In the early Eighties, the blue-collar Brady family crossed social boundaries at every turn and brought new excitement to Salem. First to be introduced was police detective Roman Brady,
assigned to protect Dr. Marlena Evans who had become the target of the Salem Strangler. 
Roman's estranged wife, Anna, and their daughter Carrie,
returned to town in 1982 just in time to put a snag in Roman and Marlena's budding romance. Once divorced from Roman, Anna strengthened her ties to the powerful but criminal DiMera family. Anna 
eventually married, then divorced, Tony DiMera before leaving Salem to continue globetrotting. Roman and Marlena married, raised Carrie, and had twins, Samantha and Eric.
Roman's parents, former sailor Shawn and more refined Caroline,turned their fish market into a pub. They raised Roman's siblings Bo,
Kimberly 
and Kayla. 
Each of their brood has been involved in crime-fighting. Because of Roman's law enforcement career, he and Marlena became early DiMera targets and frequent abductees. At one point, (from late 1984-86) Roman, presumed dead, was held captive by Stefano DiMera. Roman seemed to return in 1986, but in 1991, it turned out that the man everyone, including his wife Marlena, thought to be Roman was really John Black. John was innocent of any fraud since he, to this day, does not recall his past. In fact, the little John has learned is from the clues, records and tales of others.
The real Roman picked up his crime-fighting career in Salem, accepted John as a close friend and rebuilt his home life. However, when baby Belle,
born in 1993, turned out to be fathered by John, Roman divorced Marlena and left Salem.
Troubled sister Kimberly is an incest victim (her uncle Eric molested her) and prostitute who worked undercover for the ISA. Later, she had several mental problems including hysterical blindness and a multiple personality disorder. Still, she was a feisty crime-fighter, helping to capture the Riverfront Knifer and unravel several Kiriakis crimes. Kimberly's relationship with ISA agent Shane Donovan, a friend of her brother Roman, was always mercurial. Kimberly had a penchant for shooting people, including her brother Roman who survived after brain surgery. She had also accidentally shot her ex-husband Shane, the father of her two children, Andrew Shawn 
and Jeannie.
Shane was paralyzed for about a year, during which time Kimberly found work in Los Angeles and a fiancee, Phillip Collier. When Kimberly returned in early 1992, she was hit by a car. This shocked Shane into taking his first steps. After he regained use of his legs, Shane went off on a daring ISA mission in Europe. Kimberly's film producer fianceé Phillip stood by her during her split personality therapy and her trial for killing a would-be attacker. However, they postponed the wedding and left Salem later the same year. Occasionally, Kimberly returns to Salem for family events, such as the recently canceled remarriage of her brother Bo to Hope
In 1986, Kayla Brady returned to Salem after healing a heart broken by commitment-fearful Chris Kostichek a few years earlier. While working at a medical clinic on the river front, Kayla met Steve "Patch" Johnson, who was an ex-Merchant Marine buddy of her brother, Bo. Kayla married Patch's brother, Jack Devereaux, out of sympathy for his illness, but very quickly learned that was a mistake. While later married to Steve, the couple had a baby girl, Stephanie Kay,
who was kidnapped while Kayla was in prison, wrongly found guilty of murdering Steve s first wife, Marina Toscano. The couple retrieved their child, but Steve was murdered a short time later, in 1990. Kayla grew close to Shane Donovan while working with him, but she left for a job in Los Angeles just before Kimberly came back to town in 1992.
Rebellious, motorcycle-riding Bo Brady was raised by Shawn, but it turned out that he was Caroline's son by a brief affair with Victor Kiriakis. That seemed to explain some of the instinctual tension between Shawn and Bo over the years. They eventually reconciled. Regarding Kiriakis, Bo was more interested in undoing Victor's crime dealings than being a son to him. Vicor eventually disowned Bo, claiming he had already been sterile at the time of Bo's conception. Bo's love affair and eventual marriage to Hope Williams, a Horton grandchild in 1985, united blue and white collar families in a wedding event financed by a Royal Family in England. One of Bo and Hope's many crime-busting adventures, capturing the monarch-killing Dragon, earned them that reward. The couple had some ups and downs during Bo's Kiriakis association, and Hope miscarried their first child. However, the couple had a son,Shawn-Douglas
in 1987 shortly before they took off for a world tour aboard their boat, Fancy Face.
When they returned, Bo and Hope got caught up in a crime misadventure that took Hope from Bo, he believed, forever. In 1991, Hope appeared to go up in a fiery explosion over a vat of acid in a trap set up by Orpheus, Roman Brady s revenge seeking ex-ISA partner. After a period of mourning, Bo cautiously opened his heart to Dr. Carly Manning. However, after interference from Victor Kiriakis, who had also fallen for the attractive doctor, and Lawrence Alamain, her once betrothed and the father of her son Nikki, and the trauma of being buried alive by Vivian, Carly had enough of Salem. She opted to go to Europe with Lawrence and Nikki in 1993, leaving Bo to grow closer to Salem newcomer, Billie Reed.
The love Bo shared with Billie had the same exciting chemistry as the relationship he had with Hope. But Hope was gone. Billie found a treasured place in Bo's heart as he watched her growing courage and strength when she gave up drugs, her old life of prostitution, and faced charges for killing Curtis Reed, her abusive father. With Bo's loving guidance, Billie earned her high school diploma, developed self-confidence and started her own line of cosmetics. Billie faced, and overcame, every challenge that came her way. Even when a Hope-look-alike named Gina entered their lives on the night Bo proposed marriage, Billie's love and devotion never flinched. Then it turned out that Gina was, indeed, Hope, the mother of Bo's son and his first wife.
In a self-sacrificing move, Billie left Salem to clear the way for Bo to delve through his emotions, dreams and goals. As fate would have it, Billie was called back to Salem on business just as Hope and Bo planned their remarriage. On the big day, Hope found Bo with Billie and misunderstood their compromising position at the Horton cabin. The wedding was abruptly called off and mysterious Franco Kelly seems to have scored points with his anonymous employer who wants to cause Bo Brady trouble. Clearly, however, any one of the Brady family can handle that.