Anne Howard Bailey

Who was Anne Howard Bailey?

Anne Howard Bailey was an award-winning American writer known particularly for her work as a screenwriter and opera librettist.

Born and raised in Memphis, Bailey attended Rhodes College where she graduated in 1945 with a Bachelors degree in creative writing. After college she moved to New York City where she began writing for theatre and television. She was a regular contributor to the Armstrong Circle Theatre and Appointment with Adventure during the 1950s and was one of the major writers for National Velvet during the 1960s. Her most successful work as a screenwriter was working as a Head Writer on several different soap operas during the 1980s, including ABC Daytime's General Hospital and NBC Daytime's Days of our Lives. She also created the short-lived 1970s soap opera How to Survive a Marriage. After being fired from Days of Our Lives in 1990, Al Rabin was quoted as saying:

"[Bailey is] a wonderful writer before she got here. She was a wonderful writer here and she will be a wonderful writer in her next project. It's just that the emphasis shifted slightly from romance to adventure. Since we preferred the audience that we had, we will be shifting back."