WANC originally signed on September 6, 1982,[2] as WXTY with a Top 40 radio format; it was a sister station to WIPS. However, the station was only a rimshot into major nearby cities. It was never significant in either Burlington, Vermont, or Plattsburgh, New York, due to the presence of several other top 40 stations at the time, including WGFB "B100", WQCR "Q99" and upstart WXXX "95 Triple X".
In August 1990, Alan Chartock purchased WXTY from the then-owners of WIPS for $400,000. It became a repeater of WAMC-FM under the WANC calls for the southern Champlain Valley and Glens Falls/Lake George area. Despite it being a repeater station for WAMC, it is one a very small handful of noncommercial radio stations whose frequency is outside the standard frequency range for noncommercial FM radio stations (88-92 mHz) in the United States.[3]
