‘All My Children’ Debuted 55 Years Ago! Revisit the Show’s Historic Firsts (Like the Time Barbara Bush Stopped By)
In 1965 — half a decade before the show would debut on Jan. 5, 1970, All My Children’s creator, Agnes Nixon, conceived of a town called Pine Valley, named for her home, Pine Cottage, in Pennsylvania’s Penn Valley.
Though she was the head writer of Guiding Light at the time, Nixon’s vision for the new soap began to take form. She decided on a title, then wrote the poem that symbolized the show’s theme of the brotherhood of man: “The great and the least/ The weak and the strong/ The rich and the poor/ In sickness and in health/ In joy and sorrow/ In tragedy and triumph/ You are All My Children.”
Initial attempts to sell the series to NBC and CBS were unsuccessful, so Nixon tabled the new show and became head writer of Another World. Another World’s popularity increased as a result, and ABC took notice. The network approached Nixon to create a show — but rather than revisit All My Children, she developed One Life to Live, which premiered on July 15, 1968. When One Life to Live became a success, ABC asked her for another serial and she took her proposal for All My Children out of the drawer at her husband’s behest.
Though it took a while to get out into the world, All My Children broke new ground constantly once it was on the air. And part of its legacy remains because of the many daytime “firsts” that the residents of Pine Valley took part in.
All My Children‘s Firsts & Memorable Moments: A Timeline
January 5, 1970: All My Children premieres on ABC.
1970: Amy Tyler (Rosemary Prinz) joins an organization called Mothers March For Peace to protest the Vietnam War.
1973: Mary Fickett, who played Ruth Martin, receives the first Daytime Emmy given to a soap performer. Her submission includes an anti-war monologue.
Photo by Ann Limongello/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images
1973: In the same year of the passage of Roe vs. Wade, Erica Kane (Susan Lucci) is the first character to undergo a legal abortion on TV.
1974: Eileen Letchworth’s (Margo Flax Martin) facelift is incorporated into her storyline, marking a daytime first.
April 25, 1977: AMC expands from 30 minutes to an hour.
1978: Erica and Tom Cudahy’s (Richard Shoberg) honeymoon is filmed in St. Croix, making it the show’s first international location shoot.
1978-79: AMC is the first ABC soap to top the Nielsen ratings.
1980: When Ruth became pregnant over 40, she feared her child would be born with Down Syndrome and underwent daytime’s first amniocentesis.
1982: Jesse Hubbard (Darnell Williams) and Angie Baxter (Debbi Morgan) are paired to great success and become daytime’s first Black super-couple.
photo: Steven Fenn / ©ABC / courtesy Everett Collection
1983: The show introduces Donna Pescow as Lynn Carson, daytime’s first lesbian character.
1987: During the height of his drug addiction, Mark Dalton (Mark LaMura) shared needles with Fred Parker (Mark Morrison), who contracted HIV and died of AIDS. While Mark tested negative, Fred’s widow, Cindy Parker (Ellen Wheeler), tested positive. She succumbed to AIDS two years later.
October 5, 1990: Barbara Bush becomes the first First Lady to appear on a soap when she films a PSA about organ donation as part of a leukemia story. The characters on the show are filmed watching the PSA.
1995: Mark Consuelos joins the cast as Mateo Santos. He is paired with Kelly Ripa’s Hayley Vaughan, and their reel-life romance turns into a real-life romance.
Ann Limongello/©ABC/Courtesy Everett Collection
1996: Erica develops an addition to painkillers and seeks treatment at the Betty Ford Center.
May 21, 1999: Susan Lucci makes worldwide headlines when she is named Outstanding Lead Actress at the Daytime Emmys, her first win after 19 nominations.
February 17, 2009: Reese Williams (Tamara Braun) and Bianca Montgomery (Eden Riegel) marry in daytime’s first same-sex wedding.
April 14, 2011: ABC cancels All My Children and One Life to Live.
September 23, 2011: All My Children airs for the final time on ABC.
2013: All My Children streams online from April to September.
