Stephen King, the horror author whose books have sold hundreds of millions of copies, inspired classic films and disturbed untold nights of sleep, has long played another role closer to his home in Maine: local media magnate.
For more than four decades, King, an enthusiastic rock fan, has owned small independent radio stations in Bangor, Maine. It began in 1983 when he bought WLBZ and changed its call letters to WZON, in a nod to his best seller “The Dead Zone.” He added WZLO and WKIT, which bills itself as “Stephen King’s Rock ’n’ Roll Station.”
But now King, 77, is getting out of the radio business, having covered steady losses that the stations said had run into millions of dollars over the years. The stations are expected to sign off for the last time on New Year’s Eve and then shut down.
“While radio across the country has been overtaken by giant corporate broadcasting groups, I’ve loved being a local, independent owner all these years,” King said in a news release in which he noted that he was in good health but that he had been feeling his age and was trying to “get his business affairs in better order.”
“I’ve loved the people who’ve gone to these stations every day and entertained folks, kept the equipment running, and given local advertisers a way to connect with their customers,” he said in the release from the Zone Corporation, his radio company.
King said that he and his wife, Tabitha, were proud to have been a part of the business for so long. A representative for King did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Small radio stations across the United States have been in flux as big media companies have expanded their empires: iHeartMedia owned 870 stations across 151 markets in 2023, according to data released this year by BIA Advisory Services. Audacy owned 227 stations in 46 markets, the survey found.
In Bangor, WZON’s “Downtown With Rich Kimball” show opened on Monday on a somber note, with Kimball noting that the coming weeks would be bittersweet.
“I feel a bit sad for us and for me, but, you know, much worse for the folks who work here at the station full time who now need to find something new with relatively short notice,” Kimball said.
Cara Pelletier, the chair of the Bangor City Council, said in an interview that King’s stations were a lifeline to the community and that she had seen “quite a bit of grieving” online.
“I don’t think you can overstate the importance of these stations and by extension, the importance of Stephen King’s legacy here in Bangor,” she said.
The King family, she added, is “revered as people who have invested in the city. From their donation to the library to things like this that I think nobody knew they were doing personally, but they do because they love the city of Bangor.”
The stations have played a big role in community affairs over the years.
In 2011, when the federal government proposed cuts to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program — which helps people buy heating oil to survive the cold Maine winters — the stations raised more than $240,000, with help from King, to help keep people warm. “Everybody is just hurting, and everybody is scared,” King said in an interview with The New York Times at the time. “There was no question of not helping when we saw how much the cut was.”
Many people in the area still listen to the radio, Pelletier said, noting that the stations were vital for car rides in a remote region when there are not a lot of options.
“I don’t know what we’ll do,” she said, adding that the three stations were instrumental in promoting community events. “I’m sure the gap will be filled by something. I can’t imagine whatever it is will feel as much in tune with our residents and our community.”
King’s passion for rock music has been well documented, particularly his interest in the punk band The Ramones, which he booked for a concert in Maine in 1982, according to Rolling Stone. The Ramones later recorded “Pet Sematary” for the movie adaptation of King’s novel, and it became a hit. King has also been known to listen to bands like Metallica and Anthrax while he works.
WZON, which was never financially successful, briefly experimented with becoming a nonprofit and was sold in 1990, only for the King family to repurchase it three years later after getting approval from a bankruptcy judge.
“Independent, locally owned radio stations used to be the norm,” said Ken Wood, the general manager of the stations for the last 10 years. “There’re only a few left in Maine, and we’re lucky we had these three as long as we did.”
The post Stephen King to Shut Down His 3 Radio Stations in Maine appeared first on New York Times.
