All Mine to Give

All Mine to Give
Directed by Allen Reisner
Produced by Sam Wiesenthal
Written by Dale Eunson (novel)
Screenplay by Katherine Albert
Based on The Day They Gave Babies Away (novel)
Cosmopolitan (1946)
Starring Glynis Johns
Cameron Mitchell
Rex Thompson
Narrated by Rex Thompson
Music by Max Steiner
Cinematography William V. Skall
Edited by Bettie Mosher
Production
company
RKO Radio Pictures
Distributed by Universal-International
Release dates
  • November 13, 1957 (Premiere-Oshkosh, WI)[1]
Running time
 100-103 minutes
Country United States
Language English

All Mine to Give (British title: The Day They Gave Babies Away) is a 1957 Technicolor melodrama film starring Glynis Johns, Cameron Mitchell, and Rex Thompson. When first one parent, then the other dies, six children have to look after themselves in the American west of the mid-19th century.

This story is based on a true-life story set in Wisconsin, based on an article The Day They Gave Babies Away by Dale Eunson and Katherine (Albert) Eunson, which first appeared in the December 1946 issue of Cosmopolitan.[2]

A year later, the story would be published as a book with the same title. Original US TV version The Day They Gave Babies Away, starring Brandon deWilde, aired on the CBS anthology show Climax! on December 22, 1955.

Eunson and his wife Katherine also went on to write the screenplay for the movie adaptation.[3][4]

The exteriors of the film were filmed in Big Bear, California, Idyllwild, California and Mt. Hood, Oregon.

Plot

Robert and Mamie Eunson (Cameron Mitchell and Glynis Johns) are Scots who have just landed in America (the year is 1856), having been invited there by Mamie's uncle. They arrive in the tiny logging village of Eureka, only to be informed that both uncle and his cabin have been incinerated in a house fire. The Eunsons are assisted by the friendly locals in reconstructing the house and Robert takes to tipping timber.

Mamie is heavily pregnant upon their reaching Eureka; she delivers baby Robbie (Rex Thompson) soon after the cabin is completed. Robert eventually starts a successful boat building business and Mamie gives birth to five more children: Jimmy (Stephen Wootton), Kirk (Butch Bernard), Annabelle (Patty McCormack), Elizabeth (Yolanda White), and Jane (Terry Ann Ross). The Eunsons are prospering and happy until little Kirk is diagnosed with diphtheria. Mamie and Kirk are quarantined while Robert takes the other children away. The boy recovers, but the goodbye kiss Kirk gave his Dadda before his departure proves fatal, and Robert succumbs.

Mamie takes to working as a seamstress and Robbie becomes the man of the house. Things stabilize, but only briefly: tired and work-worn, Mamie contracts typhoid. Knowing she will not survive, she charges Robbie, her eldest, with finding good homes for his siblings. After Mamie's death, Robbie places his brothers and sisters with kindly townsfolk as Christmas approaches. Stoic and resigned during the process, he does break down when he is alone and sees the tree outside the homestead where his father had carved the names of the children into the bark. Baby Jane is the last to be handed over — Robbie stands at the door of a house and asks the woman who answers, "Please, ma'am, I was wondering if you'd care to have my sister."

Cast

References

  1. ↑ "All Mine to Give: Detail View". American Film Institute. Retrieved June 2, 2014.
  2. ↑ http://wvls.lib.wi.us/ClarkCounty/clark/news/OldDays/1998_1_7.htm
  3. ↑ All Mine to Give (1958) - Notes - TCM.com
  4. ↑ All Mine to Give (1958) - Articles - TCM.com

External links