Urban One Celebrates 45 Years Of Service To The Black Community

Supply: Mike James, Brian Stukes, Patricia McDougal and Earl Gibson / City One Inc.

On October third, WOL Information Discuss 1450 in Washington, D.C., celebrated its forty fifth anniversary, a second that showcased the perseverance and tenacity of its founder, City One maven Cathy Hughes.

The radio station, which serves the D.C. space with immediately’s information, politics, and neighborhood occasions, was the primary station within the City One household. At present, the corporate has stations that stretch from D.C. to Atlanta, Baltimore, Charlotte, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Dallas, Houston, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, Raleigh and Richmond.

Based on October 3, 1980, City One was the brainchild of Hughes by taking the facility of radio and focusing it squarely on the Black neighborhood in closely Black populated cities throughout the nation. Quickly the attain of City One would increase right into a tv community (TVOne) and land a partnership with Attain Media bringing expertise equivalent to Rickey Smiley and others to much more airwaves nationwide.

Thought of by many to be the most important distributor of city content material within the nation, City One has discovered a footprint in Black America, from radio to tv and extra, offering programming geared to listening to and amplifying the voices of the individuals. In 2019, the corporate launched City One Honors, a celebration of Black excellence, historical past makers, change creators and extra with honorees together with Jamie Foxx, Jermaine Dupri, Missy Elliott and extra.

Hughes was acknowledged by the US Home of Representatives and the US Senate for her work in broadcasting and repair to the Black neighborhood.

“Cathy Hughes has left an indelible mark on the State of Maryland and impressed hundreds of thousands of listeners throughout the nation,” Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) wrote. “This titan of the airwaves started her extraordinary profession in Omaha, NE, the place she labored for an area radio station, KOWH. But it surely was when she moved to Washington, DC, in 1971 to pursue a job on the Howard College Faculty of Communications that her profession took off. Whereas working at Howard, she bought concerned within the college’s radio program as a station supervisor. In her first 12 months on the job, she elevated the station’s income twelvefold.”

The assertion continued, “Cathy Hughes has at all times aimed excessive, and when she discovered that the native D.C. radio station WOL was up on the market, she seized the chance. After being denied a mortgage 32 occasions, she lastly obtained the financial institution financing she wanted. So she bought WOL, based her personal media firm, Radio One, and rapidly soared to new heights. Cathy Hughes revolutionized radio by rebuilding WOL from the bottom up, actually, and introduced on grassroots volunteers from the neighborhood to develop her station’s headquarters on H Avenue and 4th Northeast, only a quick stroll from the U.S. Capitol. Her progressive broadcasts captured the eye of the African-American neighborhood and attracted a large viewers of devoted listeners.”