I can’t think of an earlier divorced couple (or divorced character, for that matter) than Samantha’s parents; can you? (Incidentally, there were moments of chemistry between them that were strangely hot; Endora’s “check out that technique!” line in one episode as Maurice worked a spell and Maurice’s subtle patting of Endora’s backside in another let you know each still carried a torch.)
Were they technically divorced or just living separate lives?
They were not divorced. One ep centered on the threat of him divorcing her. They definitely lead separate lives, though.
Oh, and the Cosmic Interlocutory, or whatever, that he was seeking, would have been a spell, so I assume the marriage was backed by a spell as well.
According to this FAQ, they were just living seperate lives, not actually divorced.
I’ve tried searching for the first divorced characters on a TV show and havn’t hit the right sting of search words yet.
If it wasn’t Samantha’s parents, then perhaps Carol Brady would be the first divorced character. It’s firmly established in the first episode that Mike is a widower, but the whereabouts of Mr. Martin (Carol’s first husband) were never revealed. Sherwood Shwartz wrote the character as being divorced, but network executives objected to this for the same reason that they objected to showing a toilet in the kids’ bathroom (they were idiots).
Of course, if she is divorced, Mr. Martin must have been a pretty rotten guy to have lost parental rights to his kids and have them adopted by his ex’s second husband.
If you don’t consider Carol Brady divorced, then Felix and Oscar from the Odd couple may have been the first officially divorced characters on tv.
I don’t have an answer for this, but I would think a divorce would show up among soap operas long before prime time programs.
Mary Richards on Mary Tyler Moore was written as a divorcee, but network execs were concerned that people would still think of her as Mary Petrie from The Dick Van Dyke Show. Since they didn’t want Ma and Pa Peoria thinking that Mary had left Rob (and even worse, little Richie Rosebud), her broken marriage was changed to a broken engagement. (She would have been the first leading character to have been divorced had they proceeded as planned.)
Thanks for the link; some interesting trivia about the dubbed syndicated versions from the same page:
Une petite nitpique – her character’s name in The Dick Van Dyke Show was Laura, not Mary. It was Mary in The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
Felix and Oscar were married? But they were both men. Oh I get it - not to each other. 
I have a vague memory hee, and can’t find anything immediately to back it up.
After I Love Lucy ended, Lucille Ball came up with Here’s Lucy – essentially the same plots minus the husband. Vivian Vance was still Lucy’s sidekick, but Lucy was a widow and Viv was divorced.
As I said, I can’t verify it right now, but I’m pretty sure she would have been at least the first major character in a sitcom to be divorced.
Ah, yes. Here’s something from The Free Dictionary
The show began with Lucille Ball as Lucy Carmichael, a widow with two children Chris (Candy Moore) and Jerry (Jimmy Garrett), living in Danfield, New York, sharing her home with divorced friend Vivian Bagley (Vance) and her son, Sherman (Ralph Hart).
That’s 1962. Does anyone have anything earlier?
This doesn’t really count, but I remember a plot on one episode of *Leave It to Beaver * that revolved around one of Beaver’s friends having divorced parents. I can’t think of a divorced regular character from before *The Lucy Show * though.