A year after the station's purchase by the Newark Sunday Call in 1946, it was sold to North Jersey Radio, Inc. and the call letters changed from WNJW to WNJR. Studios were located at 97 Halsey Street.

The station's early music programming included jazz with some Western swing and Latin dance music. The station's music format changed to a mix of jazz, jive and R&B with the introduction of Alan Freed's rock and roll show in 1954, first heard in the New York area on WNJR, via syndication from Cleveland's WJW.