WTIM

PROGRAM SCHEDULE AS OF MARCH 23, 2024
Subject to change.

NATIONAL NEWS EVERY HOUR 24/7 AT THE TOP OF THE HOUR!
LOCAL NEWS AT THE BOTTOM OF EVERY HOUR 24/7!
WEATHER TWICE AN HOUR!

WEEKDAYS:
Midnight to 5am—CBS Sports Radio Network.
5am to 6am—America in the Morning, a national news magazine with the latest national/international news, national weather, and sports scores.
6:06 to 6:30am—RFD Illinois from the Illinois Farm Bureau Radio Network.
6:40 to 6:55am—Morning Farm Show with our local farm broadcaster.
6:55 to 7:00am—Senior Center Menus and Calendar.
7:10am to 7:30am—Expanded Local News.
7:30am to 7:32am—SRN Radio News.
7:32am to 7:35am—RFD Livestock report.
7:45am to 7:50am—Commodity Market overview from RFD Radio Network.
7:50am to 8:00am—WTIM Trivia call-in show.
8:10am to 8:25am—Expanded Local News.
8:28am to 8:30am—Senior Center Menus and Calendar.
8:30am to 8:32am—SRN Radio News.
8:40am to 9:00am Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays--WTIM Morning Show segment # 1, with a live, local interview guest, from our Taylorville studios.
9:10am to 9:30am Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays—WTIM Morning Show segment # 2, with a live, local interview guest, from our Taylorville studios.
9:30am to 9:32am—SRN Radio News.
9:32 to 9:35am—Opening Commodity Markets.
9:35am to 9:40am—Local Sportscast.
9:40am to 10:00am Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays—WTIM Morning Show segment # 3, with a live, local interview guest, from our Taylorville studios.
8:40am-9:00am; 9:10am-9:30am; and 9:40am-10:00am on TUESDAYS—WTIM Pana Morning Show, interviewing Pana officials, non-profit leaders and newsmakers!

8:40am-9:00am; 9:10am-9:30am; and 9:40am-10:00am on FRIDAYS—WTIM Morning Show LIVE from our DOWNTOWN SHELBYVILLE studios, interviewing Shelbyville and Shelby County officials, non-profit leaders and newsmakers!

10:06am to 11:00am—AgriTalk, a daily national agriculture talk show about the ag issues of the day and guests.
10:30am to 10:32am—SRN Radio News.
11:06am to 11:30am—RFD Illinois Mid-Day from RFD Radio Network.
11:30am to 11:32am—SRN Radio News.
11:32am to 11:35am—Local News Update.
11:37am to 11:45am—RFD Radio Network ag programming.
11:45am to 11:58am—repeat of Morning Farm Show with our local farm broadcaster.
11:58am to 11:59am—Hourly Commodity Markets from RFD Radio Network.
12:08pm to 12:10pm—National Anthem.
12:10pm to 12:20pm—Expanded Local News.
12:20pm to 12:35pm—Noon Farm Show with our local farm broadcaster.
12:40pm to 1:00pm—RFD Radio Network agriculture programming.
1:10pm to 2:00pm—Agriculture of America with host Jessie Allen.
1:30pm to 1:32pm—SRN News.
1:32pm to 1:35pm—Closing Commodity Markets.
2:06pm to 2:36pm—RFD Market Watch part 1 from RFD Radio Network.
2:30pm to 2:32pm—SRN Radio News.
2:32pm to 3:00pm—RFD Market Watch page 2 from RFD Network.
3:06pm to 4:00pm—RFD Today, a daily interview program from the RFD Radio Network interviewing state and local agriculture leaders.
4:06pm to 5:00pm—Doug Stephan.
5:10pm to 5:20pm—Expanded Local News.
5:30pm to 6:00pm—repeat of Closing Market Report from WILL-AM 580 in Urbana with host Todd Gleason.
6:06pm to 7:00pm—repeat of AgriTalk.
7:06pm to 8:00pm—repeat of Agriculture of America.
8:06pm to 9:00pm—repeat of RFD Today.
9:06pm to Midnight—“America At Night” with Rich Valdes.

WEEKENDS:

CBS Sports Radio with great sportstalk, 24/7 Saturdays and Sundays, with NATIONAL NEWS ON THE HOUR AND LOCAL NEWS AT :55! WEATHER TWICE AN HOUR!

