On this day in movie and book history - Mystery House and The Mystery of Hunting's End (both 1938)

Mystery House

directed by Noel M. Smith,

written by Sherman L. Lowe and Robertson White,

based on the novel The Mystery of Hunting's End by Mignon G. Eberhart,

was released in the United States on May 21, 1938.

Music by Howard Jackson.

Cast:

Dick Purcell, Ann Sheridan, Anne Nagel, William Hopper, Anthony Averill, Dennie Moore, Hugh O'Connell, Ben Welden, Sheila Bromley, Elspeth Dudgeon, Anderson Lawler, Trevor Bardette, Jean Benedict, Loia Cheaney, Stuart Holmes, Jack Mower, Paul Panzer, Eric Stanley.

Recommended reading:

The Mystery of Hunting’s End

by Mignon G. Eberhart.

Filmed as Mystery House (1938), directed by Noel M. Smith.

Published by University of Nebraska Press.
First published 1930.
Paperback.

ISBN-10: 0803267371
ISBN-13: 978-0803267374
 
Description:

The Sand Hills of Nebraska, where Mignon G. Eberhart lived as a newlywed, inspired the setting of this 1930 chiller. Smack in the middle of the rolling desolation is Hunting's End, a weekend lodge owned by the rich Kingery family. To that place socialite Matil Kingery invites a strange collection of guests-the same people who were at the lodge when her father died of "heart failure" exactly five years ago. She intends to find out which one of them murdered him. Posing as another guest is the dapper young detective Lance O'Leary. At his recommendation Matil has engaged Nurse Sarah Keate to care for Aunt Lucy Kingery at Hunting's End-not a pleasant assignment, as it turns out. Gathered at the lodge, Matil's guests are shut off from the outside by a November snowstorm. A collie named Jericho mopes around, and a stray cat seems to herald new, clearly unnatural deaths. What a trap to spring on people used to good wine and fresh-cut flowers at dinner! Nurse Keate is the same sharp-eyed, stiletto-tongued, strong-stomached Nightingale and sleuth who was introduced in The Patient in Room 18 and While the Patient Slept. She helped establish Mignon G. Eberhart as a mainstay of the golden age of detective fiction.

On this day in movie history - Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Rebel Without a Cause

directed by Nicholas Ray,

written by Stewart Stern and Irving Shulman,

based on a story by Nicholas Ray,

was released in the United States on October 27, 1955.

Music by Leonard Rosenman.

Cast:

James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo, Jim Backus, Ann Doran, Corey Allen, William Hopper, Rochelle Hudson, Dennis Hopper, Edward Platt, Steffi Sidney, Marietta Canty, Virginia Brissac, Beverly Long, Ian Wolfe, Frank Mazzola, Robert Foulk, Jack Simmons, Tom Bernard, Nick Adams, Jack Grinnage, Clifford Morris, Dorothy Abbott, David Alpert, Jimmy Baird, Paul Birch, Harold Bostwick, Paul Bryar, John Close, Chuck Hamilton, Chuck Hicks, Skipper Huerta, Louise Lane, Nelson Leigh, David McMahon, Edward McNally, Peter Miller, Ralph Moratz, Bruce Noonan, House Peters Jr., Stephanie Pond-Smith, Charles Postal, Nicholas Ray, Gus Schilling, Almira Sessions, Joel Smith, Bert Stevens, Dick Wessel, Robert B. Williams.