2nd Update: Changes at Five La Crosse Stations Amid Ownership Shuffle

Three La Crosse radio formats have moved to new dial positions and two others are getting new formats amid the transfer of five La Crosse Media Group stations to three buyers and the separate sale of an FM translator.

Magnum Communications closed on its purchase of three stations and the translator on Friday, July 31, and began a series of changes that affected five frequencies.

The final change came late Saturday night, when WLFN/1490 dropped Conservative Talk and flipped to Oldies as “Eagle 1490,” retaining the heritage WLXR callsign. The “Eagle” branding had been used on KQEG/102.7 (La Crescent) up until last year.

Earlier, the Classic Rock format of WKBH-FM/100.1 (West Salem) moved to the larger 102.7 signal and was tweaked to a Classic Hits/Classic Rock hybrid. The change displaces the syndicated “MeTV FM” Soft Oldies format that had aired on KQEG for just over a year.

100.1 is being sold to the Educational Media Foundation, the operator of national Christian music networks, and will change the callsign to WLCW. Listeners report 100.1 was silent as of Saturday.

Meanwhile, the “Magic” format moved from WLXR-FM/104.9 (La Crosse) to K250AZ/97.9 (La Crosse) and segued from Hot Adult Contemporary to mainstream AC. Magnum had previously told the FCC it planned to relay WLFN on K250AZ, but the “Magic 97.9” format is actually originating on KQEG-HD2.

K250AZ had previously carried the regional Prayz Network, which is now heard on 104.9 under the callsign WGSL. The Prayz Network is operated by the Salvation Poem Foundation, which bought 104.9 from La Crosse Media Group and sold K250AZ to Magnum.

Audio recorded by listener Olaf Johnson shows the change on 104.9 came mid-song just before midnight Friday night, after an opportune lyric in the AJR song “Bang!”

The changes mean the only station left untouched by the sale of the former La Crosse Media Group is Country-formatted “Kicks 106.3” (WQCC La Crosse), which is now under Magnum’s ownership.

102.7 has also added an HD3 signal relaying the Hot AC format of Magnum’s “Mix 96.1/107.3” (WXYM Tomah and W297CT La Crosse). Tomah is considered to be part of the La Crosse market, and Magnum owns two other Tomah stations and a translator in addition to WXYM.

Reid Magnum stated, “Our La Crosse stations expansion is the second of two different clusters that we committed to before the pandemic.  My Dad has worked with the very same bank, and same CPA firm, since he and my Mom started from scratch in 1991.  Those long-standing loyalties sure came in handy to close on purchases during a pandemic.  We got both clusters closed in the nick of time before Wisconsin went into the License Renewal period.  If we hadn’t, we would’ve had to wait until November at the earliest.”

Magnum’s La Crosse additions came days after the company closed on its purchase of Fort Atkinson stations WFAW/940, WKCH/106.5, and WSJY/107.3 from NRG Media.

Magnum also owns low-power TV station KQEG-CD/23.1 (La Crescent), which has translators in Tomah and Eau Claire that are temporarily off the air due to the TV spectrum repack.