Pamela is portrayed by actress Victoria Principal, first appearing on the show in the first episode, titled "Digger's Daughter", which was first broadcast on April 2, 1978.

Principal played Pam until the end of season 10 in 1987, when the character crashes her car into a truck carrying butane and propane and her body is severely burned.

[7] After crafting the backstory of the Ewing family, Jacobs began to realize that the show couldn't be settled simply around the character of Pamela.

As Principal explained to TV Guide Network in 2004, "I had left acting to be an agent and was on my way to law school, but when a friend dropped off a Dallas script, I read it.

"[13] Principal landed the role of Pamela Barnes Ewing on the long-running prime time TV soap opera series Dallas that aired on the CBS network from 1978 to 1991.

[14] Patrick Duffy, who would play Pamela's on-screen love, knew the part was ideal for Principal the minute he set his eyes on her.

"[11] Producer Michael Filerman (Knots Landing and Falcon Crest) offered insight, "Principal really wanted that role...and worked very hard to get it.

[15] After appearing in ten of the fourteen seasons of Dallas, Principal indicated that she wished to leave the serial to pursue other venues, and chose not to renew her contract.

[19] In an interview with Digital Spy.com, Cynthia Cidre (the show's executive producer) commented: "Bobby's ex-wife – played by Victoria Principal from 1978 to 1987 – is not currently planned to appear in the revamped soap's second season.

[23] They said, "Victoria Principal could be set to make a shock return to legendary drama series Dallas after stars Patrick Duffy and Jesse Metcalfe let slip producers want her in the show's upcoming reboot.

"[23] In an added piece, they said: "But the storyline was left open-ended, and it's now emerged Principal – who is the only surviving member of the show's original cast not signed up for the relaunch later this year – could be brought back to Dallas in an explosive plot.

"[23] The Staff of Yahoo.com said that Principal was "the one major missing piece" of the new Dallas and made notion that a possible return could potentially happen in the future, critically saying: "The drama.

The couple produced the opening scene of Dallas when the show first aired in 1978, with Bobby bringing his new bride home to meet Jock and Miss Ellie Ewing.

"[32] However, their off-screen relationship significantly improved in the show's third season, with Duffy explaining: "I developed an appreciation for her, and I think for the first time she started to trust me.

In order to create conflict, the producers brought in actors Priscilla Presley (Jenna Wade) and John Beck (Mark Graison) to cause drama for the couple.

When asked about the reception of his characters relationship with Pamela, Beck commented: "It was always set up that way from the beginning, so it was quite a task and of course they came back together in the long run.

[37] After Bobby brings Pam home to Southfork, she is met with great hostility from the Ewing family for being the daughter of their enemy, Digger Barnes (Keenan Wynn, originally David Wayne).

On Digger's deathbed, he tells Pam that she's not his biological child, but born after an affair her mother Rebecca (Priscilla Pointer) had with Hutch McKinney (William Watson).

[41] In soaring spirits, Pam quickly settles into her life as mother to Christopher (Eric Farlow, later Joshua Harris), while Bobby handles the adoption proceedings.

In May 1982, Bobby finally tells Pam about Jeff Faraday (Art Hindle), Kristin Shepard (Mary Crosby) and the fact that J.R. could be Christopher's father.

[35] She then begins a relationship with wealthy businessman Mark Grayson (John Beck), though he soon learns he has a terminal illness and apparently dies in a plane crash.

[44] For the next year, Pam goes on to work at Ewing Oil and runs Bobby's interest in the company, while reestablishing her relationship with Mark Grayson, who had not died as previously thought.

[46] While calling her husband to tell him the good news, she is in a massive auto accident where she hits an oil tanker which explodes and she is severely burned in the subsequent fire.

In the episode "Let Me In", the Ewings discover Rebecca Wentworth left one-third of Barnes Global to her daughter, Pam, which Christopher would inherit in the event of her death.

[48] In the same episode, an agent named Ellis finds a list of deposits made to a Swiss account that mirror the amount in the trust, indicating there is still activity and implying she remains alive.

[49] Her plastic surgeon, David Gordon, explains that she had been horribly burned in her 1987 car accident, and left her family because she didn't want them to see the way she looked.

As if to lead viewers to the conclusion that Pamela would suddenly make a complete recovery in the tradition of her husband Bobby Ewing's (Patrick Duffy) "return from the dead" at the outset of season ten, the ultimate fate of Pamela was left unresolved for several weeks—and further complicated when the poor girl suddenly vanished from her hospital bed.

The Staff of UGO Networks.com said: "Soap Operas are known (and at times hated) for their ridiculously implausible storylines, and while '80s primetime suddser Dallas is still one of our favorite guilty pleasures, even the great Ewing empire is not immune to the absurd storytelling techniques the genre has become associated with.

While your average primetime soap operas don't usually mingle with the stuff of sci-fi and horror, there's an incredibly high rate of characters returning from the dead in the genre.

Presumed dead after being run over by his sister-in-law, Katherine Wentworth, who also happened to be obsessed with him, fans (and CBS) had to do without Patrick Duffy, and even worse, ratings, for one whole season.