In April 1922, WSYsigned on as the second radio station in Alabama, owned by Alabama Power Company. Informally WSY stood for "We Serve You". Some five months later, the fourth radio station in the state, WMAV, owned by the Alabama Polytechnic Institute began broadcasting from Auburn. WSY was successful, but in 1925 Alabama Power decided they wished to get out of the entertainment business. The broadcast facilities were dismantled and donated to Auburn. At that time, the station's call letters were changed to WAPI, reflecting the ownership of the station. In 1928, WAPI returned to Birmingham, in part due to NBC's interest in affiliating with a station in Alabama's largest city. In 1929, ownership of the station was split among Alabama Polytechnic, the University of Alabama, and the Alabama College for Women. The broadcast power was increased to 5,000 watts. In 1932, the colleges sold the station to a group of businessmen known as "The Voice of Alabama." WAPI remained affiliated with NBC until 1940, when it became an affiliate of CBS. After sharing its dial position with KVOO in Tulsa, Oklahoma for several years, it moved to its present dial position in 1942. On December 1, 1947, it launched an FM sister station, WAFM. In 1949, WAPI launched the first television station in Alabama, WAFM-TV. The Birmingham News purchased WAPI and its FM and television sister stations in 1953, and in 1954. WAPI re-affiliated with NBC. The Newhouse chain bought the News in 1956, and sold off the broadcast outlets to separate owners in 1980. As network radio programming began to lose its importance due to television's popularity, WAPI 1070 evolved into a "middle-of-the-road" music station in the mid-1960s, featuring several local call-in shows at night. By the mid-1970s, it was the only Birmingham AMadult contemporary radio station, and didn't undergo a format change until 1985, when crosstown rival WSGN dropped adult standards. WAPI immediately switched to its own standards format, and remained so until January 1, 1996 when it became an all-news radio station. Since that time, the station has evolved into a talk radio station. On February 22, 2010, WWMM-FM changed its calls to WAPI-FM and dropped its former adult album alternativemusic format. The two stations began simulcasting for most of the day, with the FM side branded as the main station under the nickname "100 WAPI." However, on July 24, 2013, WAPI-FM changed its calls to WJQX and flipped to ESPN Radio as a sister station to WJOX and WJOX-FM. This left the news/talk format solely on the AM side once again, until May 23, 2016, when sister WZRR dropped their country format and began simulcasting WAPI. However, WZRR is now branded as the main station; it took the moniker "Talk 99.5," without any references to the AM 1070 frequency. Although it boasts the most powerful daytime signal in Alabama, WAPI doesn't travel as far as most other 50,000-watt stations due to this area's poor ground conductivity. It does, however cover all of central Alabama during the day from a single tower, and can be heard as far as the Atlanta suburbs under the right conditions. At night, it cuts back power to 5,000 watts, using two towers. It employs a directional pattern to protect KNX in Los Angeles, the main station at AM 1070, as well as KYW in Philadelphia at adjacent AM 1060, making WAPI all but unlistenable outside Birmingham and its close suburbs.
