WNVU (93.5 FM) is a

non-commercial A non-commercial (also spelled noncommercial) activity is an activity that is not carried out in the interest of Profit (economics), profit. The opposite is Commerce, commercial, something that primarily serves profit interests and is focused on bu ...

radio station licensed to

New Rochelle, New York New Rochelle ( ; in ) is a Political subdivisions of New York State#City, city in Westchester County, New York, Westchester County, New York (state), New York, United States. It is a suburb of New York City, located approximately from Midtow ...

, and serving the

New York metropolitan area The New York metropolitan area, also called the Tri-State area and sometimes referred to as Greater New York, is the List of cities by GDP, largest metropolitan economy in the world, with a List of U.S. metropolitan areas by GDP, gross metropo ...

. WNVU is owned by the

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

, Texas–based non-profit Hope Media Group, and broadcasts a Spanish

Christian radio Christian radio refers to Christian media radio formats that focus on Christian religious broadcasting or various forms of Christian music. Many such formats and programs include contemporary Christian music, gospel music, sermons, radio dramas, ...

format known as . The network features

Christian music Christian music is a genre of music that has been written to express either personal or a communal belief regarding Christianity, Christian life and faith. Common themes of Christian music include praise, worship, penitence and lament, and its f ...

along with Christian talk and teaching programs. WNVU is a Class A station with an

effective radiated power Effective radiated power (ERP), synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency (RF) power, such as that emitted by a radio transmitter. It is the total power in watts that would ha ...

(ERP) of 1,750 watts. WNVU's

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter (often abbreviated as XMTR or TX in technical documents) is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna with the purpose of sig ...

is located on the campus of Montefiore Medical Center in the New York City borough of

the Bronx The Bronx ( ) is the northernmost of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It shares a land border with Westchester County, New York, West ...

. It shares its

tower A tower is a tall Nonbuilding structure, structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from guyed mast, masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting ...

with

Fordham University Fordham University is a Private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit research university in New York City, United States. Established in 1841, it is named after the Fordham, Bronx, Fordham neighborhood of the Bronx in which its origina ...

's WFUV.

History

WGNR-FM, WNRC-FM, WWES-FM

For much of its history, 93.5 was the

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

WVOX WVOX (1460 AM) is a radio station licensed to New Rochelle, New York and serving the New York metropolitan area. WVOX is owned by Beverly Hills, California-based Chang Media Group, and has its transmitter located at the site of its former studi ...

(1460 AM). The station signed on the air on September 13, 1948. Its original

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally as ...

was WGNR-FM, owned by the New Rochelle Broadcasting Service, Inc. The FM station was followed two years later by the launch of WGNR (AM). New Rochelle Broadcasting Service, however, went bankrupt in 1952. The stations went

dark Darkness is the condition resulting from a lack of illumination, or an absence of visible light. Human vision is unable to distinguish colors in conditions of very low luminance because the hue-sensitive photoreceptor cells on the retina are ...

on August 1. After the appointment of a receiver, Radio New Rochelle, Inc., owned by the Iodice Family, acquired the stations and changed 93.5 FM's call letters to WNRC-FM. ( Guide to reading History Cards) FM 93.5 returned to the air in October 1953. It retained that call sign through a transfer of control to the Daniels family in 1955. WNRC-FM became WWES-FM on December 10, 1958, as both stations were sold to Radio Westchester for $225,000. The Radio Westchester sale made it a sister to the original WVIP (1310 AM, now WRVP) in Mount Kisco, in Northern

Westchester County Westchester County is a county located in the southeastern portion of the U.S. state of New York, bordering the Long Island Sound and the Byram River to its east and the Hudson River on its west. The county is the seventh most populous cou ...

