A single New England woman responds to an advertisement by a Midwestern widower in which he asks for a bride to help him raise his two children.

Jacob Witting, a widowed farmer with two small children named Anna and Caleb, puts an ad for a new wife in the paper. It is answered by a spinster named Sarah Wheaton in Maine, who writes letters to them and describes herself as "plain and tall". She takes a trip to the Wittings' farm to see if she can make a difference.—Kathy Li