In 1972, Roger Charest, an announcer at CHQT in Edmonton, decided to file for the first radio licence to serve Fort McMurray, at the time a small town with no local stations in the years before the Athabasca oil sands boomed.

[1] The station met with tremendous local interest; Charest recalled nonstop phone calls and a feeling of "jubilation" in town.

[8][9] Ultimately, the frequency change proposal was abandoned, having become unnecessary because the projected Alsands plant and population boom to support the increased coverage never materialized.

[10][11] In March 1985, OK Radio Group built rock-formatted FM station CKYX-FM; CJOK removed rock music from its middle of the road format at that time.

[14] CJOK applied in August 1997 to move to the FM band, citing the inadequacy of its signal as conceived in the early 1970s to serve the larger Fort McMurray urban area.

[15] The proposal required the CRTC to issue a waiver of its rule that prevented one group from owning more than one FM station in the same market; in December, the commission granted this waiver and approved the FM conversion, satisfied with OK Radio's commitment to retain the country format and that the arrangement would "provide a better quality service to the Fort McMurray population".