Loretta Young was originally cast as Mary but was forced to leave the production because of ill health before shooting began.
"Screen Director's Playhouse" broadcast a 30 minute radio adaptation of the movie on January 6, 1950 with James Stewart reprising his film role.
This movie came out nearly a year after Donald Meek's death. The popular supporting actor died of leukemia on Nov. 18, 1946. Meek was born in Scotland and acted several years on Broadway before becoming a prominent supporting actor on the silver screen.
While inspired by the Middletown Studies of 1924 and 1937, the movie's public opinion plot bears no similarity to those research studies by sociologists Robert and Helen Lynd. Their research was the study of "the interwoven trends that are the life of a small American city." The Rockefeller Institute of Social and Religious Research funded the Lynd research projects. A 1929 book by the Lynd's reported their findings in "Middletown: A Study in Contemporary American Culture."