Four hours by boat from the lightship Elbe 1 is the southern entrance and lock of the Kiel Canal. There, in Brunsbüttelkoog, is a seamen's home run by Klara Andresen. This is the main setting of the movie. In the sailors' wives' home, the wives of sailors wait for their return. Klara Andresen not only looks after the concerns of the waiting sailors' wives, but also her brother-in-law Gustav Andresen . Gustav has gone to sea as a ship's cook and now wants to get married. That's why he has placed a marriage announcement and is waiting for the reactions.

Father Scherzer generally buries himself in the books of the castle library, which he is responsible for managing. He is a warm-hearted but somewhat overwhelmed father to his five daughters, ranging from a preschooler to two teenage girls to a successful press photographer who flirts with a dashing dentist. While he is trying to sell the castle to an overbearing American millionaire, the housekeeper quits, and the youth welfare office insists on discipline and order in the five-girl household.

Emil's reputation for being a troublemaker makes the Svensson family's neighbours take up a collection for sending the boy off to America. But even if he among other unfortunate mishaps causes his father to get stuck in the outhouse window and get bitten by crawfish, all is forgotten when he skillfully wins the family a free horse. And when Alfred the farmhand gets seriously ill, Emil puts his own life on the line, venturing into a snow storm to get his best friend to a doctor before it is too late.

Flanders, Hispanic Monarchy, 1616. The inhabitants of the small town of Boom are busy organizing the annual local festivities when the arrival of the Duke of Olivares, who rules the country on behalf of the King Philip III of Spain, is announced. While the male citizens cowardly surrender to panic, the brave female citizens decide to become the best hosts the Spaniards can ever meet. (German version of the French film La Kermesse héroïque, 1935.)

While working as an accountant in his uncle's factory, talented young pianist Peter dreams of becoming a famous composer. When he shows his work to a producer, he manages to convince him to give him a chance. From time to time he gets bigger contracts that keep him more and more away from home and his young wife Elisa. When he "discovers" and supports a pretty ballerina in Munich, a rumor starts that he's having an affair. He fails to realize that his marriage is threatened.

A moving saga focusing on the women in a family that spans three generations and almost 70 years of German history, from the Wilhelmine period through the end of WWII. This film shows that it takes a combination of hard work, political consciousness and family work in tandem to face the tragedies of war, economic hardship and death.