In the Good Old Summertime is a 1949 American Technicolor musical romantic comedy film directed by Robert Z. Leonard.

It stars Judy Garland, Van Johnson, S. Z. Sakall, Spring Byington, Clinton Sundberg, and Buster Keaton in his first featured film role at MGM since 1933.

The plot was also revived in the 1998 film You've Got Mail, starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.

On a spring day in Chicago, in the early 1900s, Andrew Larkin is the top salesman at Otto Oberkugen's music store.

When Andrew arrives, he rushes to the post office and reads a letter from his secret pen pal, known as "Box Number 237."

Several months pass and the store's sales dwindle, in which Veronica and Andrew's professional relationship turns contentious.

Back at work, Oberkugen hands Andrew his prized Stradivarius violin to safeguard for the party.

During the store hours, Oberkugen gives Veronica her bonus, although she intends to quit in protest to Andrew's promotion.

Director Robert Leonard originally hired Buster Keaton as a gag-writer to help him devise a way for a violin to get broken that would be both comic and plausible.

The entire footage of the number was found in the MGM vaults and included in the PBS documentary American Masters: Judy Garland: By Myself in 2004.