Medical drama series General Hospital grew out of ITV’s early 1970’s opening out of the daytime schedule for the first time to include drama and entertainment instead of the usual closedown and programmes for school. This same slot also gave us the still running Emmerdale Farm and shorter run series such as Harriet’s Back In Town.
General Hospital (which copied it’s title from a US soap) took us into a large hospital in the Midlands where most of the emphasis was on the personal lives of the doctors and the nurses. After three years on the daytime schedule it was performing well enough to be moved to a prime time evening spot and around the same time changed it’s running time from half hour to an hour and was normally seen at 7.30pm
The show reached its 250th episode on 21st March, 1975 and switched to the hour long format on 18 July 1975.
production details
UK | ITV Network – ATV
RUNNING TIME: 30 minutes and then 60 minutes | NUMBER OF EPISODES: 340 (270 at 30 minutes and 70 at 60 minutes) | AIRDATES: 19 October 1972 – 26 January 1979
PRODUCERS: Ian Fordyce, Royston Morley | THEME MUSIC: Derek Scott
Cast members included:-
DAVID GARTH as Dr Matthew Armstrong
JAMES KERRY as Dr Martin Baxter
LEWIS JONES as Dr William Parker-Brown
MONICA GREY as Sister Edwards
RONALD LEIGH-HUNT as Dr Robert Thorne
TONY ADAMS as Dr Neville Bywater
LYNDA BELLINGHAM as Nurse Hilda Price
JUDY BUXTON as Nurse Katy Shaw
PEGGY SINCLAIR as Sister Helen Chapman
CARMEN MUNROE as Sister Washington
IAN WHITE as Dr Peter Ridge
EPISODES
23. Episode 23 (4 Jan 1973)
24. Episode 24 (5 Jan 1973)
25. Episode 25 (11 Jan 1973)
