Guiding Light 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 before "General Hospital" and the fifth-longest running program in all of broadcast history; only the American country music radio program "Grand Ole Opry" (first broadcast
The Soap Opera Encyclopedia (Schemering book) and characters. Schemering also includes a "Short History of Television Soap Opera," as well as profiles of major performers, writers and producers in the genre in a section entitled "Who's Who in Soap Opera." Finally, the book contains 30 pages of photos from various programs. Published in a time before the internet, the "Encyclopedia" was a primary source of background information and commentary on soap opera; it and Schemering have been quoted in various articles, books and web pages. It was revised and reprinted in 1987 () and 1988. According to the "Encyclopedia", Schemering "spent fifteen years collecting memorabilia and