World Christian Broadcasting

World Christian Broadcasting is a non-profit Christian organization that operates international shortwave radio station KNLS. The station’s transmitters are in Anchor Point, Alaska, and all of its programs are produced at the company headquarters and broadcast operations center in Franklin, Tennessee, a suburb of Nashville.

Although World Christian Broadcasting was formed in 1976, the idea came about 30 years earlier when Army Signal Corps officer Maurice Hall prepared shortwave transmitters for the Yalta Conference for use by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his staff so they could keep up with news from Washington. Hall began to realize that if shortwave radio could transmit political news across long distances, it could also broadcast Gospel messages to large parts of the world.

Dr. Lowell G. Perry, a communications professor at Abilene Christian University, served as the first president of World Christian Broadcasting. In 1977, Perry died in a plane crash as he and others sought a location for the station’s transmitter. Two years later, a site in Alaska was selected and construction began.

KNLS signed on the air July 23, 1983, broadcasting ten hours a day in Mandarin Chinese and Russian and reaching roughly one-third of the world. English broadcasts were added later. As the Soviet Union’s empire fell apart, listeners from those countries began writing and requesting Bibles and other religious materials. In 2005, the station signed on a second 100 KW antenna in Alaska.

In 1991, World Christian Broadcasting presented a program called “The Reflection Hour” from Moscow over Russia’s All-Union Radio network. The program reached all 15 republics of the former Soviet Union.

World Christian Broadcasting’s approach to programming is different from many religious broadcasters. There is no preaching or regular minister on the programs. Most of the hour is filled with popular music, news commentary, health and family tips, travelogues, and other family-friendly programming. Interspersed throughout the hour are teaching segments with Gospel messages or Biblical topics. Most of the air staff are journalists or broadcasters by training. Programs are culturally sensitive and geared toward a secular audience, although Christian listeners may also enjoy the content. Some segments focus on hymns but most of the music is secular and is checked for lyrical content so that it is wholesome and positive. Every hour also includes an announcement encouraging listeners to write for their very own copy of the Bible.

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Wikipedia