Hot Talk KSFO 560 AM is a radio station located in San Francisco, California. It is a commercial talk-radio station on AM frequency 560kHz owned by Cumulus Media. Cumulus radio owns and operates two radio stations in the San Francisco Bay Area. 560 KSFO and 810 KGO. KSFO has other sister stations including KFOG, KNBR, KSAN, and KTCT. KSFO broadcasts with 5000-watt power. The KSFO studio is located in the SoMa district of San Francisco, and its transmitter is hoisted on Amador street, at the end of Islais Creek, near the San Francisco Bay.
History of Hot Talk KSFO 560 AM:
KSFO was established in 1925 with the name KTAB, a reference to the founder: The Tenth Avenue Baptist church. It first aired in Oakland, California. The radio was purchased by Wesley Dumm, who transferred the radio’s transmitter and city of license to San Francisco and changed the name to KSFO to reflect the name of the city, San Francisco.
Dumm would later be convinced by President Roosevelt before the start of World war II to launch some shortwave broadcast radio channels: KWID (Wesley I. Dumm), KWIX. These three stations; KSFO, KWID, and KWIX were all located in Islais Creek, where KSFO’s transmitter standstill today. In its early days, KSFO broadcasted news, music, drama, comedy, and sports. The 50s saw KSFO rebroadcast some classic radio shows multiple times each year.
1956 saw KSFO change ownership from Wesley Dumm to Gene Autry owned Gold West Broadcasting. KSFO’s brand jingle was ‘The Sound of the City,’ composed by Johnny Mann and sung a Capella. KSFO had the largest audience in the San Francisco Oakland radio market throughout the 60s and 70s, leading them to refer to themselves as the greatest radio station in the world. Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Nat King Cole, Dean Martin, and Tony Bennett were all affiliated with KSFO. The First Broadcasting Company bought KSFO in 1991 and sold to Citadel Broadcasting in 2007. Cumulus Media took ownership of this station in 2011 after it merged with Citadel Broadcasting.
Audience
Hot Talk KSFO 560 AM adopted the talk-radio format after it was bought by The First Broadcasting Company in 1991. They focused KSFO on conservative talk, leading to the slogan, ‘The Station for Right-Thinking People.’ When that format began, there were three hosts on The Morning show; Melanie Morgan, Lee Rodgers, and Tom Benner. Melanie Morgan was dropped in 2008 for budgeting reasons; Lee Rodgers was terminated in 2010. Brian Sussman took over the morning show and still hosts the early morning show featuring news and interviews every weekday. While KSFO’s sister station, 810 KGO focuses on local shows and political discussions and interviews, KSFO focuses on more conservative shows with some syndicated programs aired every week.
Famous Programs
It had memorable programs from the 50s through to the 80s. They got many national and international journalism awards for their coverage of the murders of Supervisor Harvey Milk by former supervisor Dan White and George Moscone; the Mayor of San Francisco. They also covered the mass suicides at the Peoples Temple in Jonestown, Guyana.
Controversies
Many of their programs have attracted controversy and criticism from their audience. In 1995, The chairman of the Democratic National committee condemned KSFO’s ‘hate speech’ in a letter sent to the constituents of the committee. The letter suggested a campaign be started to mute this channel.
In 2005, A blogger ‘Spocko’ started recording and commenting on excerpts of their shows to prove to the people that there was indeed hate speech being broadcast on the station. Spocko gained some traction and started a letter-writing campaign that successfully convinced some of KSFO’s advertisers to stop running their commercials on the station. Many advertisers like Visa, Netflix, Bank of America, and MasterCard canceled their ad deals with the station. Spocko’s website was taken down in 2007 after he got a cease-and-desist letter from ABC lawyers on copyright violation grounds.
In 2006, Melanie Morgan was targeted for her comments on a popular case at the time. New York Times editor Bill Keller was convicted of treason and Melanie had opined that anyone convicted of treason deserved the gas chamber as punishment. Her comments got her heavy criticism in a San Francisco Chronicle editorial.
Famous Presenters
Among an array of several presenters at KSFO, the following are few of the famous personalities to have worked or are still working with them till date: Melanie Morgan, Brian Sussman, David Gold, and Michael Savage.
Melanie Morgan is an American talk-radio presenter and commentator who worked with KSFO in an on and off arrangement until 2013. She has anchored many shows during her career as a talk-radio personality including the Morning Show. She left her talk-radio position in 2013 to become the chairman of a nonprofit organization that supports American soldiers and the war against terrorism.
Brian Sussman is a talk show host, meteorologist, and author. He is the current host of KSFO’s The Morning Show.
David Gold is an American radio host and commentator.
Michael Alan Wiener, known in the media circles as Michael Savage. He is a conservative talk-radio host, activist, political commentator, and nutritionist. His radio shows have a little bit of everything, hardline discussions, political commentary, conservative idealism, humor as well as health and nutrition talks.
Contact Details:
Address: 750 Battery St, 94111 San Francisco, California
Phone: +1 415-808-5600
Email: ksfostaff@yahoo.com
Official Website: https://www.ksfo.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/560ksfo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/560ksfo
Instagram: https://instagram.com/560ksfo[/expand]