WIOD-AM 1360 
Sanford

Original Call Letters: WSFR 

Originally Licensed: April 5, 1956 

Original City of  License: Sanford

Original Frequency: 1360                                                               Meisch Building, 1st St. Sanford. First home of WIOD

Origin of Call Letters:

Original Power: 500 Watts Daytime

Original Format: Block Programming

Original Location: Meisch Building, 1st Street 


Network Affiliation(s):


Owner(s):
1956-Sanford Broadcasting Company 

1959-Sanford-Seminole Broadcasting, Inc.

History Of Call Letters and Formats:
WSFR-1956-Top 40 "Sanford Florida Radio"
WIOD-1959-Top 40
WSFR-1961-Top 40
WSFR-1962 (June)-Silent


1956: NEW RADIO STATION (By Tammy Wersinger of The Sentinel Staff - Flashback Column - November 5, 1989)
IN SANFORD. Mr. and Mrs. Emerson Browne and John Bolling filed an application for a new radio station in Sanford. Browne was former chief engineer of WTRR-AM 1400 in Sanford, but left to start his own station. The new station would broadcast daytimes at 1,000 watts.


WIOD History

Mr. Doug Douglass was kind enough to supply information for these pages. In a copy of pages for Sanford from the 
1958 Broadcast Annual  I found a listing for station WIOD in Sanford. I thought this was a misprint. Bill Reck co-owner of 
WTRR-AM 1400 in Sanford verified that there was in fact a second radio station would take to the air in Sanford in 1956. 
In 1946, Miami station (on the air originally in 1926) WIOD, changed their call letters to WCKR and Sanford Broadcasting Company saw an opportunity to “cash in” on those famous call letters. The Sanford station would later change to WSFR (Sanford Florida Radio). Their first studios were in the Meisch Building next to "old" post office, then the library. Then the studios were moved near the Amtrak station in Sanford.


Names In WIOD History

Emerson Browne-1956-Co-owner-Sanford Broadcasting Company

John Bolling-1956-Co-owner-Sanford Broadcasting Company

Jack Siegel-1957-Chief Engineer-Sanford Broadcasting Company
Carl Abel-1957-General Manager-Sanford Broadcasting Company
George Fee-1957-Commercial Manager-Sanford Broadcasting Company
Jay Caldwell-1957-Program Director-Sanford Broadcasting Company
Norm Brooks-1957-Sanford Broadcasting Company

Joseph Horenstein-1959-Prersident-Sanford-Seminole Broadcasting, Inc.

Bud Carrigan-1959-Commercial Manager-Sanford-Seminole Broadcasting, Inc.


Note: 1926- WIOD 610 AM (Miami) is Florida’s seventh oldest continuously licensed broadcast radio station. Installed in the spring of 1925 by Carl Graham Fisher, a Miami Beach developer, the station made its formal air debut on the South Florida airwaves on January 19, 1926. Carl Fisher selected the letters WIOD as the call letters signifying “Wonderful Isles of Dreams” to commemorate Collins Island, on which the station was situated. After enduring several hurricanes and subsequent power shutdowns, WIOD was acquired by Isle of Dreams Broadcasting, a subsidiary of NBC, in early 1929. The station also shared time with sister station WOMB during this adverse period, and was known as WIOD-WOMB, using the on-air slogan “Wonderful Isle of Dreams.” James M. Cox, Jr. became the chief owner of Isle of Dreams Broadcasting Corporation in 1946, and the call letters became WCKR  for owners Cox-Knight Radio. The company would eventually become Cox Broadcasting Corporation in early 1964.


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