For the early years, I am continuing with the anniversary-based chronology we have been using. Since March 26, 1978 was a Sunday, the sixth broadcast year begins on Monday, March 27.
Original U.S. run: March 27, 1978 – March 23, 1979
This is an especially important season historically: Nikki Reed and Paul Williams enter the canvas, Leslie gives birth to Brooks, Jill marries Stuart, and the Katherine/Derek/Suzanne story becomes increasingly gothic.
Episode count
Unlike modern Y&R, CBS does not provide a reliable public season-by-season catalogue for 1978–79. We know that #1488 aired January 29, 1979, and Y&R was airing normally on both March 27, 1978 and March 23, 1979. (IMDb)
For the moment, I would record:
Approximately 255 episodes
I would not assign a definitive global episode range yet, because I have not found archival evidence strong enough to establish both endpoints.
Complete principal and recurring cast
| Character | Actor |
|---|---|
| Stuart Brooks | Robert Colbert |
| Leslie Brooks Prentiss | Victoria Mallory |
| Lorie Brooks Prentiss | Jaime Lyn Bauer |
| Chris Brooks Foster | Trish Stewart |
| Peggy Brooks | Pamela Peters Solow |
| Liz Foster | Julianna McCarthy |
| Snapper Foster | David Hasselhoff |
| Greg Foster | Wings Hauser |
| Jill Foster | Brenda Dickson |
| Katherine Chancellor | Jeanne Cooper |
| Brock Reynolds | Beau Kazer |
| Phillip Foster / Phillip Chancellor III | child performer(s) |
| Lance Prentiss | John McCook |
| Lorie Prentiss | Jaime Lyn Bauer |
| Vanessa Prentiss | K.T. Stevens |
| Lucas Prentiss | Tom Ligon |
| Brooks Prentiss | infant performer(s) — from 1979 |
| Derek Thurston | Joe LaDue |
| Casey Reed | Roberta Leighton |
| Nikki Reed | Erica Hope → Melody Thomas Scott |
| Paul Williams | Doug Davidson |
| Suzanne Lynch | Ellen Weston |
The surviving 1978 cast list independently confirms Brenda Dickson, Julianna McCarthy, Wings Hauser, David Hasselhoff, Jeanne Cooper, Beau Kazer, Robert Colbert, Trish Stewart, Jaime Lyn Bauer, Victoria Mallory, Pamela Peters Solow, John McCook, K.T. Stevens, Tom Ligon, Joe LaDue, Roberta Leighton, Erica Hope and Doug Davidson. (Jackson Dynasty)
CBS 1978 cast photography
I have found genuine CBS Photo Archive material from 1978, including photographs of Tom Ligon as Lucas and Victoria Mallory as Leslie, but I have not found a CBS source that definitively identifies a particular ensemble photograph as the official “Season 6 cast photo.” Getty does, however, catalogue 1978 CBS publicity photographs of the cast and characters. (Getty Images)
So I would label the image in our archive:
1978 CBS promotional cast photography
Major plots
Leslie, Lance and Lucas — the pregnancy secret
One of Season 6’s most important stories centers on the Prentiss brothers and Leslie.
Leslie has feelings for Lance, who is married to her sister Lorie. Leslie becomes pregnant with Lance’s child.
Rather than destroy Lorie’s marriage, Leslie conceals the truth.
Lucas Prentiss, who genuinely loves Leslie, agrees to protect her and the unborn child. Leslie gradually develops affection for him and marries him. Contemporary character histories consistently identify Lucas as Leslie’s husband and Lance as the biological father of her son. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
The resulting secret is explosive:
Lance Prentiss = biological father
Leslie Brooks = mother
Lucas Prentiss = legal/social father
Brooks Prentiss is born
Leslie goes into labor on:
January 29, 1979 — Episode #1488
The surviving episode synopsis explicitly states that Leslie is in labor on that date. (IMDb)
By February 26, 1979, Leslie has named the baby:
Brooks Lucas Prentiss
and Vanessa already knows that Lance—not Lucas—is the child’s biological father. (TVGuide.com)
I have not found sufficiently strong archival evidence to distinguish whether the actual delivery aired January 29 or immediately afterward, so for our chronology I would record:
Brooks Prentiss — born January 29/30, 1979 (delivery sequence)
rather than inventing a more precise date.
