Judy Farrell

Judy Farrell ( Hayden; May 11, 1938 – April 2, 2023) was an American actress most noted for her role as Nurse Able on the television comedy series M*A*S*H. She performed small roles in several other television series, then later wrote 13 episodes for the soap opera Port Charles.

Life and career
Judy Hayden was born and raised in Quapaw, Oklahoma. She graduated from Oklahoma State University with a fine arts degree in theater.

While studying for a master's degree at UCLA in 1961, she met actor Mike Farrell. She worked as a high-school English and drama teacher at Laguna Beach High School in Laguna Beach, California. In August 1963, she married Farrell, with whom she subsequently had two children, Erin and Michael. In the 1960s, Farrell and she performed together at the Laguna Playhouse. They divorced in the early 1980s.

The Farrells' marriage was worked into the script of one episode of M*A*S*H: In the episode "The Colonel's Horse," Mike's character B.J. Hunnicutt said his wife Peg (played by Catherine Bergstrom in two onscreen appearances and a few photographs) was from Judy's hometown of Quapaw, and that her father's name was Floyd Hayden. His daughter in the show was also named Erin, as is his real-life daughter.