NED MCCOBB'S DAUGHTER

Sidney Howard's three-actmelodramaopened on 29 November 1926 for 156 performances at the John Golden Theatre in a Theatre Guild production featuring Alfred Lunt in a rare appearance without his wife, Lynn Fontanne. Carrie, daughter of Captain McCobb, marries the philandering George Callahan, who impels McCobb to mortgage his farm for two self-serving purposes, to repay money he has embezzled from a ferry company and to fund his mistress's abortion. Despite this, George is arrested and his brother, Babe, a bootlegger, gives Carrie the money to pay off the mortgage and George's legal expenses if he can keep his illegal alcohol in McCobb's barn. Carrie turns him in to the police and washes her hands of George, choosing an independent future. Critics praised the depiction of Carrie as an enlightened woman and applauded the strongly defined characters typical of Howard's work.Ned McCobb's Daughterwas made into a motion picture in 1928, although it is believed to be lost.