John and Tilly's happy marriage is ruined when Tilly's father finds out about the scandalous past of John's mother. John, unaware of his father-in-law's meddling, thinks Tilly has left him, and he leaves town. Her father leads Tilly to believe that John has died in an accident, and he pushes her to marry someone else.
Beverly Tucker, the daughter of an impoverished aristocratic Southern family, has scraped together her last pennies to put her brother Dal through college in the hope that he will support the family after graduation. However, Dal harbors no such ambition and instead spends his time gambling and drinking in a saloon owned by the town's mayor, Curran. During a raid led by Curran's crusading son Merle, a detective is killed and Dal is accused of the crime.
A dying mother left his child with an old man, but the village people want to take the child away from him because he is too old.
Vidor and Wyeth discuss the influence of The Big Parade on Wyeth and the use of metaphors in art
