Mom and Pop radio station operates from front porch of Montana famhouse

Along Montana Route 35, near Kalispell, there's a lonely yellow farmhouse with a few giant cottonwood trees out front. If you look closely as you pass, you'll see a small neon sign in the window that reads "On Air!"

This is the radio home of Montana Radio Cafe, 101.FM, a 100-watt radio station operated by Scott and Marie Johnston from the front porch of their farmhouse of 29 years. The radio tower out front is 100 feet high, the maximum the FCC allows for a low-powered station. The signal reaches nearby Kalispell, Columbia Falls and the west entrance to Glacier National Park. But that's about it. As radio stations go, this one's tiny.

Montana Radio Cafe is billed as "Front Porch Music Served Fresh Daily." Scott, with help from Marie, is the only staff.

Scott started KXZI-FM 11 years ago after working as a DJ at local Kalispell stations. He was frustrated by the short playlists —the same songs played over and over. He was bored, but it was a paycheck. After he began putting his tiny station together, he got fired from his job — "competition," Scott figured, although he couldn't fathom why anyone would be threatened by such a small-time operation.

THE FIRST NIGHT ON THE AIR he and his engineer drove to Kalispell and then other places, searching for the station on the car radio. Hearing it, said Scott, "was like a miracle."

There were no sponsors the first week. Scott wondered what the heck he was doing. How would he make money? Then, the second week, $800 showed up. "Hey, this can really work," he thought. And it has, although today it's not enough to support him and Marie all by itself. Scott figures it cost him about $16,000 to get the station up and running. Nowadays there is almost no overhead beyond a few hundred dollars a year in music licensing fees.

The station is a labor of love for Scott, 64, who has accumulated a playlist of 30,000 tunes — blues, folk, country, bluegrass, jazz — and lots of "miscellaneous" material too hard to categorize. Young and old tune in. "We span the generations," he says. Many of the artists are local, but there are big-time names, too. The programming is a hodgepodge. It's eclectic. It's one man's love of music shared over the airways.


Early on Scott set up templates to automate what was playing with some sense of order. One time, after a computer crash, the programming got screwy. Christmas songs were playing in the summer. Some people thought Scott was doing it on purpose, that there was some brilliant reasoning behind it. There wasn't.

Montana Radio Cafe is streamed on the Web at kxzi.com, expanding the audience well beyond the nearby small towns and farms. People listen from all over North America and around the world. Some make donations. A couple from Germany show up on occasion with a gift of homemade plum liqueur. Scott doesn't know how many people listen to his station, or where they listen — on the air or the Internet. He doesn't care. "I like being low key," he says. "I like being a creator more than an everyday business guy."

Musicians and bands stop by occasionally to perform. Sometimes Scott remembers to record what they play, and it ends up on his ever-expanding playlist. But other times he forgets. He plays guitar himself — he supported himself early in his career by performing — and he airs some of his own work. Few people know it's him.

THE STATION IS MOSTLY MUSIC. Scott breaks in during the day to thank sponsors, a few dozen who basically pay his bills and help the station earn a modest profit. Most messages are prerecorded. They're not ads like you hear on commercial radio but more like Scott just saying why he likes a place and then thanking it for its support.

Scott and Marie supplement the station's income by renting out a cottage in the back yard. Scott has sold cars out by the busy highway for a commission. He once sold a Porsche in 45 minutes. In a couple of years he'll have Social Security. Through the years he and Marie have raised six children, who have spawned 14 grandchildren.

Running the radio station is not a high-power, high-stress job. Each day, after getting his morning coffee, Scott heads to his front porch studio where he putters. The studio and a corner of the basement is his space. The rest is Marie's domain. That's fine with him. He has his music.

Honk your horn if you should pass by the station (those are Scott's orders). For now, just listen in by clicking here.