Embee Broadcasting took the talk station silent in mid-April after declining an offer by some employees to buy it. Now there’s an FCC filing (which you can view here) revealing the $1,000,000 cash sale to Fair Oaks, California-based IHR Educational Broadcasting, run by Douglas Sherman. This lay-Catholic group owns other stations and is part of the movement by Catholics to buy radio stations and attempt to catch up with other Christian broadcasters. The Phoenix board at Radio-Info.com has several relevant postings, about why the Gerson family might have chosen to first take the station dark and then sell it to the lay-Catholic IHR group. That discussion is going on here. KXAM’s previous talk format carried both local shows (“Culinary Confessions” and the sports-talk “Bandwagon”) and syndicated – Laura Ingraham, Bob & Sheri, Dave Ramsey, Rusty Humphries and Dr. Joy Browne. Some of those shows have found new homes on the Phoenix radio dial. KXAM has 5-kw days and 500 watts at night, and is licensed to Mesa, Arizona.