Born: 27th May 1926 (as Peter George Derek Ling)
Died: 14th September 2006 (aged 80 years)
Episodes Broadcast: 1968

Peter Ling was born in Thornton Heath, London. He appeared on Radio Luxembourg while still a child and, as a teenager, contributed an article to Good Housekeeping magazine. During the Second World War, Ling was pressed into service as a coal miner, at which time he began taking his writing more seriously. In 1947, he published a novel entitled Voices Offstage, and began selling scripts to BBC Radio. He moved to television in 1950, when he was hired to provide material for the children's show Whirligig. Here he met actress Sheilah Ward; they were married in 1954, and had four children.

During the Fifties, Ling wrote for a variety of programmes such as Into Thin Air, Saturday Special, Mr Papingay's Ship and Dead Giveaway. A rare acting role came on Jim Whittington And His Sealion, which he also wrote. Ling became a script editor for Rediffusion Television, working on programmes such as Murder Bag, and was later made their Head of Children's Series. He also wrote comic strips for the Eagle and Girl, and co-wrote a spin-off novel, Angela Has Wings, with Peter Kay.

In 1964, Ling and Hazel Adair launched the soap success Crossroads

In the early Sixties, Ling contributed episodes of The Avengers, written in collaboration with his wife, and The Roving Reasons. Then, in 1962, he and Hazel Adair created the soap opera Compact, which ran until 1965. An even bigger soap success followed in 1964, when he and Adair launched Crossroads, which would dominate the remainder of his career in television. Nonetheless, Ling also created Champion House, again with Adair, and wrote for Dixon Of Dock Green, Sexton Blake and The Pathfinders, as well as for radio. In 1968, he contributed the surreal Second Doctor story The Mind Robber to Doctor Who. Upon its completion, he discussed another idea, about a land where time ran backward, but this was ultimately abandoned due to its complexity.

In 1982, Ling and Adair worked with Doctor Who producer John Nathan-Turner on a revival of Compact they called Impact. When this failed to materialise, Nathan-Turner offered the pair a Doctor Who story, but “Hex” was ultimately abandoned. An audio adaptation by Paul Finch was eventually released in 2011 by Big Finish Productions, as part of their The Lost Stories range. In 1986, Ling wrote a novelisation of The Mind Robber for Target Books. Crossroads ran until 1988, and was followed by two short-lived revivals. Ling's focus turned to writing novels, starting with the generational saga Crown House in 1988. Sadly, Ling suffered from Alzheimer's disease in later life; he died on September 14th, 2006.