Vanessa knows the truth
Vanessa becomes central to the secret.
She realizes that Leslie’s baby is actually Lance’s son.
By February 26, 1979, Vanessa is actively trying to get Lance close enough to Leslie and the baby to realize the truth himself. (TVGuide.com)
Lorie, meanwhile, remains unaware that the child she sees as her nephew is actually her husband’s biological son.
This secret will become one of the major forces destroying the Prentiss marriages.
Casey Reed enters the story
Dr. Casey Reed — Roberta Leighton
First appearance: March 20, 1978
Casey technically debuts one week before our Season 6 boundary, so she is not a Season 6 newcomer under our chronology, even though virtually her entire first major storyline belongs to Season 6. Her March 20 debut is unusually well documented. (Wikipédia)
Casey joins Snapper’s medical clinic.
Snapper and Chris are separated, and Snapper becomes attracted to his new colleague.
Casey reciprocates but has a profound fear of sexual intimacy.
Her younger sister soon becomes another major concern:
Nikki Reed.
Nikki Reed arrives
Nikki Reed — Erica Hope
Here we encounter a genuine archival discrepancy.
The most detailed Nikki character chronology gives:
First appearance: May 11, 1978. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
Another retrospective database gives February 27, 1978, but that conflicts with the better-documented Erica Hope run beginning May 11. (Jackson Dynasty)
For our chronology I recommend using:
Nikki Reed — first appearance: May 11, 1978
Original actress: Erica Hope
That places Nikki’s introduction firmly in Season 6.
Erica Hope plays Nikki as a rebellious, sexually adventurous teenager who causes constant anxiety for the more responsible Casey. Hope’s documented run lasts from May 11, 1978 to February 19, 1979. (Wikipédia)
Paul Williams arrives
The other enormously important introduction is:
Paul Williams — Doug Davidson
First appearance: May 23, 1978
Doug Davidson was hired earlier in May, and his first episode aired May 23, 1978. (Wikipédia)
Paul is initially nothing like the responsible police detective viewers would later know.
He enters as a teenage bad boy, becoming romantically and sexually involved with Nikki.
This makes Season 6 historically important: two characters who will still be fundamental to Y&R decades later—Nikki and Paul—enter within days of each other.
Nikki and Paul
Nikki and Paul begin a volatile teenage romance.
Paul’s early characterization is deliberately rougher and more irresponsible than his later persona.
Their sexual relationship eventually has consequences: Paul infects Nikki with gonorrhea. Historical character accounts consistently identify the sexually transmitted infection as the event that helps destroy their early relationship. (Wikipédia)
The relationship continues into the following period, so not every part of the Nikki/Paul story should be compressed into Season 6.
Nikki is recast — a major historical recast
This is the biggest recast of Season 6.
Nikki Reed
Erica Hope — May 11, 1978 – February 19, 1979
↓
Melody Thomas Scott
First appearance: February 20, 1979
Melody Thomas Scott assumes the role and ultimately makes Nikki one of Y&R’s defining characters. The dates are particularly well documented: Erica Hope played Nikki through February 19, with Scott beginning February 20, 1979. (Wikipédia)
Is it a SORAS?
Not really.
Nikki remains essentially the same teenage/young-adult character. This is a straight recast, not a classic child-to-adult SORAS.
Jill seduces Stuart
Jill abandons her hopes of immediately securing Derek and turns her attention to:
Stuart Brooks.
The complication is enormous:
Stuart is in love with Jill’s mother, Liz.
Jill wants financial security for herself and Phillip and aggressively pursues the wealthy newspaper publisher.
Eventually she sleeps with Stuart and claims to be pregnant.
The pregnancy is:
fake. (Jackson Dynasty)
Jill marries Stuart
The storyline reaches its climax in early 1979.
On January 29, 1979 (#1488), Liz learns that Stuart and Jill plan to marry, while Jill privately realizes that she still wants Derek. (IMDb)
Jill nevertheless proceeds with Stuart.
