For four and a half decades TROY Public Radio has filled the airwaves with news and entertainment for listeners across southeast Alabama and this week friends of TROY Public Radio gathered to celebrate a major milestone.

TROY Public Radio celebrated 45 years on air with a birthday party in the Wallace hall lobby.

“Today is the day that we are celebrating TROY Public Radio being 45-years-old,” Say Operations Manager Kyle Gassiott. “On March 1, 1977 that’s when WTSU started, all began there, and now we have somewhere around 45,000 listeners to our radio signal and about 5000 online so we have grown quite a bit. We’re podcasting. We’re on smart speakers.”

The theme for the event was “Hear for 45.” Gassiott said he couldn’t help but have some fun with the theme since listening is a big part of radio broadcasting.

“A little bit of a pun,” says Gassiott. “But, we decided to just go for it because, you know, it NPR had ‘Hear Every Voice’ as their their motto for their 50th anniversary and we decided we wanted to be remind people that we were in here for 45 but also tune in and hear us. Hear what we sound like at 45. Hear what we sound like for the next 45 years.”

For the full story watch Cailey’s report.