[3] Attempting to build upon its two soap line-up of General Hospital and The Young Marrieds, ABC premiered this rather traditional series about class conflict in the small town of Haviland.
At the time of its debut in December 1964, A Flame in the Wind aired opposite the hugely popular game show Password on CBS, and The Loretta Young Theatre on NBC.
[5] (Just a year before, Phillips had been brought on board by ABC to help develop the hit novel & feature film Peyton Place into a successful prime-time serial.)
The later stories were focused on young love, embodied by the two Skerba sisters, Linda (Barbara Rodell; Jane Elliot) and Jane (Beverly Hayes; Margaret Ladd), battling over the same young man, Steve Reynolds, the son of Kate's former book publisher, Craig Reynolds (Frank Schofield).
Linda, who eventually went to New York, to become an actress, dated her director, Paul Davis (Conard Fowkes); and sensible Jane remained behind in Haviland and married Steve Reynolds (Gordon Gray; Tom Holland).
Which was successful in that it eliminated the class conflict that had been part of the show's first year, and put the Driscolls on the same social footing as the other families of Haviland.