Shortly into the soap's brief year-and-a-half run, the Stevenses were wed then written out of the storyline, which was refocused almost solely on the marital problems of the Garretts and the Reynoldses.

Susan Garrett struggled with the knowledge that she was the biological mother of 10-year-old Jerry Karr, who had been adopted years before by Lena Gilroy, an actress.

Meanwhile, the Garretts' neighbor Walter Reynolds saw his marriage unravel as wife Ann, his former model, embarked upon a career as manager of Halstead's, a successful local department store.

Though it rated fairly well for fledgling ABC Daytime, the serial aired directly opposite The Edge of Night, a top-rated soap opera on CBS, and failed to maintain enough of General Hospital's lead-in audience to make it viable.

The final telecast on March 25, 1966 ended with a cliffhanger that would remain forever unresolved, as a despondent Walter, having learned he would go blind from a serious illness, locked himself in his studio with a loaded gun, apparently ready to commit suicide.