According to the station's website, WGMS "was the first FM signal in the marketplace [clarification needed] and holds the record for the longest consecutive broadcast in the same format."
A public outcry in support of the classical format forestalled the change, and the United States Congress authorized the stations to simulcast their programming full-time, as an exemption from Federal Communications Commission regulations mandating separate programming on AM and FM outlets owned by a single entity.
In 1988, both WGMS AM & FM were sold off to Washington, D.C., venture capitalists Steven and Mitchell Rales and John VerStandig.
Had the deal gone through, Washington, D.C., would have been left without a classical-music station as a result of the earlier 2005 switch of WETA to a public-radio news and talk format.
Washington-based XM Satellite Radio attempted to capitalize on the development, purchasing advertisements in The Washington Post billing itself as the new home of classical music in the region.
Snyder eventually withdrew from the purchase agreement, citing "a change in the radio climate" and hopes that "a better signal will soon become available in the market."
News accounts suggested that a comment to the Post from an unnamed Bonneville executive, who said Snyder had offered "50 percent more than [WGMS] was worth," had stalled the negotiations.
(WETA had carried classical music and NPR programming until February 2005, when it switched exclusively to a news-and-talk format.)
The final classical selection played on the station was the closing chorus, "With Tears of Grief," from Bach's St. Matthew Passion.