Barnabetta Dreary's grim life of slaving for her Pennsylvania Dutch father Barnaby and her two brothers, is surprisingly changed when Barnaby marries Juliet Miller. Known as Erstwhile Susan, she becomes fond of Barnabetta, and because she retains control of her fortune, induces the other Drearys to relieve Barnabetta of some of her drudgery.

An unhappily married woman is caught up in scandal and murder when her affection toward a young man is misinterpreted.

An expose of the methods used by a police-department to extract a confession from a suspect, regardless of innocence or guilt, and the effect and consequences on a family when an innocent member breaks under the interrogation methods and confesses to a crime he did not commit.

Virginia Perry, a former movie star, leaves her family and returns to Hollywood to make a comeback, but age has taken its toll and she is cast in small character roles. Meanwhile, her daughter, Betty Ann, has won a beauty contest, and heads for Hollywood. They end up in the same, film, with Mom playing her Mom. Marshall tries to take advantage of the naive Betty. Somebody gets shot. Somebody is put on trial.

Ralph Brooks, although engaged to Julia Dean, meets and becomes infatuated with Rita Reynolds. She gains his sympathy by telling untrue stories of her husband's brutality. They plan to run away together but while Rita is taking a large sum of money from her husband's safe, he returns early from a business trip and a fight ensues which results in her husband's death.

A variety of broad-painted and unlikely characters are trapped in an underground café when a Mississippi River levee breaks and causes flood havoc above and below.

Wall Street financier Frederick Searles goes bankrupt, prompting his mercenary wife to marry their eldest daughter Needa to the wealthy, disreputable John Davis Warren, despite Needa's love for Hugh Stanton.

A widow has married rich, but didn't tell her husband about her son. And he's coming for a surprise visit. To hide his identity he is introduced as the husband's new valet, but still the husband has some doubts about a few strange scenes. And during the night, when the son tries to visit his mother, the husband always starts interfering, but the new maid also behaves strangely, trying to sneak into the husband's room...

Policeman Edgar Kennedy is told by his chief he better stop a string of burglaries that have been happening on his watch or else he will get the sack. He persuades vagrants Stan and Ollie to rob the chief's house so he can regain his reputation by catching them. The policeman promises to later get the boys off. Things do not go as planned.

A nobleman vows to avenge the death of his father by the hands of pirates. To this end, he infiltrates the pirate band; Acting in character, he single-handedly captures a merchant vessel, but things are complicated when he finds that there is a beautiful young woman of royal blood aboard.