The Vanishing Virginian

Women lawyers? Women drivers? Women voters? The Yancey family of Lynchburg, Virginia, grapples with strange new ideas in this endearing film based on Rebecca Yancey Williams' memoir of growing up in the early 1900s. Much more than the suffragette movement upsets the Yanceys' well-ordered lives, from young romance to a sensational murder trial to that amazing contraption the automobile. Frank Morgan (The Wizard of Oz) stars as the Yancey paterfamilias, Lynchburg's principled D.A.; Spring Byington (Little Women) is his gentle wife, much mystified by modern goings-on, and Kathryn Grayson, with her exquisite face and even more exquisite soprano, plays a Yancey daughter in this tender valentine to a bygone era.

THE VANISHING VIRGINIAN was adapted from the autobiographical bestseller by Rebecca Yancey Williams. Newcomer Kathryn Grayson stars as Ms. Williams, a headstrong Southern girl growing up in the early 20th century. Rebecca sets her conservative household on its ear when she joins the woman's suffrage movement, despite the objections of father Frank Morgan, a lifelong civil servant. In the tradition of LIFE WITH FATHER, the film is really about the dad rather than the daughter: his abiding love for his family, his eccentricities, his occasional bullheadedness, and his grudging acceptance of social changes. Intended in part as a showcase for MGM's new young-talent roster, THE VANISHING VIRGINIAN spotlights, in addition to Kathryn Grayson, hopefuls Douglass Newland and Natalie Thompson--who were seldom heard from again.