SPECIALTY PROGRAMMING SATURDAYS:
8:06am to 8:30am—RFD Illinois from RFD Radio Network.
8:30am to 9:00am—Commodity Week from WILL-AM 580 in Urbana, with Todd Gleason hosting.
9:06am to 9:30am—RFD Trading Post, a call-in show to buy, sell, trade farm-related items.

SPECIALTY PROGRAMMING SUNDAYS:
8:00am to 8:30am--Word of God Lutheran Church in Pana recorded program.
8:30am to 9:00am--Locust Grove Church near Assumption recorded program.
9:00am to 10:00am—First United Methodist Church live broadcast.
10:00am to 11:00am—Focus on the Family Weekend.
11:00am to 12 noon—St. Mary's Catholic Church live broadcast.

THRU-OUT THE YEAR:
--Taylorville High School sports play by play broadcasts of football, boys and girls basketball, all home, away, and playoffs; selected baseball and softball, plus playoffs; and selected Little League and Junior Football League games!
--St. Louis Cardinal baseball!
--NFL Sunday afternoon doubleheaders, Monday/Thursday Night Football, NFL divisional championships and the SUPER BOWL!
--NCAA Football
--NCAA mens basketball, including the Men's Tournament, Final Four and the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP!
--LIVE remote broadcasts of local events all year long!

Schedule as of 3/23/24. Subject to change.

Program Links

Agritalk

RFD Radio Network

About WTIM

WTIM began as a 1000-watt daytime directional AM radio station at 1410 on the dial, signing on January 20, 1952, with studios and towers located at the end of Cherokee street just past a creek on the west side of the road. Some of the recollections of those around at the time, tell us that the station actually signed on at 4 pm that day, with a live broadcast of the Taylorville High School band playing the National Anthem. Keith Moyer built the station, and owned and operated it until the early 1960s.

WTIM moved its studios from its Cherokee street transmitter site, to the Hotel Frisina on Market Street, in 1961, and they remained there until 1978. Don Jones and Jon Ulz purchased the station in the early 60s, and Ulz and a group which included Dr. John Ferry of Taylorville and Harold Hefker of Gillespie purchased the station in the 70s.

MEMORIES added from former WTIM staff member Eric DeWeese, submitted June 2025:

I was hired in the summer of 1962, probably June, by Keith Moyer’s PD Jim Hilderbrand. I was only 15 years old. It was about a year later, 1963, that Jon Ulz and Milburn Stuckwish bought the station. They had been working at WSOY when they decided to partner and become owners. Milburn Stuckwish was an engineer, did a lot of consulting work, and Jon was in sales. Officially, Mr. Stuckwish was G.M. and C.E. Jon was sales manager. Jon’s wife, B.J., did traffic. They hired a recent U of Illinois grad, Don King, to be PD. And they kept me on.

When I left a year later in August 1964 to become a full time college student at Millikin, Ulz and Stuckwish were still in place. A year after that, my parents moved to Danville renting their house at 543 N. Webster to Mr. Stuckwish. So, he was in Taylorville in 1965. After that, I don’t know what happened.

I do remember seeing a newspaper obit for Mr. Stuckwish.

One last memory of Mr. Stuckwish. (He went by the nickname ‘Stuck’ but I knew my place) The last time I saw him I was home from Millikin and stopped by the studios in the Hotel Frisicina. He told me he had found an almost new transmitter for the new 92.7 and he wondered if my parents would mind if he repainted a bedroom in the house he was renting from them.

Mr. Stuckwish never understood why you would pay a lot of money for a new car when there were many reasonably priced used ones available. He felt the same way about broadcast equipment. Being an engineer, he was not intimidated by the thought of maintaining something that wasn’t brand new.

And, about Jon Ulz:

My last conversation with him was in the mid-1980’s. I wanted to start a station in Gulf Shores, Alabama, a beach community between Mobile and Pensacola. Jon was interested and said he would be in Dallas the following week and would come to Baton Rouge, where I was managing a station, afterwards.

When he failed to show, I called an old classmate in Taylorville and found that two days after I talked to him, Jon died of a heart attack. I enjoyed working for him and would have enjoyed working with him.

