A small group of determined, unpaid volunteers took it upon themselves to start a local public radio station in 1974.
KTOO staff and volunteers pose outside the station’s former location on 4th Street in Juneau circa 1985. The story goes that longtime staffer Jeff Brown bought suit jackets for everyone on discount.
“There’s this line in here that says, ‘You’ll never need more than $10,000 a year to run the radio station,’” he said. “So, sort of quaint in that regard, but it was the blueprint for how to start a public radio station.” Harris, Mitchell and a small group of determined volunteers began to get the word out that they were starting a community-focused radio station.
Meanwhile, national community radio trailblazer Lorenzo Milam wrote “Sex and Broadcasting: A Handbook on Starting a Radio Station for the Community” – the same book that inspired Mitchell and scores of other stations around the country. “I was hired as the first coordinator of volunteers, which we only had that one position,” Hoskinson said. “Everyone else was a volunteer.”
Part of the station’s early focus revolved around legislative coverage. Mitchell and Harris hosted a legislative digest that aired in the evenings and was available to public radio stations statewide.“It was a real hub for the community. I mean, there were people coming in and out of the station,” she said. “People would just come in and hang out and talk.”KTOO later moved to two other buildings downtown before finding its current home at 360 Egan Drive in 1996.