WVOM-FM


WVOM-FM is a commercial FM radio station licensed to Howland, Maine and serving Central and Down East Maine, including Bangor. It airs a talk radio format and is owned by Maine-based Blueberry Broadcasting which is headed by Louis Vitale and Bruce Biette. WVOM-FM is known as "The Voice of Maine News/Talk Network."
The studios and offices are located on Target Industrial Circle in Bangor. The transmitter, powered at 90,000 watts, is on a mountaintop near Burlington. WVOM-FM is simulcast on WVQM 101.3 FM in Augusta and WVOM AM 1450 and FM translator 95.1 in Rockland, which extend WVOM-FM's programming to the capital region and Maine coast.

Programming

Weekdays

WVOM-FM airs a local morning drive information and talk program co-hosted by George Hale and Ric Tyler. Syndicated conservative talk shows follow, mostly from Premiere Networks. They include The Glenn Beck Radio Program, The Rush Limbaugh Show, The Howie Carr Show, The Sean Hannity Show, Ground Zero with Clyde Lewis, and Coast to Coast AM with George Noory. Most hours begin with world and national news from Fox News Radio.

Weekend

Local shows on weekends include "Hot and Cold with Tom Gocze." It is WVOM's longest running local program and originated in the 1989 on then-talk station AM 620 WZON. It had been co-hosted by Gocze and Dr. Dick Hill, a mechanical engineering professor at the University of Maine for over 46 years. A TV show was also seen on Maine Public Broadcasting Network, after being carried for many years on WVII/WFVX-LD. Gocze and Hill also wrote columns for the Bangor Daily News. In 2008 Hill scaled back his time on the program and later retired.
Other weekend programming includes The Kim Komando Show, The Car Doctor with Ron Ananian, Senior Talk, Financial Safari, Maine View, The Maine Outdoors, Somewhere in Time with Art Bell, the weekend version of Coast to Coast AM and the repeats of weekday shows from Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck and Howie Carr.

History

A construction permit for an FM station in Howland was granted by the Federal Communications Commission in 1989. That permit carried the call sign WPVM, although it was never used on the air. In 1992, the construction permit switched to WPRG, which also didn't make it to the air.
In June 1993, the station signed on as WSNV. It aired an adult contemporary format and was owned by Bay Communications, Inc.
In 1997, the station was acquired by San Antonio-based Clear Channel Communications. Clear Channel switched the format to conservative talk, mostly featuring its own syndicated programs, and using CBS Radio News for world and national coverage.
WVOM and the other 16 Clear Channel stations in Maine were sold in August 2008 to Maine-based Blueberry Broadcasting which is headed by Louis Vitale and Bruce Biette.

Past programming