Larry Steckline


Larry Steckline is a prominent Kansas broadcasting entrepreneur, and radio and television personality—particularly known for his Kansas agriculture news/feature/commentary programs. His company, Steckline Communications—formerly known as the Mid-Kansas Ag Network—provides various media services, including agricultural news syndicated to radio and television stations throughout Kansas. Steckline has also owned and operated 27 Kansas and Oklahoma radio stations.
Since 1964, Steckline has produced agricultural news, information and commentary programs aired on television and radio stations throughout Kansas and into adjoining Nebraska, Colorado, and Oklahoma, particularly on KTVH-TV -- the state's main provider of television broadcast to rural communities, as well as three of Kansas' five largest cities. Most recently his program has appeared on Wichita's KAKE-TV.
Steckline is the husband of former Kansas Attorney General and former Republican gubernatorial candidate Carla Stovall, who abandoned her 2002 gubernatorial run, and promptly married him, withdrawing from politics at the end of her term in 2003.

Early life

Larry E. Steckline was born on August 24, 1941 in Hays, Kansas, and raised in Ellis, Kansas until nine years old. His parents were Carl Steckline, who was raised at Hyacinth, Kansas, and Irene Schoendaller Steckline, of Liebenthal, Kansas. Both were of Volga-German ancestry.
The family then moved to a 200-acre leased farm near Ogallah, Kansas, which, though it had electricity, had no running water. The family leased 200 acres and survived by farming wheat, milking cows, and feeding chickens. Steckline attended high school in WaKeeney, Kansas, and graduated in 1959.
Though Steckline's father wanted him to remain on the farm, his mother wanted him to go to college. Steckline attended Wichita Business College, in the state's distant largest city, Wichita, and studied to become a bookkeeper.
While attending school, Steckline was a bookkeeper for Wichita's livestock yards—a job that continued for 15 years, until Steckline was hired as public relations director for Wichita's entire livestock market industry—one of the nation's largest.

Broadcast career

Steckline's agri-business programs, eventually aired over his Mid-America Ag Network, would ultimately reach 40 affiliate radio stations, and be carried on Kansas's largest television stations — his programs reaching into four states. By invitation, he interviewed three U.S. Presidents on agriculture issues at the White House.
Over the course of his career, Steckline, or his companies, owned 27 radio stations, mostly in Kansas. To promote his stations, Steckline hosted country music concerts by Roy Clark, Tanya Tucker, Charlie Pride, Reba McEntire, T.G. Shepherd, Ronnie Milsap, The Oakridge Boys, the Bellamy Brothers, and others.

1960s-1990s

In the mid-1960s, a few months after ascending to the public relations executive job, Steckline began broadcasting the uncompensated agriculture report on Wichita's television channel 12 KTVH-TV, suddenly filling in for a reporter who had quit, soon becoming the station's "farm director." Steckline continued the airing the report over the next 45 years.
Starting in 1968, Steckline worked with KFRM for several years, broadcasting agricultural news.
In 1974, Steckline built KJLS in Hays, Kansas, a country-western station that, according to Steckline, was the first FM radio station to survive west of U.S. Highway 81. It would be the first of many radio stations he would acquire, several with call letters that included his initials: "LS".
By 1977, Steckline -- still broadcasting -- was also operating his own farm. In 1977, following an abrupt dismissal from KFRM, he created the "Mid America Ag Network", syndicating his ag shows state-wide, and beyond.
In 1978, Steckline, with a delegation of journalists from the National Association of Farm Broadcasting, interviewed President Jimmy Carter about agriculture matters.
In 1985, Steckline was one of a handful of broadcasters invited to interview then-President Ronald Reagan about recent farm legislation.
By 1988, Steckline owned six radio stations in Kansas, and one in Oklahoma, jointly labeled as the "LS Network"—including KSLS and KYUU, both in Liberal, Kansas, KXXX and KQLS in Colby, Kansas, and KXLS in Enid, Oklahoma. The network's flagship station, at the time, was KGLS, near the center of the state in Hutchinson and Pratt—a "modern" country music station, whose 1,000-foot tower was estimated to boost the station's reach to 75 miles—the strongest signal of any commercial radio station in centrally located Hutchinson, Kansas.
In the 1990s, he was invited to interview President Bill Clinton, on agriculture issues, at the White House.

Since 2000

In 2001, Steckline's Mid-America Ag Network -- at that time with 40 affiliate radio stations -- acquired radio broadcast rights to the games of Kansas State Athletics. The five-year contract, beginning in July 2002, cost $6 million -- nearly quadrupling the rights fee paid to K-State by the previous contractor.
In 2007, the "Rocking M" radio group—reportedly comprising more broadcast properties than anyone else in Kansas—was assembled from 17 former Steckline stations: one AM and three FMs in Dodge City; one AM and two FMs in Great Bend ; one AM and two FMs in Goodland; two FMs in Salina, one AM and one FM in Colby; one AM and one FM in Liberal; and one AM in Pratt.
In 2010, after 30 years broadcasting his daily "ag report" on the Kansas State Network and its forerunner, Steckline's contract was abruptly terminated in a one-sentence notice from KSN's general manager, with no explanation or comment
In 2011, Steckline began appearing in an online news format, Steckline Ag Report, with ag news in 3-5 minute segments, produced for the website of the Farm Credit cooperative American AgCredit
By 2015, Steckline owned only one remaining radio station -- KWLS -- on which he continued to broadcast his agri-business program daily,. However his syndicated program was also airing on 40 radio stations across Kansas and Nebraska.
In 2020, Steckline resumed his ag program on KSN's Wichita rival, KAKE-TV.

Other business and personal affairs

With his first wife, Wah-leeta, by 1977 Steckline had three children, and mortgages on a farm and home.
Over the following years, as his show grew in popularity, Steckline and his wife took Kansas farmers on tours to China, Russia, Australia, and South America. He made several trade-mission trips to Russia. He traveled internationally with U.S. Agriculture Secretaries John Block, Ed Madigan, Clayton Yeutter and Dan Glickman.
Wah-leeta, at age 59, died September 30, 2000, in a farming accident, just a few months before their 40th wedding anniversary.
By 2001—while still the owner and president of his Mid America Ag Network—Steckline, with his son Greg, were operating their 2,500-acre farm and ranch, "The Ponderosa," outside Garden Plain, Kansas, near Wichita.
In early 2002, Steckline interviewed Kansas Attorney General Carla Stovall—then a Republican candidate for Governor, who had served as President of the National Association of Attorneys General. A romance ensued. Despite being regarded as a front-runner, and confident she would win, Stovall abandoned her 2002 gubernatorial run before the primary election, in April, saying she no longer desired the job, and promptly announced plans to marry Steckline —withdrawing from politics, and throwing the Kansas Republican Party into chaos; Democrat Kathleen Sebelius won the subsequent general election.
In 2015, wife Carla published a biography of Steckline -- Larry Steckline: A Half-century as the Voice of Kansas Agriculture—and the couple committed the proceeds to local chapters of the National Association of FFA, an agricultural-education program for young people.
The couple acquired and renovated a 30-year-old sightseeing cruise ship, the Cherokee Queen—one of only a few such ships available in Oklahoma—and began offering scenic cruises of the Grand Lake Waterways area, starting in 2019.
Steckline's daughter, Anita Cochran, served as a news anchor for KSN's flagship station, KSNW-TV in Wichita, from 1991 to 2009.

Other roles