Remember my family's Christmas 2020 Film Fest? Well, we wound up including a movie I'd wanted to show my family for a long time. I'd lay odds you haven't heard of it.
But you should.
The movie is from the 1950s. It's called "All Mine to Give," and I've linked to the Wikipedia page because the information is true and fairly complete.
I'd previously only seen it twice in my life.
The first time was Christmas night when I was twelve. It came on fairly late, and I was the only one who stayed up watching it. I saw it a year later, and I never saw it again until last month.
But the back story is even more remarkable than the film. Because, thanks to the magic of the internet, I learned that the story is completely true.
"All Mine to Give" was a movie I wanted to show my kids during our homeschooling days. But it wasn't on VHS, then it wasn't on DVD, and then when it was, copies were $200 - definitely out of our budget.
Last month, we found an affordable version. And so, we watched it.
"Outlander" fans might like this.
The story is about a young couple in the mid-nineteenth century that leaves Scotland to come to Wisconsin to build a new life for themselves. The father works for a logging camp; they live in a cabin; and they have six kids. The mother stresses education and makes sure her kids have the best access to it since she herself can't read.
The youngest boy, Kirk, develops diphtheria, so the father and the other kids are sent to another cabin to live. When Kirk passes the crisis stage, everyone is allowed to return.
Unfortunately, the father has caught the disease and chokes to death on the third night of the illness. That's often how people die of diphtheria. The diseases creates a thick, gray membrane in the throat. It's horrible.
So the oldest boy, Robbie, who just twelve, tries to keep up with his schooling while working part time as an errand boy for the logging company. Then the mother get typhoid and dies on Dec. 23. Right before she dies, she makes Robbie promise that he will be the one to find homes for his siblings since he knows them the best.
Village officials, of course, want to step in. But Robbie persuades them to let the kids stay home together for Christmas, since it will be the last one they will celebrate as a family.
Instead, Robbie draws up a list of potential families that might be good matches for his siblings. And he makes the rounds on Christmas Day, one sibling at a time, hoping to appeal to these families on the holiday to take in a child.
Which they all do.
Then he travels ten miles in the snow through the woods on Christmas night with his baby sister on a sled because a rather unpleasant woman has set her sights on her. He finds a family and leaves her there, heading back to the logging camp afterwards to work and support himself.
What happens to the family after that is nothing short of miraculous. All of them except Kirk, who "took to drink" and died in his twenties, did very well, and Robbie kept in contact with all of them for the rest of their lives.
Robbie himself became a sheriff and experienced more tragedy in his life. But he was well-respected. and loved by his community.
Robbie's son Dale became an editor at Cosmopolitan magazine and a writer of stories and scripts.
Dale wrote a book about his father's experiences called "The Day They Gave Babies Away." The book is out of print and super expensive to buy.
Dale and his wife also wrote and produced "All Mine to Give."
If you'd like to read further, here are some good links:
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