See also
| Archives at | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ||||||
| How to use archival material |
| |
|---|---|
| Broadcast area | San Francisco Bay Area |
| Frequency | 94.1MHz |
| Branding | Pacifica Radio |
| Programming | |
| Language(s) | English |
| Format | |
| Affiliations | Pacifica Radio Network |
| Ownership | |
| Owner | Pacifica Foundation |
| History | |
First air date | April 15, 1949 [1] |
Call sign meaning | Pacifica |
| Technical information [2] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 51246 |
| Class | B |
| ERP | 59,000 watts horizontal only |
| HAAT | 405 meters (1,329 ft) |
Transmitter coordinates | 37°51′54.7″N122°13′15.8″W / 37.865194°N 122.221056°W |
| Translator(s) | 94.3 MHz K232FZ (Monterey) |
| Repeater(s) | 94.1 MHz KPFA-FM3 (Oakley) |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Webcast | Listen live |
| Website | kpfa |
| Satellite station | |
| KPFB | |
| |
| Frequency | 89.3MHz |
| Ownership | |
| Owner | Pacifica Foundation |
| Technical information [3] | |
| Facility ID | 51243 |
| Class | A |
| ERP | 4,600 |
| HAAT | 72 meters (236 ft) |
Transmitter coordinates | 37°52′19.7″N122°16′21.8″W / 37.872139°N 122.272722°W |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
KPFA (94.1 FM) is a public, listener-funded talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station signed on the air April 15, 1949, [4] as the first Pacifica Radio station and remains the flagship station of the Pacifica Radio Network.
The station's studios are located in Downtown Berkeley, and its transmitter site is located in the Berkeley Hills.
Launched in 1949, three years after the Pacifica Foundation was created by pacifist Lewis Hill, KPFA became the first station in the Pacifica Radio network and the first listener-supported radio broadcaster in the United States. [1] [5] [6] Previously, non-commercial stations were licensed only to serve educational functions as extensions of high schools, colleges, and universities. This departure into listener-oriented programming brought many detractors as KPFA aired controversial programming. The first interview with anyone from the gay political movement was broadcast by KPFA, as well as Allen Ginsberg's poem Howl in the 1950s. In 1954 the broadcast by a group of marijuana reform advocates extolling the pleasures of cannabis resulted in the tape being impounded by the California Attorney General. In the 1960s KPFA and Pacifica were accused of being controlled by the Communist Party, and several challenges to its license were waged, none of them successful.
KPFA was the first station to broadcast a radio show specializing in space music, with the debut of Stephen Hill and Anna Turner's Music from the Hearts of Space in 1973. Ten years later, the show – now known by the shorter title Hearts of Space – was syndicated in the U.S. to NPR stations, while remaining at its first home at KPFA.
In the 1970s and 1980s, it broadcast a weekly long-running radio program called Fruit Punch for gay and lesbian listeners. [7]
Since 1981, the station is known for airing the pioneering culture jamming sound collage show Over the Edge . Originally hosted by Don Joyce of Negativland, it is the longest-running block of free-form audio collage in radio history. [8]
KPFA is also known for Puzzling Evidence, the longest running radio program of the Church of the Subgenius hosted by Doug Wellman and Harry S. Robins. The program was the inspiration for the Talking Heads song of the same name from the band's film True Stories .
In 1999 the station was effectively taken over by KPFA's governing Pacifica Foundation, after Dennis Bernstein, the long-established host of the station's Flashpoints news magazine, was forcibly removed by police for airing grievances on air over a labor dispute. [9] [10] [11] A broad cross section of protesters joined in direct action outside of the station [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] in a weeks-long lockout during which station management spent over half a million dollars on security measures. [17] At one point, listeners created a separate fund to accept listener pledges that would be directed away from the Pacifica Foundation. [18]
In 2007, KPFA derecognized its Unpaid Staff Organization. The staff claimed that Pacifica Radio had been making network more corporate, softening its voice of dissent, and attempting to get rid of some of the volunteers at the station. In 2008, a forcible removal by police of a KPFA volunteer highlighted the concerns between management and volunteer staff. [19]
A member of the KPFA board suggested that it was problematic that there was no grievance procedure for unpaid staff at the station. [20]
In November 2010, the management of Pacifica laid off most of the staff of the popular KPFA Morning Show. The union representing the paid staff of KPFA claims that the lay offs were done in violation of the union contract. [21] Pacifica management says the lay offs were financially necessary and done according to staff seniority. [22] Pacifica management replaced the paid staff of the Morning Show with an all volunteer crew. [23]
KPFA's sister stations are WBAI New York, KPFT Houston, KPFK Los Angeles, and WPFW Washington. Pacifica continues today to be a listener-supported network of stations. The main KPFA transmitter is a 59 kilowatt class B, though there is a booster KPFA-FM3 in Oakley. KPFB 89.3 is a smaller station, also in Berkeley, that covers areas of Berkeley that are shielded from the main KPFA signal by the Berkeley Hills. It also carries some separate programming specifically for its Berkeley audience. KPFA programs are also rebroadcast by KFCF in Fresno. KZFR in Chico also carries KPFA's programming from 2:00-6:00 a.m. daily. KZSC Santa Cruz simultaneously broadcasts KPFA's Pacifica Evening News on weeknights. In the Bay Area, Comcast carries KPFA's broadcasts on cable channel 967, as part of its digital radio offering. The channel is labeled "Variety/Berkeley".
| Archives at | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ||||||
| How to use archival material |
Pacifica Foundation is an American nonprofit organization that owns five independently operated, non-commercial, listener-supported radio stations known for their progressive/liberal political orientation. Its national headquarters adjoins station KPFK in North Hollywood, California.
