Stephen King is killing his Maine radio stations

Stephen King is taking a big old ax to his Maine radio empire. The prolific author bought Bangor-based station WLBZ in 1983, renaming it WZON in honor of his 1979 novel, The Dead Zone, per Billboard.  Over time, WZON grew into The ZONE Corporation, which also ran WKIT ("Stephen King's Rock Station") and WZLO ("Maine's Adult Alternative"), both under the ownership of King and his wife, Tabitha. (The original, WZON, was branded as "Retro Radio.")

Now, it's time for all three stations—which, according to a statement from the ZONE Corporation, never made even a little bit of money—to go to their grave once and for all. King is citing his age (77) as a reason for the shutdown, but this writer is guessing the good people of Bangor probably got as sick of hearing "Mambo No. 5" on their morning commutes as King's wife did.

"While radio across the country has been overtaken by giant corporate broadcasting groups, I’ve loved being a local, independent owner all these years,” King said in a statement. “I’ve loved the people who’ve gone to these stations every day and entertained folks, kept the equipment running, and given local advertisers a way to connect with their customers. Tabby and I are proud to have been a part of that for more than four decades." Ken Wood, the stations' general manager, added, "Independent, locally owned radio stations used to be the norm. There’re only a few left in Maine, and we’re lucky we had these three as long as we did."

It's sad that King is killing the stations, but as anyone who's ever read one of his books well knows, things don't usually stay dead for too long in the author's world. We'll see if zombie versions of the stations come back at some point in the next few years; sometimes, dead isn't better.