It was originally licensed in 1979 as KCKS-FM[3] to General Broadcasting Company, owned (mostly) by William F. Danenbarger, a former reporter and bureau manager for United Press International (UPI).

[4] The station license permitted broadcast at an effective radiated power of 3,000 watts on 95.3 MHz (channel 237A).

Increase of power to 100,000 watts required the station to purchase a new transmitter, change frequency from 95.3 MHz, a "class A" channel (limited to 6,000 watts), to 94.9 MHz, a "class C1" channel, and move to a new tower, 528 feet tall.

KCKS began its broadcasting years as an automated EZ-listening station, using a format provided by the Century 21 music service of Dallas, Texas (now part of the Jones Radio Networks.

While many radio stations chose to offer subscription-based "Muzak" services on a subcarrier channel, KCKS instead retransmitted the "Audio Reader" program, a radio reading service for the blind offered by the University of Kansas.