Catholic radio station goes on air

Queen of Heaven Catholic Radio went on the air Monday at 1480 AM, broadcasting programming from the Irondale-based EWTN radio network.

"It covers the greater part of the metro area, with a potential listening audience of about 725,000 people," said John Martignoni, general manager of the new radio station.

He said the Birmingham-based non-profit organization Queen of Heaven Radio paid about $500,000 for the license to the frequency, purchased from Davidson Broadcasting, which is based in Charlotte and New York City.

Davidson had been broadcasting Hispanic programming on 1480 AM, WRLM, for more than a year, Martignoni said. Prior to that, the frequency had been used by Willis Broadcasting of Norfolk, Va., run by Church of God in Christ Bishop L.E. Willis.

Willis aired black gospel music on 1480 as WLPH-AM for many years.

The new call letters for 1480 AM are WQOH, using the initials for Queen of Heaven.

Martignoni worked for a previous Catholic radio station, Queen of Peace, that went on the air on FM 92.5 in September 1999, and went off the air in May 2004. When that station started, it was one of fewer than a dozen Catholic radio stations nationally, Martignoni said. "We've been trying ever since to get another Catholic radio station," he said.

John Pepe, national marketing manager for radio at EWTN, said EWTN now has about 120 radio affiliates across the country, out of about 150 Catholic stations total.

"The growth has been tremendous," Pepe said. EWTN provides free programming to any radio station that wants to use it, which has contributed to the proliferation of Catholic radio stations, he said.

"It makes it very feasible for a local station to have programming," Pepe said. "They depend on EWTN doing the heavy-lifting from a programming standpoint."

Mother Angelica, who founded Eternal Word Television Network in Irondale in 1981, established a shortwave radio station in Vandiver in 1992. At first, the radio programming was mostly audio feeds of the TV shows, Pepe said. EWTN then began developing radio programming and in 1996 made it available free to AM and FM stations, he said.

"It's trying to take advantage of every opportunity to reach souls," Pepe said. "It has always been the philosophy of Mother Angelica to give it away free to any broadcast station that wants to put it on."

Queen of Heaven Catholic Radio went on the air Monday at 11 a.m. and will broadcast daily from sunrise to sunset, Martignoni said.