Summer Magic is a 1963 American musical film directed by James Neilson, and starring Hayley Mills, Burl Ives, and Dorothy McGuire in a story about an early 1900s Boston widow and her children taking up residence in a small town in Maine.

In the early 20th-century, financial problems force young Boston widow Margaret Carey (Dorothy McGuire) and her 3 children to move out of their home.

Nancy (Hayley Mills), the dramatic but kind-hearted eldest child, remembers a large yellow house that the Careys had admired when they visited the small town of Beulah, Maine, and makes an inquiry about it.

He also steers young Peter in the right direction, trading him a pair of overalls for his "Buster Brown suit" in which he now feels too citified, and offering him haircut money and carpentry lessons.

They reluctantly agree, and while they get ready for her, Gilly (Eddie Hodges) and Nancy entertain Peter (Jimmy Mathers) with jokes about her appearance and snobby, snotty personality ("Pink of Perfection").

Aghast at Beulah's primitive ways, she forces Osh's daughter Lally Joy (Wendy Turner) to help her bathe in the kitchen rather than lug kettles of hot water up the stairs.

He pretends that Mr. Hamilton has answered in the affirmative, only requesting that on Halloween the Careys must have a ceremony for his dead mother and find a decent place for her picture.

After church the next Sunday, Nancy and Julia spot a handsome man, Charles Bryant (James Stacy), who has moved to Beulah to be the new schoolteacher.

Lally Joy, who harbors a big crush on Gilly, displays her ugly dress to Nancy and Julia, fretting embarrassment at the party.

The screenplay was adapted by Sally Benson, author of the semi-autobiographical short stories that were the basis of M-G-M's similarly themed early 1900s era Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), starring Judy Garland and Margaret O'Brien.

"[3] John L. Scott of the Los Angeles Times wrote: "School vacationers, and their parents, will find that Walt Disney's 'Summer Magic' lives up to its title admirably ...

"[4] Richard L. Coe of The Washington Post stated, "'Summer Magic' was a pleasure to the small fry who packed the Metropolitan yesterday, but this Walt Disney gift, which includes Hayley Mills and Burl Ives, will charm oldsters as well.