Thoughts about "The Doctors" - December 1974

Another month's worth of episodes of "The Doctors" has aired on RetroTV. Below are my thoughts on what has aired for the month of December 1974.

Margo arrived at Toni's after the bridal shower ended. She destroyed the black negligee that Lauri gave as a gift. Margo ended up in the hospital, and died on the operating table. Steve had a surgeon assist him, but we were told there was nothing that could be done. She had an infection from trying to get pregnant again. We found out that she was never going to be able to have a biological child due to a blockage and an infection, though it does make me wonder why this wasn't in her medical records from when she had the miscarriage in Hawaii when Alan was a POW.  After Margo's death, everyone tried to make Alan not feel guilty over what happened with his late wife. Also we saw Matt and Steve discuss the most difficult part of being a doctor losing a patient. Alan left Madison to go bury Margo in Hawaii, while Toni spent Christmas with her son, Martha (who changed her hair color) and the Powers.

Maggie and Greta argued about Mike, but he left Madison and returned to the Far East, his work with corpses and Dawn. (I do wonder how he has money to afford all the plane travel, as a "dead" man, but I digress.) Mike and Dawn seem to like each other, but Dawn didn't understand how Mike could leave without saying anything to his family.

Karen became frustrated when she met a former patient who blamed her for her issues. Karen didn't understand how she could forget how to treat patients. Rolf finally told her some truths about how Karen ended up in that plane with Erich.

Steve played in the touch football game for Billy and Erich. He ended up scoring the only touchdown after falling over his shoelaces, as the game was called for snow. Erich was proud of his Dad, but Steve said he was never doing that again. Carolee was glad that she and Steve and the kids had the holidays together. (Though when Carolee spoke about a past Christmas with Lauri after the holiday, she spoke about 1972, not 1973...as that's when they had Steffy trying to walk.)

Kitty visited with Ann once the quarantine was lifted and made believe she was a coworker of Tommy. Kitty got the scoop, though Matt stopped it from being used in the paper. Ann's lungs were damaged, but she would survive Obanda fever. She had to leave town due to her health, and Nick went with her to Arizona. He convinced Tommy to take over his work at the lab. Nick wanted to still marry Ann, though she wouldn't think of doing that until she was well. Althea and Tommy found Iris, who had been in Florida (Palm Beach, I believe) with her friend, Rex, who wanted to start a Cosmic Force Institute using the money left by Iris's dead South African husband. Rex seemed shady and more interested in the money than anything else. Iris wanted to go to the hospital to get tested, but Rex wanted her all to himself.

Those were the highlights of December 1974. This month there was one missing episode (December 18) and  one preemption (December 31 for New Year's Eve). I enjoyed the Kitty Harris character, as the actress Lynne Rogers was best known in soaps for playing the character of Marie Grant on "Guiding Light" from the mid-50s to early 60s, where nearly every episode was wiped. It was fascinating to finally see someone in action that only pictures remain of her work.