Jill Foster & Stuart Brooks
Marriage: early 1979
Jill has effectively trapped Stuart with her false pregnancy.
Her plan eventually collapses when she falls down a staircase. Stuart asks the doctor whether the fall has harmed the baby.
The doctor reveals:
Jill was never pregnant.
Stuart realizes he has been deceived and seeks to end the marriage. (Soap Hub)
Katherine, Derek and Suzanne
The Katherine/Derek/Jill triangle becomes increasingly bizarre.
Katherine has succeeded in keeping Derek with her, but a woman from his past arrives:
Suzanne Lynch — Ellen Weston
First appearance: 1978
Suzanne is Derek’s former wife and the mother of his son Jamie.
She wants Derek back. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
Suzanne befriends Katherine while secretly plotting against her.
Suzanne drugs Katherine
Suzanne gives Katherine candy laced with a mind-altering drug.
Katherine’s increasingly bizarre behavior convinces Derek that she is mentally unstable.
She is eventually committed to a sanitarium.
Suzanne continues sending the drugged candy there.
Katherine’s roommate eats some and becomes psychotic.
She starts a fire.
The roommate dies and her body is burned beyond recognition. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
Katherine fakes her death
Katherine realizes Suzanne has been drugging her.
She sees an opportunity in the sanitarium fire.
Katherine places her ring on the dead woman’s body, allowing everyone to conclude:
Katherine Chancellor is dead.
But she is alive.
Katherine then begins secretly “haunting” Suzanne, appearing around the Chancellor estate and driving her toward a breakdown. (Jackson Dynasty)
This storyline straddles late Season 6 and the following season, so the eventual Katherine/Jill/Derek wedding confrontation should not all be placed prematurely into Season 6.
Leslie and Lucas
Lucas genuinely loves Leslie despite knowing that her feelings are complicated by Lance.
Leslie accepts his proposal and they marry. (Jackson Dynasty)
However, the marriage is founded on an enormous secret: Lucas is raising his brother’s biological child as his own.
This becomes even more dangerous once Vanessa recognizes the truth.
Recasts & SORAS
Nikki Reed
Erica Hope → Melody Thomas Scott
February 20, 1979
This is the season’s most important recast. (Wikipédia)
Classification: recast, not a major SORAS.
Greg Foster
By Season 6, Wings Hauser is established as Greg following the James Houghton/Brian Kerwin transitions of the previous period. (Jackson Dynasty)
Leslie Brooks
Victoria Mallory remains Leslie throughout Season 6. CBS’s own 1978 publicity material explicitly identifies Mallory as Janice Lynde’s replacement. (Wikimedia Commons)
Major SORAS
None.
Phillip Foster remains a child, while Brooks Prentiss is born during the season.
Births
Brooks Lucas Prentiss
Birth sequence: January 29–30, 1979
Mother: Leslie Brooks
Biological father: Lance Prentiss
Legal/social father: Lucas Prentiss
Leslie is explicitly in labor on January 29 (#1488), and Brooks has been born and named by February 26. (IMDb)
Major births: 1 — Brooks Prentiss.
New characters
Nikki Reed — Erica Hope
May 11, 1978 — recommended archival date. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
Paul Williams — Doug Davidson
May 23, 1978. (Wikipédia)
Suzanne Lynch — Ellen Weston
1978. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
Brooks Prentiss
January 1979 — born on screen.
Casey Reed — Roberta Leighton
March 20, 1978, so technically not a Season 6 newcomer under our March 27 boundary. She belongs in the Season 6 cast, but her debut belongs to the final week of Season 5. (Wikipédia)
This is an important correction to my previous Season 5 sheet: Casey should have appeared there under “New Characters,” even though only her first week falls inside Season 5.
Character departures
Erica Hope as Nikki Reed
February 19, 1979
Actor departure only; Nikki remains and is immediately recast with Melody Thomas Scott. (Wikipédia)
Katherine Chancellor
Katherine is presumed dead, but this is not a genuine character departure or death.
Jeanne Cooper remains part of the story as Katherine secretly manipulates Suzanne.
