Plot Summary

Charles Farrell (who starred in virtually all the Frank Borzage high-art films) plays Lem Tustine, a Minnesota wheat-farmer's son who has been sent to the big city to sell the year's crop. He meets and falls in love with a lonely waitress (Mary Duncan) and takes her home to the folks. Upon their arrival, Kate discovers that Lem is controlled by his domineering father (David Torrence), who rejects her as a gold-digger from before the moment he meets her. Lem and Kate's relationship further crumbles when a band of rowdy laborers (led by Richard Alexander) arrive to harvest the crop, and begin flirting with the worldly woman whom fate has dropped onto the joyless farm. An approaching hailstorm pushes the workers to their physical limits, and puts an emotional strain on the Tustine family that seems destined to break them apart or, possibly, bind them together.