Over the Edge is a sound collage radio program hosted and produced in the United States by Jon Leidecker ("Wobbly") and Robert Cole ("KrOB"), who took over in 2015 after the death of longtime host Don Joyce.
WBAI is a non-commercial, listener-supported radio station licensed to New York, New York. Its programming is a mixture of political news, talk and opinion from a left-leaning, liberal or progressive viewpoint, and eclectic music. The station is owned by the Pacifica Foundation with studios located in Brooklyn and transmitter located at 4 Times Square.
Mary Frances Berry is an American historian, writer, lawyer, activist and professor who focuses on U.S. constitutional and legal, African-American history. Berry is the Geraldine R. Segal Professor of American Social Thought where she teaches American legal history at the Department of History, School of Arts & Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania. She is the former chairwoman of the United States Commission on Civil Rights. Previously, Berry was provost of the College of Behavioral and Social Science at University of Maryland, College Park, and was the first African American chancellor of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
KPFK is a listener-sponsored radio station based in North Hollywood, California, United States, which serves Southern California, and also streams 24 hours a day via the Internet. It was the second of five stations in the non-commercial, listener-sponsored Pacifica Foundation network.
KTRU-LP is the college radio station of Rice University, a private university in south-central Houston, Texas, United States.
KUNM is a public radio station broadcasting on FM 89.9 MHz from high atop Sandia Crest, with broadcasts originating from the third floor of Oñate Hall, on the campus of the University of New Mexico (UNM) in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
KPFT is a listener-sponsored community radio station in Houston, Texas, which began broadcasting March 1, 1970 as the fourth station in the Pacifica radio family. The station airs a variety of music, news, talk, and call-in programs, most ranging from center-left to far-left. Prominent persons who have been regulars on KPFT include science educator David F. Duncan and humorist John Henry Faulk.
WPFW is a talk and jazz music community radio station serving the greater Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. It is owned by the Pacifica Foundation, and its studios are located on K Street Northwest. The station’s slogan is "Jazz and Justice."
KBOO is a non-commercial, listener-supported, community radio station in Portland, Oregon. It airs an eclectic radio format, with a small paid staff and scores of volunteers. The studios are on SE 8th Avenue, in a converted warehouse in inner Southeast Portland, purchased in 1982. The mission is to serve groups that are underrepresented on other local radio stations and to provide access to the airwaves for people who have unconventional or controversial tastes and points of view.
William Marx Mandel was an American broadcast journalist, left-wing political activist, and author, best known as a Soviet affairs analyst. He was born in New York City.
KBAY is a commercial radio station licensed to Gilroy, California, serving San Jose and the San Francisco Bay Area, and broadcasting a country music radio format. KBAY is owned by Alpha Media, along with sister station 106.5 KEZR. The radio studios and offices are located off U.S. Route 101 and Hellyer Ave in South San Jose.
KRCL is a listener-supported community radio station in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States.
KOPN is a non-profit community radio station in Columbia, Missouri, United States, which from its start was modeled on the progressive format of KPFA in Berkeley, California. The station relies heavily on volunteers for programming and also carries programming from National Public Radio, Public Radio International, and Pacifica radio network.
Larry Bensky was an American literary and political journalist with experience in both print and broadcast media, as well as a teacher and political activist. He is known for his work with Pacifica Radio station KPFA-FM in Berkeley, California, and for the nationally-broadcast hearings he anchored for the Pacifica network.
KYLD is a commercial radio station in San Francisco, California, serving the San Francisco Bay Area and owned by San Antonio–based iHeartMedia. The station airs a Top 40 (CHR) format on its analog primary signal. The station has studios located in the SoMa district of San Francisco, and the transmitter is located atop the San Bruno Mountains.
Nicole Sawaya was a Lebanese-American radio journalist who was the Executive Director of the Pacifica Radio Network.
KPFZ-FM is an FM radio station that broadcasts a community radio format to Lake County, California.
Richard O. Moore was an American poet associated with Kenneth Rexroth and the San Francisco Renaissance.
KHOI is a community radio station in Story City, Iowa and serving the Ames area. The station primarily broadcasts a mix of music, news and local public affairs programming. KHOI also is affiliated with the Pacifica Radio network.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Geographic | |
| Artists | |
| Other | |
