Dear Abby is a long running advice column written by Abigail Van Buren, (her real name is Pauline Esther Friedman). She began writing the column in 1956. She approached the editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, (because she thought she could write a better advice column than the one they ran). Her column was very successful and now appears in thousands of newspapers around the world.

Her twin sister later took over the Ann Landers advice column. (Isn't it kind of strange that the 2 top advice columns in the world are written by twin sisters)?

Lately Pauline's daughter Jeanne Phillips has been writing the majority of the columns, and will eventually take over the position of "Dear Abby" full time. A small note, officially the two are currently sharing the job equally, but it appears that Jeanne has basically already taken the whole thing over.