Rex Morgan, M.D. is an American soap opera comic strip, created May 10, 1948 by psychiatrist Dr. Nicholas P. Dallis under the pseudonym Dal Curtis. History The name for the strip was inspired by the real life Rex S. Morgan Sr., the U.S. Army's "chief mortician" and a popular Philadelphia TV personality in the 1960s. The strip's look and content was influenced by the work of Allen Saunders and Ken Ernst on Mary Worth. Initially syndicated by Publishers Syndicate and then by Field Newspaper Syndicate, Rex Morgan, M.D. is now at King Features Syndicate. A 1952 attempt to create a TV series starring Louis Heyward was unsuccessful, with the pilot never shown. Story and characters The story centers on Dr. Rex Morgan, who in 1948 moves to the fictional small town of Glenwood to take over a late friend's practice. Helping him grapple with a dizzying array of medical problems is his old friend's office manager and nurse, June Gale. Morgan and Gale collaborated in resolving the medical and emotional problems of patients and friends over the years. Among their patients was feisty elder Melissa Clairidge, introduced in 1951. Rex's former classmate Keith Cavell was introduced in 1957 and starred in occasional story lines until he was killed off in 1995. Young Dr. Brice Adam sometimes had a story to himself from 1970 to 1978, for example in a situation which saw him taken hostage by two felons who had meningitis. Rex and June married in 1995. They introduced their first child, a daughter named Sarah Ann Morgan, on February 22, 2000. Their second child, Michael Dallis Morgan, was introduced on 29 November 2015, and an adopted child, Johnny, joined the family in 2018. Rex and June now operate their own free clinic. They have a dog named Abbey. The strip has long been praised for its blunt tackling of social issues and taboo subjects, such as drug abuse, domestic violence, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, diabetes, organ transplants, adoption and sexual harassment. The story's constant realism about these issues has led groups such as the Leahy Foundation to use Rex Morgan as a teaching tool. In the case of the Leahy Foundation, the strip has been used to teach their students about epilepsy at Harvard University. Some issues, particularly in the strip's early years, proved too controversial. In 1950, the Newark News refused to run one series in which a nurse tried