We all know “It’s a Wonderful Life,” right? Clarence the Angel, Potter the Evil Banker, George Bailey and all that?

Mom gave me a copy of “The Greatest Gift”. It’s the short story on which the movie was based. The story behind its move from print to film is told in an Afterword, and it’s quite a tale. Author Philip Van Doren Stern

finished the 4,100 word short story in 1943 after working on it since November 1939. Unable to find a publisher, he sent the 200 copies he had printed as a 21-page booklet to friends as Christmas presents in December 1943. Stern privately published the short story in 1945, and it was copyrighted in 1945.

[snip]

In 1945, RKO, anxious to unload the project, sold the rights to [Frank] Capra’s production company, Liberty Films, which had a nine-film distribution agreement with RKO, for $10,000 and threw in three script adaptations for free.

There’s more to it than that, but that’s the gist.

It’s an attractive little book to have, with only 64 pages and a bright red cover. I’d have enjoyed it just for the backstory behind the making of the movie, but the short story itself is good too.