Guiding Light "Guiding Light" episodes on a two-disc DVD set. Also beginning in June 2012 the series was later released on DVD in Germany beginning with the 1979 episodes. Guiding Light Guiding Light (known as The Guiding Light before 1975) is an American television soap opera. It is listed in "Guinness World Records" as the longest-running drama in television in American history, broadcast on CBS for 57 years from June 30, 1952, until September 18, 2009, overlapping a 19-year broadcast on radio from 1937 to 1956. With its run of 72 years of radio and television, "Guiding Light" is the longest running
Soap opera The first major soap opera hit in Australia was the sex-melodrama "Number 96", a nighttime series produced by Cash Harmon Television for Network Ten, which debuted March 1972. The program dealt with such topics as homosexuality, adultery, drug use, rape-within-marriage and racism, which had rarely been explored on Australian television programs before. The series became famous for its sex scenes and nudity and for its comedic characters, many of whom became cult heroes in Australia. By 1973, "Number 96" had become Australia's highest-rated show. In 1974, the sexed-up antics of "Number 96" prompted the creation of "The Box", which rivaled