WNAX is a radio station in Yankton, South Dakota, currently owned by Saga Communications, Inc., which broadcasts a News/Talk format. WNAX broadcasts at 5,000 watts around the clock from a tower in eastern Yankton. Due to its location near the bottom of the AM dial, transmitter power, and South Dakota's flat land the station's 5,000-watt signal provides at least secondary coverage during the day to most of the eastern half of South Dakota, much of western Iowa, and most of the densely populated portion of Nebraska. In addition to its home markets of Sioux City and Sioux Falls, WNAX provides a strong grade B signal to Omaha and Lincoln. Under the right conditions, its daytime signal penetrates as far south as Kansas City, as far north as Fargo and well east of Des Moines with a good radio. Among U.S. stations its daytime land coverage is exceeded only by KFYR in Bismarck, North Dakota. A single tower is used during the day. Three towers are used at night to protect clear-channel stations on adjacent frequencies, concentrating the signal along the Sioux Falls-Sioux City corridor.
History
WNAX was first licensed on November 7, 1922, to the Dakota Radio Apparatus company, and is the oldest surviving radio station in the state of South Dakota. The call-letters came from a sequentially assigned list, and WNAX was the last station in the state to receive a callsign starting with a W instead of K, as additional stations in the state were established after the January, 1923 shift that moved the K/W call letter boundary from the western border of South Dakota to the Mississippi River. WNAX was purchased by Gurney's Seed and Nursery Company in 1926 and became known as "WNAX—Voice of the House of Gurney in Yankton". The station was used to promote Gurney products and services, making Gurney's a household name. In 1957, Cowles Broadcasting Corporation sold the station to Peoples Broadcasting Corporation, a subsidiary of Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co., which, in turn, was an affiliate of the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation. Peoples Broadcasting was then the owner of KVTV-TV. On February 10, 1933, the Federal Radio Commission authorized an increase in daytime power from 1,000 watts to 2,500 watts. Less than two years later, December 18, 1934, the new Federal Communications Commission authorized another increase in power, to 5,000 watts. The radio station launched the careers of many stars, both local and national. Starting in the late 1920s, Lawrence Welk spent a decade performing daily without pay on WNAX. In 1939, Wynn Hubler Speece started her radio program and became known regionally as "Your Neighbor Lady". Speece was still continuing to do her Marconi Award-winning broadcast more than sixty years later when WNAX celebrated its eightieth anniversary in 2002. Other well-known regional radio personalities from WNAX have included Norm Hilson, Whitney Larson, "Happy" Jack O'Malley, Bob Hill, Ed Nelson, Steve Wallick, George B. German, Roland "Pete" Peterson and the hillbilly performers on the WNAX Missouri Valley Barn Dance show. In October 2005 Speece announced her retirement after almost 66 years of continuous broadcasting. She died on October 22, 2007, at 90 years of age. In 1983 a fire destroyed the main WNAX building. All of the station's historic live recordings as well as thousands of records were destroyed. The staff of WNAX went to the station's transmitter site and continued broadcasting. Eventually, the station recovered when a new building was constructed on Highway 50 in Yankton. In 1942 the station built a tower at Yankton at, which was the tallest radio broadcasting tower at the time. The current tower is tall. Today WNAX continues many of the traditions started in 1922 with frequent news, sports, weather and farm market updates. The station continues to be affiliated with CBS Radio, an association that began in the late 1920s. WNAX is the flagship for South Dakota State University sports. WNAX also carries Minnesota Twins baseball and Minnesota Vikings football.
Honors and awards
In May 2006, WNAX won one first place in the commercial radio division of the South Dakota Associated Press Broadcasters Association news contest.
