KABF
88.3 is 'non-commercial' Community Radio, driven by volunteers,
fueled by good-will
donations and sustained by sponsoring underwriters.
We rely on donations to help us
determine what programs you, the listeners, want us to broadcast. Our
DJ's are all volunteers, and we offer programming that you will not
find anywhere else. Underwriting sponsorships and goodwill donations
are how we meet our operational costs.
KABF's broadcast license is owned by The Arkansas Broadcasting
Foundation. Board of Directors meet monthly on the 3rd Tuesday, 6pm,
in the first floor Conference Room located at 2101 S. Main St., Little
Rock. Meetings are open to the public.
As a listener supported, non-profit
501(c)3 organization, all donations and underwriting subscriptions are
tax deductible.
KABF 88.3 "Voice of the
People," began broadcasting from Little Rock on August 31,
1984. Pieced together with discarded equipment, by 1990 the
station's unique sprit and format were making national news.
“This is radio where the public decides what it wants to hear, and
then plays it,” commented Tom Brokaw on the NBC Nightly News, in a
feature about KABF's unconventional grass-roots approach where all
the disk jockeys, program producers, broadcast engineers
and administrative personnell are volunteers.
“Most of the stations will only play what the big dollars will
push,” Dale Hawkins (who recorded the top-hit “Suzy-Q” in 1957)
said of the station's significance in 1990, and his words ring
doubly true today. KABF's 'all volunteer structure' and
community-mindedness remain a precious anomoly in a world of
privatized, profit-driven mega-media.
Still, as KABF Program Director John Cain will tell you,
it's not easy keeping an all-volunteer boat afloat these days. To
keep all the wires connected, technology running, office
equipment maintained and utility bills paid takes considerable
dollars on top of a quantum investment of energy, skill,
dedication, perseverance and time, too often leaving too much
undone.
That's why plans are in the works for a KABF 'broadcast technology
upgrade and makeover', details of which will be announced soon.
In the meantime, the 'all volunteer' programming Cain oversees
will keep on going out to listeners, not only in Little Rock but
all around the world on the station's Internet
livestream. MORE
ABOUT KABF
August 2010 SYNC: Radio Free Little Rock
KABF Turns 20
Radio Station Information
FCC Data
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PICTORIAL
of the 2013 VALENTINE'S DAY MEET & GREET at the ARKANSAS STATE
CAPITOL ROTUNDA

"Voice of the People"
updated February 24, 2013

A
BIT OF KABF HISTORY
by Radio Journalist Michael Hibblen
"KABF
was the first radio station I would broadcast on," writes Michael
Hibblin (pictured at right). "Hosting a weekly alternative rock
show called Radios In Motion. The 100,000 watt station had a
signal that covered much of Arkansas and featured more than 100
volunteer program hosts like myself, offering a wide range of
music and talk not heard on other radio stations in the state. It
offered the incredible freedom of essentially being able to play
anything you want on the air." [READ
MORE]

Photo above:
Michael Hibblen, (sitting in front of the control board) with
longtime co-hosts Louisa Rook and Thad Gilbert, taken by Arkansas
Gazette photographer Ellen Black in August 1990 as the newspaper
was preparing a story about the station.
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