Sky Soap

Sky Soap's logo from 1 August 1995 to 31 October 1997

When Sky Channel relaunched in February 1989 as a UK only service, the daytime schedule was overhauled, and included a block of five back-to-back soaps. The first, starting at 11:30-12:00, from Australia, The Sullivans, which was also still airing on some ITV regions. Next were four American daytime soaps - Another World, which had been airing on the channel since 1987, started at midday; next was General Hospital from 12:55-13:50; after that was As the World Turns at 13:50-14:45 and finally, Loving - the two hour premiere of which was shown on the channels launch evening, on Sunday, 5 February 1989, and continued on Sky Channel from the next Monday in a regular 14:45-15:15 timeslot.[2] A sixth soap opera, another Australian serial, The Young Doctors, was also aired in an early evening slot, 17:00-17:30, before switching to mid- morning after a year.[3] Changing its name to Sky One in July 1989, The Sullivans, General Hospital and As The World Turns were all dropped, and in November 1990, more daytime soaps were added to the line-up, and The Bold and the Beautiful and The Young and the Restless were both inherited from the BSB Galaxy channel.[4] In February 1991, Santa Barbara replaced Loving, which was also broadcast on the ITV network. By 1993, with the addition of Australian soaps E Street and Paradise Beach to the schedules, as well as a daytime repeat run of American primetime series Falcon Crest, the block of daily soap operas on Sky One now stretched from 10:30am through to 3:30pm, so it was decided to spin-off Sky One's American daytime soaps onto a new, dedicated channel. Sky Soap began broadcasting on 3 October 1994[5] from the Astra 1C satellite on weekdays between 8am and 12pm. The original line-up on the channel was: Loving, Peyton Place, Guiding Light, As the World Turns and Another World. Santa Barbara eventually replaced Peyton Place.

The broadcast time was soon changed to between 12pm and 4pm. Classic episodes of British soaps was then added to the line-up, including Emmerdale Farm and Take the High Road. In 1997, the channel moved to Astra 1B and was broadcast between 11am and 4pm. Due to poor viewing figures and failure to outreach with Sky Digital, Sky Soap ceased transmission on 30 April 1999.

• Sky Soap at TVARK
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