As the World Turns Boned the Fish When...

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As the World Turns (ATWT) is an American television soap opera that airs each weekday on CBS. Set in the fictional town of Oakdale, Illinois, the show debuted on Monday, April 2, 1956 at 1:30pm EST. Before this show (and The Edge of Night, which premiered at 4:30pm EST on the same day), all soaps were fifteen minutes in length; ATWT was the first half-hour serial. At first, viewers did not respond to the new half-hour serial, but ratings picked up in its second year, eventually reaching the top spot in the daytime Nielsen Ratings by the fall of 1958. In 1959, the show started a streak of weekly ratings wins that would not be interrupted for over twelve years. In the year-to-date ratings, As the World Turns was the most-watched daytime drama from 1958 until 1978, with ten million viewers tuning in each day. At its height, core actors such as Helen Wagner, Don MacLaughlin, Don Hastings, and Eileen Fulton became nationally known.