CKTS (AM)

CKTS was an English language Canadian radio station located in Sherbrooke, Quebec.

It broadcast on 900 kHz with a power of 10,000 watts as a class B station, using a directional antenna which had a slightly directional pattern during the day and a much tighter pattern at night.

The station's programming was, since 1992, largely a simulcast from news/talk station CJAD in Montreal. The only exception is a church service that aired every Sunday morning for half an hour. This situation was maintained since the station was acquired by Corus Entertainment in January 2005, this despite the fact that Corus also operates an English-language news/talk station in Montreal (CINW) in competition with Standard Broadcasting's CJAD since September 2005.

CKTS went on the air on July 1, 1946; it was originally on 1240 kHz, and was operated by The Telegram Printing & Publishing Co. (owner of the Sherbrooke Telegram-Observer, a local weekly newspaper). The station moved to its current frequency in 1959, and was sold to Telemedia in the late 1960s. It was an affiliate of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's (CBC) Trans-Canada Network (later CBC Radio) by 1957 (the date of disaffiliation is unknown).

As the English-speaking population declined in the Eastern Townships, the station tried to appeal to francophones, and by the mid-1980s the station had a Top 40 format with minimal spoken word content. Most of the advertising on the station was in French and most listeners were francophones, much to the displeasure of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) [http://www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/Decisions/1989/DB89-496.HTM] . In 1989, the CRTC forced CKTS to use only English; as a result, the station would later (in 1992) strike a deal to rebroadcast most of CJAD's programs.

Effective November 19, 2006, the station was shut down, and its licence was voluntarily revoked as of December 13. This decision, according to Corus, was due to high ongoing maintenance costs that neither they nor Standard are willing to cover.

External links

* [http://www.cjad.com/ CJAD 800]
* [http://www.cnw.ca/en/releases/archive/November2006/17/c5853.html CKTS to stop rebroadcasting CJAD] , Corus press release, November 17, 2006
* [http://www.broadcasting-history.ca/listings_and_histories/radio/histories.php?id=878&historyID=638 Historical information on CKTS Radio] from the Canadian Communications Foundation.