WENN was then bought by local businessman A. G. Gaston, who immediately fired Joe Lackey, the station manager; all of the disc jockeys quit in protest.

Lackey was then given a job managing WATV, a radio station located on the 20th floor of the Thomas Jefferson Hotel where he brought all the former WENN personalities with him.

Despite operating with a relatively weak AM signal and broadcasting only from sunrise until sunset, WATV immediately became the top-rated radio station in Birmingham.

Dr. Erskine Ramsay Faush Sr and Shelley Stewart, both longtime radio personalities in the Birmingham area, sold the station to MCL/MCM-INC, a subsidiary of Sheridan Broadcasting.

On September 14, 2006, Sheridan Broadcasting restructured its radio stations, and WATV was put under the control of MCL/MCM Alabama, LLC.