Staff Writer
WOODSTOCK, N.B. — Radio listeners may have picked up a new station while driving around the Houlton area Monday as CJRI, a gospel radio station from Woodstock, New Brunswick officially went on the air this week. CJRI has been broadcasting from Fredericton, New Brunswick since 2005, but expanded to Woodstoock. The station officially began broadcasting Monday on 101.1 FM.
“We chose a Southern gospel format because no one else was doing it and there’s a so-called Bible belt that extends from south of Fredericton to somewhere north of Centreville in New Brunswick,” said Ross Ingram, owner. “This spills over the line into the border counties of Maine both from Woodstock and from our new transmitter in St. Stephen.
“There’s a history of over 100 years of evangelical Christianity in that area which we see as the core of our listenership,” Ingram said. “However, Southern gospel music is a close cousin of country music and we have a lot of listeners who could best be described as ‘unchurched.’”
Ingram said CJRI is one of three radio stations in Canada with this particular format (85 percent Southern gospel, 15 percent country gospel and praise).
“Visiting Southern gospel artists tell us there are only a few in the United States,” he said.
With four transmitters now on the air, CJRI — the Faithway Radio Network — broadcasts from Fredericton to the Miramichi Valley of New Brunswick, Woodstock and St. Stephen, all under the CJRI call letters.
“We strive to be as local as possible with Canadian, New Brunswick and local news, sports and weather and interviews of interest to our listeners,” Ingram said.
The staff is mostly volunteers. Paul Dixon serves as the technical director and business partner with Ingram for Faithway Communications Inc. The two are 30-year veterans of the CBC Radio Network.
“As retirees we decided this was something we wanted to do,” Ingram said. “It’s interesting, we think, to note that expansion beyond Fredericton has been at the request and with the support of the people of each of those areas.”
