KRVS Lafayette

Official site = https://www.krvs.org/

KRVS began as a small university station and grew into the most ambitious French radio project in modern Acadiana. Its official start came in 1963, after years of lobbying at what is now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. The new FM station had only thirty watts, enough to serve campus and the nearby city, and its first duties were practical: public service for the community and radio experience for students.

By the late 1970s, the station was becoming something larger. A new tower and a boost to 3,000 watts widened the signal, and Paul Casey, an architecture student with a love for Louisiana French culture, created Bonjour Louisiane in 1979. The first hour was Cajun music, on the theory that Cajuns woke early; the second hour reached outward to French music from around the world. Barry Ancelet soon took over hosting, and the show’s mission of cultural promotion was plain from the start.

Daily Advertiser (Lafayette), article about the start of Bonjour Louisiane, from Feb 25, 1979

CODOFIL then pushed KRVS into its defining role. With Jimmy Domengeaux’s political help, the station won approval and funding for a 100,000-watt signal and became an NPR affiliate. It also adopted the name “Radio Acadie,” carrying an unofficial mandate to make French audible across southwest Louisiana. Pete Bergeron arrived in 1982 and gave the station its most recognizable voice, managing more than thirty hours a week of French-language programming, including Bonjour Louisiane, La Voix de la Louisiane, stories, religious shows, and zydeco.

KRVS has always lived with tension. It is local and academic, Cajun and Creole, French and NPR, cultural preservation and public-service journalism. Today it remains the region’s leading station for French programming, with Bonjour Louisiane, Dimanche Matin, The Basile Cajun Hour, Zydeco Est Pas Salé, Herman Fusilier’s Zydeco Stomp, FrancoMix, and Creole programming. Cheryl Devall called the station one that sounds like the place it comes from. That may be the simplest definition of KRVS.

Here’s another good site with info on KRVS = https://acadianahistorical.org/items/show/84