WLIB - History

History

When WLIB first went on the air the station's target audience was upper middle-class and wealthy New Yorkers, as evidenced by its format of classical music and popular standards which competed with WQXR. The station was purchased by New York Post publisher Dorothy Schiff in 1944 and regularly ran news updates from the Post's newsroom at various times during the day.

In 1949 WLIB was purchased by the New Broadcasting Company. The firm was headed by former WNYC executive Morris S. Novik and his brother, garment executive Harry Novik. Upon taking control of the station the Novik brothers turned WLIB into a station which served ethnic audiences, with large amounts of programming targeting the city's Jewish and African American communities. The station eventually became the leading voice of New York's black residents, and established a presence in the community's epicenter with studios inside the Hotel Theresa in Harlem. During the mid-to-late 1950s its airstaff included pioneering black radio disc jockey Hal Jackson, actor William Marshall (of Blacula fame) and Victor Bozeman, who would later become a Los Angeles-based staff announcer for NBC television.

In the 1960s WLIB was one of several commercial jazz stations in New York. Among its disc jockeys was Billy Taylor, whose shows were not only great listening but an education. According to him, "With the help Del Shields and Ed Williams built the biggest jazz audience in New York." During much of this period WLIB's primary competition came from WWRL, another station which programmed to Black audiences.

WLIB became black-owned in the 1970s after activists picketed the station and demanded African Americans be given a chance to purchase it. Many felt the station’s series of white owners didn't care about broadcasting with community concerns in mind. Percy Sutton, Malcolm X’s former attorney and then-Manhattan borough president, formed the Inner City Broadcasting Corporation (ICBC) with the backing of a group of black investors (including Hal Jackson and Billy Taylor, who was installed as WLIB's general manager), and purchased WLIB from the Novik brothers in 1972. The station’s first talk shows featured Betty Shabazz, widow of Malcolm X, and Dr. Carlos Russell, a noted former college professor who taught some of the Black and Latino students who later founded the Young Lords Party.