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KICY Alaska Dedicates New Transmitter, Station
NOME, AK (June 9, 2001) - By Bob Smietana
In late 1956, Bill Hartman traveled to Alaska to help Ronald Amundsen, then director for Covenant outreach there, put in a series of radio phones for pastors in the Alaskan bush. Amundsen thought the Covenant should start a radio station to tie the churches in the villages together. All through the trip, he talked with Hartman about the idea.
"So just to get him off my back, I told him that I would look into the idea," Hartman said. "I wrote up a feasibility study for it and sent it in and kind of forgot about it. Ralph Hanson, who was then secretary of Covenant World Mission, picked it up and convinced the board they ought to do it." In 1959, Hartman was back in Nome putting up the tower for KICY, a Covenant radio station in Nome.
More than 40 years later, KICY is still on the air. And Hartman is still involved with the station. Over the past two years, he has worked with the staff to install three new antennas and a 50,000-watt transmitter - five times the power of the current 10,000 watts.) The new antenna will allow the station to reach more of Western Alaska and will allow KICY to transmit Christian programming across the Bering Sea and into Russia.
The new station and transmitter were dedicated today at a ceremony honoring Hartman for his years of service. The site is named after Bill and his wife Arlene. "We honor Bill Hartman because he first honored God," said Margaret Olson, vice chair of Arctic Broadcasting Association (ABA) and a member of the Covenant church in Golovin, Alaska. "God lifts us up when we first honor him."
The three new radio towers have a combined signal strength of 240,000 watts, said Ted Haney, ABA president. This will allow the signal to reach 1,500 miles into Russia. Pastor Harvey Fiskeaux of Nome Covenant Church reminded those gathered at the dedication that the real strength of the station comes from God. Fiskeaux told the story of how his grandfather became a Christian - just three days before he died - after listening to a radio preacher's sermon. "God's word is the power behind the tower, and God's word is going to do the work," he says. "The people of Western Alaska and Russia need someone to tell the story. The greatest miracle is a changed heart for a man or a woman who is lost."
Hartman's daughter, Gail Withuhn, came with her father to the dedication (see accompanying photo), saying that she was coming in the place of her mother, who died in 1998 from cancer. This is the first time that Withuhn has traveled to Alaska with her father. "He has been there from the beginning, and even before the beginning, so I am very proud that they honored him," she said. "I have been hearing about Alaska since I was 14 years old and I am here now to see his stomping ground and to see the place he feels most at home."
Hartman was presented a plaque by Gary Walter, executive director of Church Growth and Evangelism for the Evangelical Covenant Church. Dennis Weidler, KICY general manager, presented Hartman with a plaque from the State of Alaska, which also honored Hartman for his service.
In his remarks, Hartman credited the station's staff and others who have made the work of KICY possible. "I am just the guy who has been around for a while, and so I am getting the plaque," Hartman noted. He said he is most pleased that the station will now be able to reach Russia.
"If when I get up there (to heaven) . . . and I can meet a few Russians that say, 'you know, we wouldn't be here save for KICY,' that will be enough," said Hartman, who is in his mid-eighties.
Copyright © 2008 The Evangelical Covenant Church. |
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