Forty-five years ago, it was a CBS prime-time sitcom entering its third of four seasons, capturing a legion of fans and the rapt attention of radio station talent and leadership for its at-times spot-on accuracy of the way some AMs and FMs were operated.
Today, WKRP In Cincinnati remains a much-beloved series, with actor Gary Sandy among those feted with lifetime achievement honors during the 2025 Giants of Broadcasting & Electronic Arts luncheon and awards ceremony presented by the Library of American Broadcasting Foundation.
But did you know there actually is a broadcast radio station that for 12 years has sported the “WKRP” call letters? Indeed, it exists in North Carolina’s Triangle region, and it is launching a fundraising drive in support of needing low-power FM radio stations across the U.S. by “auctioning off” its famed call sign to any other broadcast service operator.
With 100 watts of power and a mix of programming that ranges from “Democracy NOW!” to a two-hour show featuring “Weird” Al Yankovic, WKRP-LPFM 101.9 covers a portion of northeast Raleigh. It doesn’t offer live streaming of its over-the-air signal, and has been operated by Oak City Media since it signed on the air on November 30, 2015.
As the 10am hour began on February 3, General Manager D.P. McIntire could be heard hosting “That Show” for those lucky enough to be within the range of the low-power FM station’s broadcast signal.
While not behind the mic, he’s engineered an opportunity to allow the famed “WKRP” call letters to a full-power AM, full-power FM, or any broadcast TV station regardless of class. Eligibility is up to the owner of any station in these categories, and McIntire welcomes inquiries at [email protected]. RBR+TVBR responded to McIntire’s call for auction participants, asking how one station can possibly share a call sign, as such situations in the past largely involved the same ownership group at the time the call letters were assigned.
McIntire explains, “Under FCC guidelines, a station that is issued a call sign holds a sort of vested right in it, in that we are authorized to ‘share’ the call with others so long as they are not providing the same broadcast service we do.”
As such, there can be a WKRP-AM, WKRP-FM, WKRP-DT, and WKRP-CD, as Oak City Media is prepared to give written authorization to any party willing to obtain it for the right price.
McIntire shares that he’s already received a handful of requests to share the “WKRP” call letters. He also notes that since being awarded the WKRP-LPFM call sign in March 2014, “a few futile lawsuits by others claiming a right to it” have surfaced. While there may be an intellectual property case involving “WKRP in Cincinnati” and any overt connections to MTM Enterprises-held content related to the series or its 1991-1993 syndicated reboot, the “WKRP” call sign is free and clear of any such IP claims.
With what is unofficially described as a call letter bidding/auction system put in place by Oak City Media, the station owners in each category who offer the largest one-time cash donations would be awarded the call letter authorization.
While one may easily dismiss the scheme as a dollar-generating gimmick for a tiny operation in need of cash, that’s not the case here. McIntire says the funds will be channeled into a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization created following the FCC’s 2023 LPFM filing window, as an aid to operators that would need funds to stay afloat should the fiscal health of the newly launched LPFMs falter.
“We assisted dozens of groups with their applications when the filing window opened, and each group we assisted ultimately was granted a construction permit,” McIntire says. “In the course of this consulting we realized that a number of these stations would likely fail after the initial enthusiasm and local donations wave; this has happened during the first two ‘waves’ of LPFM as well.”
Once the consulting concluded, McIntire and his associates created the program as a means of providing those low-power FM stations with financial assistance if and when needed. As such, the winners in the call letter auction will be able to consider their payments as tax-deductible contributions. The non-profit, says McIntire, “will operate in a trust-like manner, aiding stations based on need while investing the proceeds in hope of perpetuating the fund.”
What inspired McIntire to move forward with this initiative? “While our board chose to take this path, it was at my request, both as a means of giving me the comfort of feeling I’ll be ‘paying it forward’ to radio’s next generation; and to take a piece of nostalgia from the past and put it to use in a way that benefits the future.”
Learn more about WKRP-LPFM 101.9, serving a portion of Raleigh, N.C., by clicking here.
