KEGL (97.1 FM) is an iHeartMedia hot talk and sports betting formatted commercial radio station licensed to Fort Worth, Texas, and serving the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. The studios are located along Dallas Parkway in Farmers Branch, although it has a Dallas address.
KEGL has an effective radiated power (ERP) of 100,000 watts, the maximum for most FM stations. The transmitter site is in Cedar Hill. KEGL broadcasts using HD Radio technology. The HD-2 subchannel carries the active rock format formerly broadcast on the main signal.
History
Rock/Top 40 era
The station signed on the air on . In its early years, it used several call signs, beginning with KFJZ-FM, then KWXI, then back to KFJZ-FM. When it was KWXI, it used the moniker "Quicksie," borrowed from WQXI Atlanta. As KFJZ-FM, it called itself "Z97, The Texas Music Star" and "Texas FM 97."
In 1981, it took the call letters KEGL. It was one of three album rock stations in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex throughout most of the 1980s. Robert Jones, known on air as "Christopher Haze", became the program director of the station in August 1980, and changed the call letters and imaging of the station as "Eagle 97" on January 20, 1981. Within a short period of time, the station aired a hybrid Rock and Top 40 format known as "Rock 40." The original morning show was "The Rude Awakening Morning Show", consisting of Billy Hayes, Rose Wright and "The Rude Moose" (a character voiced by Hayes).
Future KLOL Houston morning DJs Stevens and Pruett were the next morning show hosts from February 1982 to March 28, 1986. Stevens and Pruett were replaced with Paul Robbins, Paul Kinney, and Phil Cowan. James Paul "Moby" Carney was added to the lineup as the afternoon drive jock on September 1, 1986. DJs from the earlier era of KEGL included Drew Pierce, Charlie "Doc" Morgan, Danny Owen, Jonathan Doll, Dave Cooley, Jimmy Steal, Anthony "Tony Paraquat" Johnson, Jimmy White (1980–84; hosted an afternoon talk show on the station called "Relationships", during 1981–82), Sharon Golihar-Wilson (who hosted the evening show "House Party"), Lisa Traxler (who went on to work at Boston's WBCN), Russ Martin (who hosted a late Sunday night talk program), and Martha Martinez reported news during Stevens and Pruett's program.
David "Kidd Kraddick" Cradick (who would go on to greater success at now-sister station KHKS) started his career as KEGL's night DJ in 1984, then moved to afternoon drive on October 20, 1986, when "Moby in the Morning" replaced RKC, who left to do mornings in Sacramento. (Cradick used his real first name, Dave, for a time between 1989 and 1991. He was also known for a regular segment, "Burn Your Buns," where a fake threatening telephone call was placed to a specific unsuspecting person, by a listener's request.) Moby left KEGL on April 8, 1988, because of Federal Communications Commission's alleged violations of content. Cradick was then moved to mornings with "The Kidd Kraddick and Company Morning Show"; the show debuted on April 11, 1988. Rusty Humphries was briefly a personality for KEGL in the 1990s, known for his attempt to "smuggle" toy weapons into the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport as an on-air stunt.
Through most of the 1980s, the station was owned by Sandusky, a newspaper company. The studios were located in the Xerox Tower at 222 West Las Colinas Blvd. in Las Colinas, a commercial district in the Dallas suburb of Irving. (The station had been located at 4801 West Freeway in Fort Worth under the original KFJZ-FM and KWXI tenures, then at 5915 West Pioneer Parkway in Arlington during the second incarnation of KFJZ.)
CHR/Rock era
Responding to KTKS-FM's format change from oldies to Top 40/CHR, KEGL changed to a rock-leaning Top 40/CHR format on September 12, 1984, and altered its moniker Eagle 97 KEGL to All Hit 97.1 KEGL, The Eagle. KEGL's Program Director at the time was Joel Folger. In early 1986, KEGL began adding a minimum amount of mainstream pop titles. Later into the third part of the decade, the station also added a minimum amount of upbeat rhythmic titles in addition to the main rock material the station was known for. However, KEGL would shift back to a rock-lean in 1989, but would return to mainstream Top 40/CHR the following year in 1990; during this time, KEGL competed with KHYI ("Y95").
In June 1992, KEGL Program Director Donna Fadal decided to make changes to the station. After being jockless for most of the summer (and stunting with weeks of Eagles songs), KEGL changed to active rock, while retaining the "Eagle" branding. KEGL also hired former Z Rock jock Madd Maxx Hammer for afternoons.