Rutherford, "a bull-headed capitalist who crushes his own children beneath the wheels of industry"[3] has built a glassmaking business which he has always intended to pass onto his son, John.
When John and Mary had a child, Tony, they could not afford to feed and look after the baby properly, and they have come back to live in Rutherford's house.
Rutherford dominates the household, consisting of Ann, his sister, and his children John, Richard and Janet; he barely acknowledges Mary's existence.
Rutherford's other son Richard (Dick), who is a curate, comes to ask his father's permission to leave the house and take a position in Blackpool.
With all three children gone, Mary speaks up to Rutherford, and offers him a bargain: if he will keep and clothe her and her son for ten years, she will then hand the boy over to him entirely to be trained to take over the business.
After its initial success Rutherford and Son dropped out of sight, although the BBC Home Service broadcast a radio version in its Saturday Night Theatre slot on 29 November 1952, starring the Lancashire-born actors Frank Pettingell and Belle Chrystall.
The play's modern revival did not get underway until 1980 when a production by the feminist theatre company Mrs Worthington's Daughters (directed by Julie Holledge) was staged at the Royal Court Upstairs before going on tour.
[6] In 2019 Cody Holliday Haefner directed a production with the University of Washington School of Drama at the Jones Playhouse, Seattle.
In 1998, Rutherford and Son was included in the list of the top one hundred plays of the twentieth century by the Royal National Theatre.