WNSY

WNSY FM 100.1 is a radio station in northwest Georgia that simulcasts WLKQ-FM "La Raza", with a regional Mexican format.

First applied-for in 1995, it went on the air as WCHK-FM in 1998. The original WCHK-FM 105.5 is now WWVA-FM 105.7 and owned by Clear Channel. The station became oldies Sunny 100 in 1999.

WNSY has Talking Rock, Georgia as its city of license, with a transmitter near Jasper, Georgia. Both are to the far north-northwest of Atlanta, well beyond even the exurbs of metro Atlanta. Its broadcast range is most of northwest Georgia, not including south or southeast metro Atlanta very well for the most part.

In January 2007, Davis Broadcasting of Columbus, Georgia completed the purchase of WNSY and WCHK. WNSY, Sunny 100 went off the air on the morning of January 22, 2007, and returned on February 1 with the simulcast of WLKQ, carrying Latino-oriented programming. This would add a fifth Latino radio station to northwest Georgia, as Clear Channel owns WWVA-FM Viva 105.7 FM and WBZY El Patron 105.3 FM, and a local group owns WDAL AM 1420 in Dalton, which was formerly owned by Clear Channel.

Listeners to Sunny 100 were surprised by the loss of the station. For the next 14 months, only two FM stations in all of northwest Georgia carried any semblance of the classic oldies genre: WATG "95.7 The Ridge" in Rome and WSRV "97.1 The River" in Atlanta, both under the classic hits format. The oldies format returned in March 2008 at WYAY FM 106.7.

The original WCHK-FM

McClure owned the original WCHK-FM, which was located at 105.5 FM and broadcast a locally-oriented format that was a mix of country and Southern Gospel music. It was a simulcast of WCHK AM 1290, the original station of Cherokee Broadcasting, in turn named for Cherokee County, Georgia, of which city of license Canton is the county seat, largest city, and geographic center. The CHK in turn stands for Cherokee.

In 1991 the station received Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approval to upgrade to a much stronger signal and move to the 105.7 frequency, allowing it to be heard throughout the metro Atlanta media market. This moved the station from its allotment on Bear Mountain near Waleska, to the new tower next to Interstate 575 in Holly Springs, Georgia. (It has since moved to Sweat Mountain, even closer to Atlanta.)

The station remained under local management for a little over a year, briefly as “North Metro's K-105", then with a revamped format as "Atlanta's Classic Country 105.7". In 1993 the frequency was leased by local marketing agreement (LMA) to Jacor (which would later merge with Clear Channel) and simulcasted WGST AM 640 under the WGST-FM callsign, especially since that station was is extremely difficult to receive at night even locally. In 2000, Clear Channel abandoned the WGST simulcast, and the station became WMXV "Mix 105.7".

In 2003, when then WFOX (now WSRV) FM 97.1 abandoned its oldies format, Clear Channel picked-up the format, becoming WLCL "Cool 105.7". For the next year, Cherokee Broadcasting was the legal owner of the licenses of two oldies stations in the same area, WNSY and WLCL (although Cherokee Broadcasting only operated WNSY). The 105.7 frequency was sold outright to Clear Channel in 2004, and oldies was abandoned on 105.7 in May 2005.

External links

• Query the FCC's FM station database for WNSY
• Radio-Locator information on WNSY
• Query Arbitron's FM station database for WNSY