WVOX-FM, WRTN and WVIP

On February 26, 1959, the station switched its call letters to WVOX-FM. WVOX-AM-FM joined a growing radio operation owned by the '' New York Herald-Tribune'' newspaper. By 1962, after

John Hay Whitney John Hay Whitney (August 17, 1904 – February 8, 1982) was an American venture capitalist, sportsman, philanthropist, newspaper publisher, film producer and diplomat who served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, publisher of the '' New ...

bought the ''Herald-Tribune'' the year before, the paper's radio division included WVOX-AM-FM, WVIP,

WGHQ WGHQ (920 kHz) is a commercial AM broadcasting, AM radio station City of license, licensed to Kingston, New York, and serving the Hudson Valley. WGHQ is owned by Pamal Broadcasting and it simulcasts a conservative talk radio format known as "The B ...

in Kingston and WFYI (now WJDM) in Mineola. With the shutdown of the ''Herald-Tribune'', Whitney Communications sold WVOX-AM-FM and WGHQ-AM-FM in 1968 to Hudson-Westchester Radio for $800,000. Hudson-Westchester was led by William O'Shaughnessy, a former account executive with the Herald-Tribune Radio Network who had been WVOX's general manager since 1965. Under O'Shaughnessy's ownership, the WVOX stations simulcast a community-oriented talk format, inviting local civic leaders, elected officials and local volunteers to do shows on the stations. In 1973, WVOX-AM-FM moved into modern facilities in New Rochelle, known as One Broadcast Forum. WVOX-FM ended the simulcast with WVOX (AM) around 1977, changing its call sign to WRTN and adopting an

adult standards Adult standards (also sometimes known as the nostalgia or Big Band format) is a North American radio format heard primarily on AM or class A FM stations. Adult standards started in the 1950s and is aimed at "mature" adults, meaning mainly tho ...

format, playing pop classics from the 1950s, '60s and '70s. Some evenings, it experimented with

active rock Active rock is a radio format used by many commercial radio stations across the United States and Canada. Active rock stations play a balance of new hard rock songs with valued classic rock favorites, normally with an emphasis on the harder edge o ...

and

heavy metal music Heavy metal (or simply metal) is a Music genre, genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the United Kingdom and United States. With roots in blues rock, psychedelic rock and acid rock, heavy metal band ...

. The station changed its call sign to WVIP in 2006 (flip-flopping with WRTN for a two-month period between August and October 2006). The station also ended the adult standards/rock music hybrid and began airing a brokered format primarily consisting of

music Music is the arrangement of sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm, or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Music is generally agreed to be a cultural universal that is present in all hum ...

and informational programming for the local

Afro-Caribbean Afro-Caribbean or African Caribbean people are Caribbean people who trace their full or partial ancestry to Sub-Saharan Africa. The majority of the modern Afro-Caribbean people descend from the Indigenous peoples of Africa, Africans (primarily fr ...

community.

Sale to Hope Media Group

Whitney Global Media (parent of Hudson-Westchester Radio) owner William O'Shaughnessy died on May 28, 2022. On July 3, 2023, his estate announced that WVIP would be sold to the

-based Hope Media Group (formerly known as WAY-FM), a nonprofit Christian radio broadcaster. Hope Media later announced that it would install its Spanish-language music network on the station upon its takeover. The sale announcement was met with both shock and disappointment among WVIP's Caribbean programmers and audience. Two months later, it was announced that WVOX would be divested in a donation sale. The move ended the O'Shaughnessy family's involvement in radio after nearly six decades. The sale of 93.5 FM was approved by the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...

(FCC) in mid-August 2023. The deal was consummated on August 31, 2023. Hope Media began operating the station on September 1, 2023, carrying its Spanish Christian network. The call sign was change to WNVU to represent New York .

References

External links

* * ( Guide to reading History Cards) The record is incomplete due to FCC error, starting in 1974. {{Religious Radio Stations in New York NVU Mass media in New Rochelle, New York Caribbean-American culture in New York (state) 1948 establishments in New York (state) Radio stations established in 1948 Christian radio stations in New York (state) Spanish-language radio stations in New York (state)