XEG-AM

History

XEG received its concession on February 21, 1944. In 1950, the advertising time on XEG came under the control of Harold Schwartz of Chicago who also came to represent co-owned XERB 1090 AM in Tijuana/Rosarito, Baja California, the station made famous in the movie American Graffiti.

During the mid-and late 1970s, XEG (then at 150 kW power, directional north) was known for its nighttime English-language R&B/Soul music shows. For 4–6 hours per night, taped transcriptions from KGFJ (Los Angeles) disc jockeys made specifically for XEG were audible throughout much of the Southern, Southwestern and Midwestern U.S.

In the late 1970s, XEG's powerful nighttime signal attracted several U.S. ministries, including Billy James Hargis. But between programs, commercials occasionally offered suspicious-sounding medicines which promised to "cure cancer" and other illnesses. By 1982, XEG was known as "The Golden Gospel Giant".

The XEG mailing address announced on the air was antiquated: "Post Office Box 28, St. Louis, 66, Missouri." This was more than a decade after ZIP codes were introduced across the U.S. As of November 2014, QSL (reception report) cards were still mailed out from St. Louis.

AM radio waves are of a much lower acoustical quality than FM, but during hours of darkness the Earth’s ionosphere drops sharply, typically from an altitude of roughly 600 miles to 30 miles, and the much longer wave length of the AM transmissions causes them to be refracted off of that lowered layer so that they “skip” back to ground level several hundred miles away. Accordingly, that causes the border blaster stations like XEG to be valuable as a commercial advertising medium far from their transmitters on the south side of the US border. Depending on atmospheric conditions, multiple skips can result in acceptable night time AM reception as far north as Canada.

References

• Wolfman Jack's old station howling once again. - Dallas Times Herald, January 2, 1983. - primarily about XERF but it also includes background information on the border-blasters.
• Border Radio by Fowler, Gene and Crawford, Bill. Texas Monthly Press, Austin. 1987
• Mass Media Moments in the United Kingdom, the USSR and the US, by Gilder, Eric. - "Lucian Blaga" University of Sibiu Press, Romania. 2003

References

1. [https://fccdata.org/?lang=en&mex=FER037241CO-105486&mexsvc=AM FCCdata.org/XEG]
2. "Mexican Border Blaster stations geographical location".
3. "Conócenos". XEG La Rachera.
4. "XEG-AM 1050 - Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico - Station ID - October, 1982 | Radio Geek Heaven".