WDUL is a Class D AM station. It is powered at 1,000 watts by day, using a non-directional antenna. To avoid interference to other stations on 970 AM, at night it reduces power to 26 watts.[2] Programming is also heard on 250-watt FM translator W251CD at 98.1 MHz in Superior. It uses the translator dial position in its moniker "Hot 98.1."
The station signed on the air on August 10, 1959, as WQMN. It was a 1,000-watt daytime-only station transmitting on 1320 kHz. WQMN was owned by Quality Radio, Inc. in Superior, Wisconsin.[3]
At noon on May 9, 1964, the station changed its call sign to WAKX ("WAX"), playing a Top 40 format. Lance "Tac" Hammer was the station's first program director.[4]
WAKX moved to 970 kHz, formerly the home of WIGL in Superior, on October 26, 1967. The 1320 kHz frequency in the Duluth-Superior market is no longer in use.
Owner Lew Latto purchased the facilities of beautiful music station KPIR in September 1974, and began simulcasting the format of WAKX on both 970 AM and 98.9 FM.
In 1994, Latto sold KXTP and WAKX to Ken Beuhler and Patty McNulty, the owners of WDSM and KZIO (currently KDKE). The FM station flipped from classic rocktocountry music and became KTCO. Later that decade, Buehler and McNulty sold their stations to Shockley Communications, which changed KXTP's format to country music and then Radio Disney network in April 1998.
On March 16, 2015, WGEE changed its call sign to WDUL. Even though WDUL is licensed to Superior, Wisconsin, the call letters stand for Duluth, Minnesota.
On November 4, 2020, WDUL rebranded as "970 The Game". Its weekday daytime programming originated from WRNW97.3 FM, a sports station in Milwaukee owned by iHeartMedia.[5]
On April 25, 2022, WDUL changed formats from sports to Top 40 (CHR), branded as "Hot 98.1" competing against Top 40 outlet KBMX 107.7 "Mix 108". Some programs from the prior sports format were moved to sister station 710 WDSM.[6]
The switch to a Top 40 (CHR) format was primarily for listeners to 98.1 FM, the station's translator outlet. This also returned the Top 40 (CHR) format to 970 AM for the first time since WAKX signed off in 1982.