In 1978, under Ulz's leadership, studios were moved to the former Charter Communications cable TV building at 11 Clearing Avenue in Taylorville's Industrial Park, and the transmitter site was moved to a tract on Bypass Route 48 between Cherokee and Lincoln Trail.

In 1968, WTIM-FM 92.7 signed on the air with a beautiful music format. Call letters were changed to WEEE in the early 70s, and the station later featured an album rock format, then a mainstream rock format in the 80's. In 1984, WTIM-AM and WEEE-FM were sold by the group headed by Ulz, to a Wisconsin group, which only owned it a couple of years, and then the stations were purchased by Marsha Linton (now Marsha Linton Farr). Under Lincoln 's ownership, the stations moved their studios from 11 Clearing Avenue, to the Mini-Mall building on the north side of the Taylorville square.

Linton owned the stations until the early 90's when she told them to the late Jim Green of Riverton. Green owned the stations until 1992, when WTIM was sold to its present owner, Miller Communications, Inc. and WEEE was sold to WMAY/WNNS in Springfield. The 92.7 frequency was able to get a power increase and was subsequently moved to Springfield in May 1993.

WTIM was granted a limited nighttime power (103 watts) in 1988, and that was reduced by the FCC to 63 watts in 1993. WTIM, as an AM station, had to protect other stations on 1410 on the dial, because at night, AM radio waves bounce off the ionosphere and “skip” across the country. That's why high powered “clear channel” AM radio stations, such as KMOX 1120 St. Louis and WGN 720 Chicago, are heard in over 20 states at night.

Miller Communications, Inc. secured another FM frequency in 1996 and signed on WMKR Lite Rock 94.3 to operate along with WTIM Newstalk 1410. WMKR enabled listeners outside of Taylorville to hear Taylorville sports broadcasts at night. WTIM was unable to reach outside of Taylorville at night due to its FCC-mandated 63 watts of power.

Miller Communications, Inc. wanted to give WTIM's newstalk format a better signal both daytime and nighttime, so it secured 97.3 FM and moved WTIM from 1410 AM to 97.3 FM on November 13, 1997. After 30 days of simulcasting the format on both stations, WTIM 1410 AM signed off December 12, 1997.

Miller sold the 1410 AM transmitting facility to Covenant Network of St. Louis, which returned it to air in July 1998 as a satellite-fed non-profit Catholic radio station.

Miller moved WTIM/WMKR's studios form its 1800 sq. ft space on the north side of the Taylorville square to a 3600 sq. ft. building at 918 East Park in March 2000.

Miller built a new 345-foot tower for both WTIM and WMKR in November 2001, expanding both stations' coverage by 25%. The tower, build on a hill south of Taylorville, increased WTIM's antenna height to 374 feet above average terrain, and WMKR's antenna height to 341 feet above average terrain.

WTIM moved to THE BIG 870 AM covering an area from Jacksonville to Paris and Bloomington to Effingham daytime, and moved to 96.3 FM in Christian County all the time, on August 1, 2014.

WTIM added an FM repeater at 94.7 in Shelby County on October 7, 2015.

WTIM's FM dial positions changed on June 1, 2016. WTIM moved from 96.3 to 96.1 in Christian County, and from 94.7 to 107.5 in Shelby County. Both moves gave WTIM's FM signals greater coverage in each county.

On April 26, 2021, WTIM added a new FM signal at 107.9 in the Pana/Nokomis area.

Today, WTIM THE BIG 870 across Central Illinois, 96.1 FM in Christian County, 107.5 FM in Shelby County, and 107.9 FM in the Pana/Nokomis area, still serves communities with local news, sports, weather, and over 8 hours of agriculture programming daily, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year as Your INFORMATION Station.

FCC on-line Public File link

PUBLIC INSPECTION FILE

https://publicfiles.fcc.gov/am-profile/WTIM

FCC Applications

Viewers with disabilities can get assistance accessing this station's FCC Public Inspection File by contacting the station with the information listed below.

Questions or concerns relating to the accessibility of the FCC's online public file system, should be direceted to the FCC at 888-225-5322, 888-835-5322(TTY), or fccinfo@fcc.gov.

Public File Liaison:

Kami Payne, General Manager

Toll-free 866-500-3395 or (217)824-3395

kamip@randyradio.com

Fax (217)824-3301

918 East Park Street

Taylorville, IL 62568

EEO Public File Reports