Thanks to former manager Steve Morgenstern for many of the photos from the 80's.

Below are pictures from the KTEQ archive. Most of the information about the photos from the 70's is unknown and photos from the 1990s are needed. Please feel free to contact the station with any information. Higher resolution images are currently available upon request. If you have photos you would like to add to this page, please feel free to mail them (postal or email ).

The TERC board oversees KTEQ activities by meeting once a month with KTEQ staff. Visitors are welcome at TERC board meetings. Please notify the board if you would like to attend by sending an email to KTEQ@mines.sdsmt.edu . The TERC board is made up of a combination of students, staff, and community members. Being on the TERC board is a fun, low-time commitment activity that looks great on a resume. All students are encouraged to attend meetings as visitors. First- and second-year students are especially encouraged to join the board.

Do you have a story, photo, or other gem of KTEQ history? We would love to add it to this webpage! We can scan documents and return them to you.



In 1922, a handful of energetic Electrical Engineering students established the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology's very first campus radio station. WCAT, or Wildcat Radio, began operating from the school's Physical Education building on the commercial AM band. Initially airing mostly news and informational programming, the station's popularity grew steadily through the 1940's and 50's with the inclusion of basketball games and music that was unique and popular for the era. Unfortunately, WCAT's rich broadcasting history met an abrupt end in 1952 when it was pressured off the air by a competing commercial station.



In 1969, after a nineteen year broadcasting hiatus, student body president Jim McGibbney spearheaded an effort to broadcast a program of current events on the Tech campus. With the assistance of announcer Greg Carey, McGibbney gained Student Association support to form the Tech Educational Radio Council (TERC). Plans for Tech's second fully-operational radio station were set in motion. In following two years a mountain of triplicate forms were filed with the FCC, space was secured for a new studio in the Surbeck Center, and tower space for the new station's antenna was donated by KBHE. Then on August 7, 1971, KTEQ touched the airwaves surrounding the SDSM&T campus, breaking nearly two decades of radio silence.



For further details about KTEQ's early years, read the report prepared by a former manager, Thomas Aldrich. Aldrich's report covers KTEQ's inception in 1969 through December 1975.



The History of KTEQ,1969-1975: The Aldrich Report

Dec. 1981 Black Hills Monthly Magazine Article on KTEQ (PDF)





KTEQ Frequency Change, 88.1 → 91.3 MHz ( .pdf .doc .htm)

Early KTEQ History According To Gary Brown Before KTEQ came up, we had a weekly radio show called "Hardrocker

Highlights" on KOTA. From '68 to '71 I did it with Karl Gerdes.

I worked with Greg back in '71 to get KTEQ up on the air, and was its first

station manager.

To get our license, we went up to Skyline Drive and had the religious

station (it's call sign escapes me now) reduce its power to 10W. We put a

homemade antenna on a broomstick and then traveled around Rapid seeing how

the signal was.

To get our original record library, I called up the VPs of marketing for

all the major labels in the US. I called collect and, amazingly, they

almost all accepted!

I was the first person on the air.

The first broadcast opened with "Also Sprach Zarathustra" as the sign on

theme (instead of the Star Spangled Banner). Remember..."2001 A Space

Odyssey" had just come out!



The "Alternative Radio for the Black Hills" slogan dates right from the

start.

The on-air auction was modeled after the auctions on Chicago radio stations.

When we started off, we broadcast tapes from Radio Moscow! You can bet that

hacked off a lot of people...and probably got me on an FBI list of some sort

or another.

Using the old state CENTREX lines, KTEQ was the originator of the first

all-state radio broadcast. There was a panel discussion on prison reform.

I patched through Surbeck Center into our panel, and then used the CENTREX

lines to send a feed out to the other college stations in the state.

Geo. McGovern was interviewed on the air for the '72 election. You should

have seen the secret service spooks go through the office!