KEST is a radio station in San Francisco, California. Most of the station's programming is non-English, such as Indian, Chinese, and other Asian languages. KEST does English-language programming during the week, which consists of New Age Talk. Its history is continuous with KSAN , known later as KSOL, one of the first "rhythm and blues" radio stations in the United States, located in San Francisco, California. One star to come out of the station was the DJ Sylvester Stewart, later known as Sly Stone of Sly and the Family Stone recording fame. KEST is owned by Multicultural Radio which owns several stations across the country. KEST broadcasts around the San Francisco Bay Area; its power is 1,000 watts day and 960 watts night. It is diplexed at the KSFB transmitter site. The station features programming from Bay Area Metro Radio and Sino Radio. In 2019 KEST was granted an FM translator allocation on 104.9, though the coverage of this license is limited to Southeast San Francisco and the city ofSouth San Francisco. In reaction, classical station KDFC which operates on the same 104.9 frequency in San Jose began an on-air appeal to listeners looking for interference complaints from the new transmitter.
History
The station was signed on by a local church and began broadcasting in the 1920s. Although unpopular, it was bought in 1939 by Sherwood Patterson, who changed the call letters to KSAN. New studios were constructed in the Merchandise Mart near Market Street; a 250-watt transmitter was installed in a tower on top of the building. Listenership dramatically increased with a format of popular music and disk jockeys such as Les Malloy, who would purchase the station himself in the early 1960s. Malloy changed the call letters to KSOL and strengthened the rhythm and blues/soul music format targeting the African-American community; the station launched the career of popular 1960s and 1970s musician Sly Stone, who was one of the station's DJs. KSAN was a pioneer in broadcasting to the black audience in the San Francisco Bay Area, along with Oakland's KWBR, which later became KDIA. Until the mid-1950s, the handful of stations on the air locally devoted little time to "ethnic" programming of any kind, with the exception of KSAN and KWBR, which also broadcast programs intended for the Chinese, Italian, Portuguese, German and Japanese communities. The original KSAN was born in June 1925 as KGTT. In 1929, it became KGGC and, in 1938, it became the first local station to use the KSAN call letters. In 1958, KSAN switched to a full-time rhythm and blues music format, targeting black listeners in the Bay Area, the first station on the local dial to broadcast R&B around the clock. KSAN's transmitter was on top of the Merchandise Mart building on Market Street, where the studios were located. On July 3, 1964, KSAN was sold to John F. Malloy and Delmor A. Courtney, two well-known San Francisco radio and television personalities. Malloy was for many years a star on local radio and had hosted a popular TV talk show on KGO-TV in the 1950s, while Courtney found fame as a bandleader and personality on KSFO. With Malloy as president and general manager, KSAN became KSOL on its first day under new ownership, hoping to better emphasize its "Soul Radio" format, which it continued until September 1970. The format changed to a general-market music format by the early 1970s. The station became KEST. In 1974, KEST changed its format to a mix of Old Time Radio Dramas, Comedy Recordings known as "Freeway Funnies" and talk shows. The station was known as "KEST Theater Of The Air". In 1977, KEST dropped the Old Time Radio Dramas and Talk Shows and changed format to Religious Programming but surprisingly kept the "Freeway Funnies" until 1980. In the early 1990s, KEST adopted a talk and world ethnic format and became part of Douglas Broadcasting.
