FM History Profile: WMRK

History:

This station started out as a very small station on 103.9, licensed to Marion. At first it simulcast WAJO-AM, which later changed to WJAM-AM, playing black contemporary music and community service programs. Later the power was increased, the transmitter moved and the incredibly small town of Orrville because the city of license for this station, which targeted Selma. The format is now black adult contemporary / contemporary, and it's known as 97 Jamz.

The WJAM callsign can be traced to a small AM station in Marion, where the calls stood for "Judson And Marion", the two colleges in that town. In  May 2004 the station was granted a construction permit to change frequencies from 97.3 to 107.9. This was done to facilitate the upgrade of a station on 97.3 in Birmingham.

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In May of 2006 the station was granted a construction permit to relicense and relocate to Shorter, near Montgomery.  As of April 2008, the station is still broadcasting from the old location outside Selma.  Rumors abound that the station will take on the WMRK calls from a co-owned AM in Selma, switching to adult contemporary.  Other rumors seem to swirl around a WACV move to FM, to become Montgomery's first news/talk on FM.  A few weeks after the rumors, the Selma-Times Journal confirmed all the area changes.

 

WJAM flipped to news/talk in early April, with the new WMRK-FM calls, taken from the AM in Selma.