I have not found evidence for another major permanent core-character departure that can be securely placed inside the exact March 27, 1978–March 23, 1979 window.
Returning characters
Season 6 is primarily an expansion season, bringing in the Reeds and Williams orbit rather than reviving long-absent characters.
I therefore have no major returning former regular that I can securely document within this precise season window.
Marriages
Katherine Chancellor & Derek Thurston
1978
The historical marriage index records Katherine and Derek’s marriage beginning in 1978. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
The circumstances are characteristically Katherine: Derek is manipulated into signing what turns out to be a marriage license. A Y&R 50th-anniversary retrospective specifically dates Katherine’s trick marriage to Derek to 1978. (Zinio)
Leslie Brooks & Lucas Prentiss
Leslie marries Lucas, who agrees to raise her unborn child despite the fact that Lance is the biological father. (Jackson Dynasty)
Some marriage databases place the marriage in late 1977, however, so I would not claim a precise Season 6 wedding date without an archival episode. The marriage itself is unquestionably in force during Season 6.
Jill Foster & Stuart Brooks
Early 1979
Jill marries Stuart after claiming to be pregnant. By January 29, 1979, the wedding plans are explicit, and subsequent contemporary chronology places the marriage shortly afterward. (IMDb)
Deaths
There is an important distinction here.
Katherine Chancellor — presumed dead
Katherine is believed to have died in the sanitarium fire.
She did not die.
The actual victim is Katherine’s unnamed/secondary roommate, whose burned body is mistaken for Katherine’s after Katherine puts her ring on the corpse. (Les jeunes et les indomptés)
Therefore:
Major regular-character deaths: 0
The death of Katherine’s roommate can be recorded as a supporting-character death, but Katherine herself must never be listed as deceased.
Season 6 at a glance
| Y&R — SEASON 6 | |
|---|---|
| Dates | March 27, 1978 – March 23, 1979 |
| Episodes | ≈255 — exact global range not yet securely established |
| Major newcomers | Nikki Reed, Paul Williams, Suzanne Lynch |
| Just before season boundary | Casey Reed — March 20, 1978 |
| Major recast | Nikki: Erica Hope → Melody Thomas Scott — February 20, 1979 |
| Major SORAS | None |
| Major birth | Brooks Prentiss — January 1979 |
| Major marriages | Katherine/Derek; Jill/Stuart |
| Existing marriage central to plot | Leslie/Lucas |
| Major regular deaths | 0 |
| Presumed death | Katherine Chancellor — actually alive |
| Main Brooks/Prentiss plot | Leslie’s pregnancy; Lance is Brooks’s biological father |
| Main Foster/Brooks plot | Jill traps Stuart with a fake pregnancy |
| Main Chancellor plot | Katherine/Derek/Jill/Suzanne |
| Historic introductions | Nikki Reed and Paul Williams |
One chronology point is particularly important going forward: Casey Reed actually debuted on March 20, 1978, seven days before our Season 6 boundary, while Nikki’s best-supported debut is May 11 and Paul’s is May 23. So Casey belongs among the very last Season 5 introductions, while Nikki and Paul are genuine Season 6 introductions. (Wikipédia)
Newlyweds Lance and Lorie quickly sped through the honeymoon stage of their marriage and found themselves saddled with a major problem. Surprisingly, it wasn’t Vanessa and her jealous feelings towards Lorie. Instead, it Lance’s wayward brother, Lucas, who had a talent for stirring up trouble and an eye for the ladies. He showed up unannounced on their doorstep one day and immediately began creating havoc.
Meanwhile, Lorie attempted to build a relationship with Vanessa and even suggested that she have facial surgery for her burns. Vanessa, however, wasn’t interested in accepting Lorie as her daughter in-law, despite Lorie’s interest in correcting her disfigurement. When Vanessa discovered that Lorie’s new novel, “In my Sister’s Shadow,” chronicled her sister Leslie’s nervous breakdown, she seized upon the opportunity to undermine Lorie. While Lorie was promoting her book, word leaked out, thanks to Vanessa, that it was actually an autobiographical account of her troubled relationship with her sister, Leslie. Soon after, Leslie, who was on a grueling concert tour, found herself hounded by reporters anxiously seeking tawdry details about her nervous breakdown. Leslie became so upset at being hurled into the frenzied media’s harsh spotlight that she nearly suffered a second breakdown. When Lance heard what Lorie had done, he lashed out at her and then flew to meet Leslie and lend her emotional support. Leslie’s family was also concerned for her well being. Leslie decided to cancel her tour, but with Lance’s support, she slowly regained her confidence and resumed performing.
