12. Agnes Nixon
There’s a very good chance that you have not heard of Agnes Nixon, but this woman might have had the greatest impact on television, specifically daytime television, of anyone in history. First of all, Nixon created both One Life to Live and All My Children, daytime soap operas that ran for a combined 86 years. No, that’s not a typo. Both shows ran for over 40 years each. In addition to being forever linked to two of the longest running television shows in history, Nixon was also an innovator and boundary pusher for television. She created the first health-related storyline and the first Vietnam storyline. She also wrote in the first lesbian kiss on-screen and the first abortion. At age 93, on April 6, 2016, Nixon died from pneumonia resulting from Parkinson’s disease.
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