tesh are veterans to Triangle radio, having worked at
WKIX in the early 1970s, along with former
WRAL-TV morning and noon anchor
Bill Leslie. On March 5, 2013, morning
drive time personality Bill Jordan announced his retirement after 23 years with the station. On April 2, 2013, WRAL-HD2 changed formats to
contemporary Christian music, an expansion of the "Cornerstone" program normally heard on Sunday mornings on the main channel from 7 to noon. "Cornerstone" has been hosted by Jami Caskey since it first aired in 1984, and is the station's longest-running program. When the main channel switches to all-Christmas music after Thanksgiving, HD2 airs the adult contemporary format heard during the rest of the year. However, as of 2023, Christmas music on WRAL-FM was restricted to a few select weekends and their normal format ran with some Christmas songs mixed in during the weekdays. WRAL-FM's website offered a 24/7 stream of their Christmas music, and the station would eventually go all-Christmas at 5 pm on December 8.
Morning show changes On July 28, 2014, "The Gene and Julie Show" began airing in morning drive time, with husband and wife Gene and Julie Gates. On August 2, 2022, WRAL-HD3, W243DK, and W257CS flipped from
sports radio "The Buzz" (which moved to
WDNC and WCLY while remaining on WCMC-FM HD2) to
all-news radio as "WRAL News+", airing newscasts from
WRAL-TV. The stations remain as the radio home of
Durham Bulls baseball. ==Translators==