A gorilla escapes from its master on a ship, breaks into a young woman's home, and kills her. The woman's fiancé, Jim, who had visited earlier, is framed for the murder by the police.
The widowed elderly mother of three adult children, two sons and a daughter, wishing to relieve herself of the burden of care of her property, decides to divide it up among her children.
John Holland, a planter in a small way, is devotedly attached to his wife and infant child. The wife wearies of the monotonous grind of farm life and is easy prey of a contemptible villain, in the person of Tom Roland, the ubiquitous "other man".
A woman who is filled with romantic ideas is making no secret of her eagerness to find a husband. Her father decides to help her by pressuring and threatening an eligible bachelor, who reluctantly allows wedding plans to be made.
A boy takes pictures of everything, including some embarrassing situations. When he projects the pictures on a wall for everyone to see, his father spanks him and smashes the camera.