One evening, after a successful performance, Lance and Leslie returned to her hotel suite, where they ended up making love. The following morning, Leslie felt so guilty about their one night encounter that she encouraged Lance to patch things up with Lorie. Soon after, Leslie discovered their lone night of lovemaking had left her pregnant. Rather than risk destroying Lance and Lorie’s marriage, Leslie didn’t tell Lance that she was pregnant with his baby. Lucas, who had fallen in love with Leslie, because of her kind nature, sympathized with the position she was in and proposed marriage. Leslie appreciated Lucas’s concern for her and gradually developed feelings for him. She accepted his proposal and they married.
Jill gave up her hopes of winning back Derek and orchestrated an elaborate campaign to seduce her mother’s boyfriend, Stuart Brooks. Jill didn’t care that Stuart was already romantically involved with her mom, Liz, because Jill was primarily driven by a desire to provide her son, Phillip, with financial security. Initially, Stuart resisted Jill’s advances. But when Jill stepped up her efforts, Stuart eventually spent a weekend in Vegas with her. Soon after, in a sly attempt to trap Stuart into marrying her, Jill announced that she was pregnant. Stuart agreed to marry Jill, even though he was in love with Liz, who was heartbroken by the news. Shortly after the marriage, Jill accidentally tumbled down a flight of stairs. At the hospital, Stuart questioned Jill’s doctor about the impact the accident would have on Jill’s pregnancy. Bewildered, the doctor announced that Jill wasn’t pregnant. With Jill recuperating in a nearby hospital bed, Stuart suddenly realized that she had conned him into marrying him. When Stuart told Jill that he wanted a divorce, Jill refused.
Derek’s ex-wife Suzanne Lynch arrived in Genoa City, determined to win him back. She pretended to befriend Katherine and then supplied her with candy that was laced with a mind-altering drug. When Katherine began acting bizarre, Derek committed her to a sanitarium. Suzanne continued her dastardly scheme by sending a box of the candy to Katherine at the sanitarium. Katherine’s roommate ate some of the candy and, in a psychotic state, set fire to their room. Katherine’s roommate died in the fire and her body was burned beyond recognition. It dawned on Katherine that she had been set up by Suzanne. Thinking quickly, Katherine devised a scheme to punish Suzanne. Katherine slipped her wedding ring onto the corpse’s finger and led everyone to believe that she had died in the fire. Then, Katherine began “haunting” Suzanne. It seemed that everywhere Suzanne turned in the Chancellor mansion, she saw Katherine. Feeling tormented by what she had done to Katherine, Suzanne went temporarily insane and repented her actions. With Suzanne and Katherine both out of the picture, Jill realized that Derek was free to marry her. She hastily divorced Stuart and arranged to marry Derek. Soon after, Jill and Derek had a surprise guest at their wedding–Katherine.
Meanwhile, Stuart and Liz married. Jill found herself without a man or financial support. And Liz, who had supported herself as a housekeeper, found it difficult to adjust to her new life as the wife of a successful newspaper publisher.
Separated from Chris, Snapper fell for Casey, a fellow doctor who worked at the clinic with him. Their relationship was troubled from the start because Casey suffered from a fear of sex. She was also worried about her kid sister, Nikki, who was a promiscuous teenager. When Nikki and Casey’s mother were killed in a car crash, their father, Nick, returned to Genoa City. Seeing her father again, Casey suddenly remembered a traumatic incident that had been buried deep in her subconscious. When she was a child, Nick raped her. When Casey, accompanied by her friend Brock, went to confront Nick, he was in the process of trying to rape Nikki. During Nikki’s struggle to defend herself, she accidentally killed her father
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