KDWN


KDWN is a commercial AM radio station in Las Vegas, Nevada, and owned by the Beasley Broadcast Group, Inc. The station pronounces its call letters as "K-Dawn." The station's studios are located in the unincorporated Clark County area of Spring Valley, while it transmits from a three-tower facility on Galleria Drive in Henderson. Programming is simulcast on 250-watt FM translator station K268CS at 101.5 MHz.
KDWN airs a talk radio format. It runs several nationally syndicated conservative talk hosts, along with local shows, most of which are brokered programming. National hosts include Sean Hannity and Mark Levin. Other hours are devoted to money, health, real estate and sports. In most cases, the local hosts pay for their time on the air, and are permitted to run their own advertising. Most hours on weekdays begin with world and national news from Westwood One News. A local staff provides Nevada news, weather and traffic. KDWN also has a local news alliance with Channel 8 KLAS-TV, the CBS-TV Network affiliate in Las Vegas.
KDWN broadcasts full-time with 50,000 watts, the highest power permitted for commercial AM stations in the U.S. A single tower is used during the day, beaming a non-directional signal that covers large slices of Nevada, California, Arizona and Utah. But because AM 720 is a clear-channel frequency reserved for Class A WGN in Chicago, KDWN must adjust its coverage at night. During this time, power is fed to all three towers in a directional pattern, nulled away from the East. Even with this restriction, its nighttime signal can be heard throughout most of the Western United States, north into Canada and south into Mexico. KDWN broadcasts in the HD radio format. KDWN is southern Nevada's primary entry point station for the Emergency Alert System.

History

From music station to talk radio

KDWN first came on the air on April 7, 1975. It was founded by A.J. Williams and Jack Reeder. Williams owned KTYM-AM-FM in Inglewood, California and also owned KAIL TV in Fresno. Reeder was the chief engineer of AM 1110 KRLA. Reeder died, leaving his half of the station to Williams, who owned the station until his death in 2005.
The station began by broadcasting a full service format of middle of the road music, news, sports and talk. The music format lasted longer on KDWN than on most AM radio stations of the day. In the 1970s, many AM stations were leaving music formats to FM, and switching over to talk programming.
KDWN's transition from music to talk began slowly. In the late 1970s, KDWN aired a mix of music and some talk during the day. In January 1980, KDWN began broadcasting talk around the clock. KDWN was the top news/talk outlet in the Las Vegas radio market and won an award for its coverage of the 1980 MGM Grand Fire.
Unlike most Las Vegas-area stations, KDWN remained locally owned even as most of its competitors were bought out by large radio corporations such as Clear Channel Communications and Infinity Broadcasting. The continuity of ownership kept a consistent style of station sound. The station continued to rely on experienced, yet older, hosts who may have had been with the station since it began broadcasting in the talk-radio format. The station did well in the ratings as one of the first generation of talk radio stations. Call screening was not used until recently.

Art Bell and Rush Limbaugh

Noted radio talk host Art Bell, after minor jobs at several California radio and TV stations, began hosting an all-night show on KDWN in 1983. KDWN had just been granted Federal Communications Commission permission to increase its nighttime power from 10,000 watts to 50,000 watts. KDWN was now audible with a good radio between nighttime and dawn in Los Angeles, San Francisco and around the West Coast. So Bell called the show "West Coast AM" because it aired between 1 and 6 a.m. Pacific Time. Bell began by discussing mostly politics. But he increasingly added discussions of the paranormal and conspiracy theories to the program, resulting in increased ratings and national attention. The show got nationwide syndication in 1993, when it was renamed "Coast to Coast AM." Bell did the show from the Plaza Hotel, where KDWN had studios. Later it moved to a studio in his home in nearby Pahrump, Nevada, in Nye County. Eventually KDWN, no longer in control of the program, decided not to continue carrying it in syndication and it was picked up by rival Las Vegas talk station AM 840 KXNT.
KDWN was one of the first radio stations to carry Rush Limbaugh's nationally syndicated show in 1988. Limbaugh helped boost KDWN's midday ratings. But in 1996, with the rates to carry it increasing, KDWN decided not to renew the show. Like Coast to Coast AM, the Rush Limbaugh Show moved to 840 KXNT. KDWN produced and broadcast a local morning show, The Snoozebusters, from the early 1980s until 2006. It was hosted by Ken Stahl and Hart Kirsch.

Beasley Broadcasting acquisition

In March 2006, Beasley Broadcast Group announced plans to buy the station for $17 million. A Las Vegas newspaper reported a rumor that KDWN would change to an all-sports format, effective July 1, 2006, although the switch did not happen. Host Jim Dallas reported on Wake Up, America on July 21, 2006, that audience backlash against the change forced Beasley to retain the talk radio format.
In the fall of 2006, Beasley introduced a morning drive time news and information show hosted by Heidi Harris, with the remainder of its weekday talk format consisting of nationally syndicated shows and local brokered programming. Harris' show was discontinued in the mid-2010s, with the nationally syndicated Laura Ingraham Show moved into the morning time slot. Harris had also been heard on KDWN from 1988 to 1998.
In June, 2017, the Oakland Raiders, in preparation for their relocation to Las Vegas, announced that a two-year deal had been reached with the Beasley Broadcast Group to carry Raiders games on KDWN and FM sister station 102.7 KCYE, starting with the 2017 NFL season. In 2019, the team moved their broadcasts to KYMT.

Current and former hosts