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Welcome to the website for The Other House, an independent movie filmed in Athens County, Ohio, and Walpole, New Hampshire, over the summer of 2008. The film has already been shown in Walpole and in Athens, and will be released on DVD soon. Catch the movie at ARTS/West in Athens on Friday, September 17.
Plot Synopsis:
Beautiful nineteen-year-old Ruth, a nursery school teacher, is the daughter of Quakers Peter and Mehitable Holden who had worked on the Underground Railroad in Massachusetts but now live in Augusta, Georgia operating a cotton mill. The year is 1885. After a young man is killed in a duel over belle-of-the-ball Ruth, she is devastated. Her family believes it is best that she flee to Walpole, New Hampshire, the home of her older sister Martha Hooper and Martha's husband Franklin. Before she leaves, Jefferson, an ardent suitor, pledges his love to her.
Ruth soon settles in to life on the farm with her sister's family and the relatives who live in the "other house" headed by the villainous Alonzo Hooper.
Almost immediately, Ruth is smitten by a handsome architect from Boston who is visiting the town, Eliot Windsor. The romance quickly blossoms, but a problem soon emerges when it appears Eliot has claimed a deceased friend's prize-winning architectural plans as his own.
The story weaves amongst colorful characters which include children and elderly aunts and uncles. And in the meantime, Jefferson has not given up his pursuit of the delectable Ruth. The well-grounded, Emerson-reading, concert pianist Martha provides Ruth with stability and reason in her chaotic life. She is called to be the solid rock, since her Type-A husband Franklin is usually away in New York working feverishly to promote his dream of a great museum — what is now the Brooklyn Museum.
The story resolves amidst a plethora of characters and rich detail of nineteenth-century farm life in New England, with a generous dose of Hooper family lore. For this is a story that is based on the actual Holden and Hooper families, though considerable poetic license may have been added, and some of the more dramatic characters, such as Eliot and Alonzo, never existed. It has been recently discovered, however, that the lovely protagonist Ruth may have been based in fact. To read more about the real Ruth Holden, click here.
Written sometime before 1937, the year prolific author Rebecca Hooper Eastman died, the book shines on Martha and Franklin's two children, Rumply and Dana, Rumply being the author at the age of ten. The manuscript was discovered in the 1990s by the author's granddaughter, Amy Abercrombie, who had the book published and produced the movie. This delightful and authentic tale makes stilted ancestors known mostly by formal portraits in oils come to life, and the story is sure to warm every reader's heart.
A full-length movie adaptation of The Other House is in production now, with scenes shot in wide screen in Athens County, Ohio and Walpole, New Hampshire.