The 92.5 MHz frequency in Rochester was first occupied in 1960 by WVOR, owned by the Functional Broadcasting Company. But within a couple of years, that station moved to 100.5. In 1965, classical music station WBBF-FM moved to the unoccupied 92.5 frequency. WBBF-FM had already been established in 1961 at 101.3 as the sister station to popular AM outlet WBBF. The call letters were changed to WBFB in 1969. In 1975, NBC Radio started a 24-hour all-news radio network called NIS, with WBFB switching to join the NIS Network, becoming WNWZ. However, the network was not profitable, and NBC announced it would be shut down at the end of 1976. At the same time, the soft rock format had been catching on around the country, heard on stations such as WMGK in Philadelphia and WMJC in Detroit. LIN Broadcasting, which owned WNWZ at the time, decided to put a soft rock format on 92.5, calling the stationWMJQ, as well as their branding "Magic 92". These stations played many of the same artists as were heard on album rock stations, but only their softer works. Over time, WMJQ moved to a more mainstream album rock direction, putting it in competition with Rochester's leading rock station WCMF, eventually WMJQ was renamed as "Rockradio 92MJQ". By early 1983, WMJQ had shifted to more of a modern rock format, though continuing to play a lot of mainstream album rock artists, and used the slogan "Rock of The Eighties." The modern rock format had proved to be quite successful on KROQ-FM in Los Angeles and other stations around the country. However, in the late summer of 1983, LIN Broadcasting decided to make a switch; co-owned WBBF had given up its Top 40/CHR format for news-talk the previous year, as many AM stations were doing at the time. Capitalizing on this, WMJQ switched to a Top 40/CHR format in early September 1983, under their new nickname as "Hitradio Q92".. Even after WHFM changed format in early 1985, WMJQ was in a difficult competitive position against format ratings-leader WPXY. On April 2, 1987, WMJQ flipped to another format that was quickly becoming popular among FMradio stations at the time and began broadcasting country music as WBEE-FM. It used the FM suffix to its call letters because there was already an AM station, WBEE in Harvey, Illinois near Chicago, now known as WBGX.
