Guiding Light Discussion Thread

[Reverend Ruthledge]

Agnes wasn't the one who moved GL to Springfield. I don't know who made that decision, but Agnes didn't. The setting was still Los Angeles when she left. 

[Contessa Donatella]

I have some more photos from this Weekly GL Collectors Edition.

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Last day in the studio, all cast & all crew

 

[Maxim]

Ha, that's interesting. Thanks for clarifying. 

[kalbir]

Chris Bernau passed away in 1989, so it's possible that he was HIV positive in 1984. 

Back in the 1980s HIV was considered a death sentence so five years seems like it could be the life expectancy for someone that was HIV positive. 

[Mona Kane Croft]

You may be correct, but are you sure about that?  I've always been told that transition took place while Mike Bauer was appearing on Another World in 1966, and that is why Mike never mentioned the name of his home town (Selby Flats), while he was in Bay City,  He simply called it "my hometown."  And by the time Mike returned to Guiding Light, the show had been relocated to Springfield.  And wasn't Nixon still writing both GL and AW at that point?  This would have been around 1967, I believe.  Before the premiere of One Life to Live on ABC.  I appreciate your comment, and would enjoy continuing this conversation.  Guiding Light's move from Los Angeles to Springfield is so clouded by lack of information, I would love to know anything you have read or heard about it.  If Nixon didn't write the location change, then that makes the entire situation even more clouded.   

[Reverend Ruthledge]

I will say this. Even though Los Angeles was the setting until Nixon left, fewer and fewer references were made to the location towards the end of her run. It became a lot more of a generic location. And it looks like they were trying to perhaps move away from having Los Angeles and the coast be the setting although they hadn't settled on a new location yet. There are just hints of this. For example, when Julie Bauer was put in a sanitarium, it was referred to originally as "Seaview Hospital" and it was scratched out and renamed "Lakeview Hospital". 

I've read every script of GL from 1966 except the month of December and Springfield was never mentioned. Perhaps it is in December. But Nixon was gone by then. Her last month with GL was November 1966. Per my other post, I think Nixon had started moving away from Los Angeles being the setting but it was a later writer who settled on the new location being Springfield. 

[Maxim]

Thank you again! And I'm sooooooooo envious of the fact you're read the entire year.  WOW! Magical stuff. And here we are... yet another amazing thing we've learned again. 

[P.J.]

Thank you! I'm not sure I've ever seen this picture in color! 

[Contessa Donatella]

Oh, good to know!! 

[Mona Kane Croft]

So interesting. Thanks for the information.  Sounds as if you are of the belief (as am I) that GL's transition from Los Angeles to Springfield was not a "scripted" move. In other words, none of the characters actually moved to a new city in the script, but TPTB just stopped mentioning Selby Flats in the script for a year or two, and then quietly began referring to their location as Springfield.  That seems to be the way it was handled according to the information that is available.  

However, I have read accounts from some fans who swear they remember an on-camera move -- in which the Bauer and Fletcher families literally moved from California to Springfield. Mostly prompted (they suggest) because of a new branch of Cedars Hospital opening in Springfield.  No idea why Bert and Bill would have made the move, because Bill did not work for Cedars.   

Anyway -- this has to be one of the biggest unexplained mysteries in the history of Daytime TV

[SoapDope]

I remember reading they wanted Michael Zaslow to take over the role of Alan when Bernau departed. Zaslow told them it would be disrespectful to his friend Bernau and that the audience would only see him as Roger. It would also be silly since Roger & Alan had be involved in previous storylines in the 1970's. 

I wish Bernau had lived. Original recipe Alan & Roger redux would have awesome. 

[kalbir]

Sadly the timeline didn't work. Chris Bernau departure May 1988. Michael Zaslow return January 1989. Chris Bernau passed away June 1989.

GL had two show-defining villains with MZ Roger and CB Alan and those that got to see 1977-1980 Roger vs. Alan were most fortunate.

[P.J.]

not gonna lie....Roger/Alan is probably the number one reason I want more of the Dobson's work to surface. I don't quite get how that all developed.

I believe there's a similar pic with Maeve looking straight ahead, but I usually see that in black and white. I don't know why, but it's hard to find Billy/Vanessa photos.

[Contessa Donatella]

Also from this mag:

HOMETOWN HISTORY
    This edition of Hometown History looks at a few of Springfield's most famous families, and their inextricable connections.
    The most prominent family in the Journal files is the Bauers, personified by Bill and Bert Bauer, who moved to Springfield in 1966. Bert was a strong-willed but caring woman. Bill was a genial man with a drinking problem--and then there was Papa, Bert's wise, understanding dad. Bert and Bill's sons, Ed and Mike, became a successful surgeon and attorney, respectively. Mike was the Springfield Chamber of Commerce's Man of the Year in 1977. 
    In the '70s, Alan Spaulding switched Jackie Marler's baby, Phillip (who was secretly Justin's son, given up for adoption), with his wife Elizabeth's stillborn child. When Elizabeth suddenly left for Switzerland in 1981, her friends Jackie and Justin became Phillip's stepparents, but it wasn't until 1983 that Phillip learned Justin and Jackie were his biological parents. He was devastated by Alan and Justin's betrayal.
    The middle-class, struggling Coopers' lives started interlacing with the Spauldings when Harley Cooper married Spaulding scion Alan-Michael in 1989. Several romantic links, including Alan-Michael's marriage to Lucy Cooper in 1996 and Harley wedding Phillip in 2008, fostered the connection between the families, but business united the clans in 2005 when Harley talked her way into becoming CEO of Spaulding Enterprises.
    The machinations of Harley's mother, Nadine, resulted in a battle involving several families in 1994. Bridget Reardon had allowed Vanessa Chamberlain and Billy Lewis to raise Peter (Bridget's son with Hart Jessup), a child which Nadine had tried to pass off as her own. Billy dumped Nadine for her deception--but when Billy was jailed and Vanessa became a single mom, Bridget was inspired to take Peter back. The custody battle involved Peter's grandfather, Roger Thorpe. During a tense trial, Vanessa's change of heart led to the women agreeing on joint custody. Vanessa married Bridget's brother, Matt, the next year.
    On the subject of brothers, we will close this installment of HH as we always do, quoting Rev. Dr. John Ruthledge's poem:
    There is a destiny that makes us brothers
    None goes his way alone
    All that we send into the lives of others
    Comes back into our own.

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The upper two photos are radio casts.

 

[Maxim]

Thank you a million for sharing with us.