The station signed on the air in 1987 as an independent station under the call letters WOCD. It was owned by Amsterdam Broadcasting, a subsidiary of Coit Services of San Francisco, and was leased to Christian Community Television (CCT) of Schenectady, New York. CCT faced financial troubles from the outset and they soon fell behind on their payments, so Amsterdam Broadcasting reassumed control of the station. The station went dormant in 1989, but in 1991, Coit struck a deal to sell the station to Tennessee TV executive Wade Griffith for $1.8 million. Griffith would have relaunched the station as WNSI, but the deal fell through, and WOCD was sold to Cornerstone Television, a religious broadcaster, for $375,000 in 1992. The second incarnation of WOCD had problems getting cable carriage in much of the market which combined with the looming conversion to digital television led the station to be sold again.