 It had operated W8XH, an Apex band station, from 1934 to 1939; W8XH was the first Apex station to operate a regular schedule.That station converted to facsimile broadcasting as W8XA in 1939 before shutting down in December 1940.The Federal Communications Commission issued a construction permit to WBEN, Inc. for a new FM station on 43.3 MHz on the original 42-50 MHz FM Broadcast Band on August 10, 1944 with the WBEN-FM call sign.