WWOZ was founded by a group of local music lovers led by brothers Jerry and Walter Brock. The original antenna hung from a telephone pole at the levee near the Huey P. Long Bridge. At night Jerry and Walter would record their programs on cassette, and then, the next day, run them up river where they’d plug the tape recorder directly into the transmitter. It was not long before WWOZ moved upstairs at Tipitina’s, where the beer was stored. Apocrypha has it that someone punched a hole in the floor of the ‘OZ “studio” and, whenever the station elected to air a live music performance, they’d just lower the microphone down the hole and broadcast whoever happened to be on stage below!

In 1984, WWOZ moved to Armstrong Park, where it broadcast from a 3-room building adjacent to Perseverance Hall. After the Great Flood caused by the breach of the federal levees during Hurricane Katrina in 2005, WWOZ was forced to relocate to the historic French Quarter – into the French Market Building at 1008 North Peters Street.

In 1987, the financially-strapped Nora Blach Foundation, which had established WWOZ in 1980, turned the station’s license over to the Friends of WWOZ, Inc, a not-for-profit 501(c)3 corporation established by the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival Foundation for the purpose of operating WWOZ. Since that time, the Foundation has been the guarantor of WWOZ’s financial and operational stability.

The Foundation has been a key player in making it possible for the station to grow from a compelling idea struggling to realize its potential to a widely-recognized and respected platform for supporting and nurturing the local music scene.