Filmed between March 11 and May 15, 1946, with re-takes shot in April 1947, the movie was held back until its nationwide release on February 20, 1948.
The three dollars and twenty-five cents for the roller skates Flavia Mills is admiring in the pawn shop window in 1936 would be the equivalent of fifty-six dollars and forty cents in 2016.
This movie was a major flop at the box-office for MGM, resulting in a loss to the studio of $1,227,000 (nearly $15M in 2022), according to studio records. It made back only about half its negative cost, never mind duplication, distribution and advertising expenses.
Character actor Ray Teal, who would go on to have many roles in Westerns (including Sheriff Roy Coffee on Bonanza (1959)), makes an appearance here as the horseback riding railroad guard.
Flavia's block party speech was taken from President Franklin D. Roosevelt's address to the Young Democratic Club in Baltimore, Maryland on April 13, 1936.