Why do radio stations always begin with a "W"???!
Question:
Why do radio stations always begin with a "W"???
Answers:
They don't all start with "W"... obviously you have never been WEST of the Mississippi River or you wouldn't make a statement of "fact" that is not a "fact".
The System of call letters for radio stations (and later TV stations) grew out of the needs of the Government's FCC to catalog the radio stations in the 1920's. Until the W/K system came along, most radio stations had call letters like the Ham stations they developed from... 2EX 2KD etc...
So, in the 1920's the forerunner to the FCC decreed that ALL radio stations to the EAST of the Mississippi River would have a "W" call letter and all stations WEST of the Mississippi River would have a "K" designation.
There are some notable exceptions to this rule... KDKA in Pittsburgh and WOC in Davenport for example... but they are exempted because they were grandfathered into their call letters before the current system became law.