List of three-letter broadcast call signs in the United States: Difference between revisions

In the United States, all radio and television broadcasting stations that are licensed by the [[Federal Communications Commission]] (FCC) are assigned official, distinct [[call sign]]s. Organized broadcasting began in the U.S. in the early 1920s on the [[Medium wave|AM band]] — FM and television did not exist yet. Initially most broadcasting stations were assigned three-letter calls; however, a switch was made in April 1922 to primarily four-letter calls, after the number of stations had increased into the hundreds. For a few years thereafter a small number of new three-letter calls continued to be issued. Although most of the original three-letter calls were randomly assigned, these later calls were often specially requested to match station slogans. The last new three-letter call was assigned to station [[WVOC|WIS]] (now WVOC) in Columbia, South Carolina on January 23, 1930. Since then, only fourthree-letter callcalls signshave haveonly been assigned to stations, including FM (beginning in 1943)<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=mwwEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PT6 "Standard Broadcast Station Call Letters for All Outlets Starting Nov. 1, FCC Rule"], ''The Billboard'', September 4, 1943, page 7.</ref> and TV (beginning in 1946).,<ref>[https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-BC/BC-1946/1946-08-19-BC.pdf#page=84 "Call Letter Style Adopted For Video"], ''Broadcasting'', August 19, 1946, page 82.</ref> Stations with -FM, -TV and -DT suffixeswhich are technically five-letter call signs, but in all cases are expansions of and historically related to an AM station that was originally issued that call sign.