Whit's Visitor

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#FP01: “Whit's Visitor”
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Last aired
January 5, 1987 ↓
Original Release Date
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Date Recorded
November 1986
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Album
Album
Family Portraits ↓
Cassette No.
BR 825
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Scripture

Malachi 2:13-17

13Another thing you do: You flood the Lord's altar with tears. You weep and wail because he no longer pays attention to your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands.

14You ask, "Why?" It is because the LORD is acting as the witness between you and the wife of your youth, because you have broken faith with her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant. 15Has not the LORD made them one? In flesh and spirit they are his. And why one? Because he was seeking godly offspring. So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. 16"I hate divorce," says the LORD God of Israel, "and I hate a man's covering himself with violence as well as with his garment," says the LORD Almighty. So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith.

17You have wearied the LORD with your words. "How have we wearied him?" you ask. By saying, "All who do evil are good in the eyes of the LORD, and he is pleased with them" or "Where is the God of justice?"

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Whit's Visitor

“Whit's Visitor” is episode #1 of the Family Portraits audio series. It was written by Steve Harris and Phil Lollar, and originally aired on January 5, 1987.

Summary

Whit finds a young boy named Davey Morrison hiding in his garage. The boy's parents are getting separated, and Whit realizes Davey needs some help coping with the pain.

Plot

We are introduced for the first time to John Avery Whittaker with a long monologue to the listening audience, a rare occasion within the series. Whit relates a brief history of his time in Odyssey as well as a brief lesson on the town's history on his walk back to his house. By the time he gets within sight of his house, his phone starts to ring, and the narrative switches as Whit runs into his house to answer the phone.

Once inside, Whit answers the phone and we are introduced to Tom Riley. The conversation goes on to Whit talking about his planned night with Robert Louis Stevenson. Tom, however, doesn't quite grasp the concept that Whit is talking about a book and not the author himself, which leads to a comical exchange, which is then interrupted by a noise in Whit's garage.

Whit goes to investigate, and finds little Davey Morrison from across the street in his garage with a sleeping bag and other items for a camp-out. Whit talks to him and Davey says that he is going to run away, buy a house and get a job somewhere. Whit asks him if his parents would miss him, and Davey says that they probably don't even know he is gone. Whit then discovers that Davey ran away from home because his parents had been fighting a lot recently, and it got bad today because he hit a boy at school and came home with a note. Davey told Whit that after he came home with the note, his mother and father locked themselves in another room and yelled loud enough for Davey to listen, and hear them call each other unfit parents, and say that they should get a divorce.

As Davey calms down and agrees to go back home, he sees his dad's car in the garage and asks Whit if that means his Dad is home to stay. Whit consoled the young Davey and said that even though he couldn't promise him the sun would come up the next day, Davey should know that his dad will always be his dad. And his mom will always be his mom and no matter what happens they will always love him and that God loves him more than anyone else. After this Davey runs across the street back home.

The episode ends with Tom and Whit looking out the window at Whit's End at the children playing and Whit comments that half the children come from broken houses. Tom makes the comment that "they" say divorce is better for the kid if the parents just can't get along. Whit strongly disagrees, and recalls times with his wife, Jenny Whittaker, when they had very bad arguments, but at no time was there any thought of splitting up. He also says that the divorce argument doesn't stand up when you come face to face with a little guy who just lost half his family.

Discussion Questions

Discussion Questions are not available for episodes in the Family Portraits collection.

Cast

Heard in episode

Relative Importance / Chronological
Role Actor
Jimmy Bob Luttrell
John Whittaker Hal Smith
Tom Riley Walker Edmiston
Davey Morrison Unknown
Relative Importance / Chronological
Role Actor
John Whittaker Hal Smith
Davey Morrison Unknown
Tom Riley Walker Edmiston
Jimmy Bob Luttrell

Mentioned in episode

Character Mentioned By
Horace McAlister John Whittaker
Jenny Whittaker John Whittaker


Notes

A "Whit's Visitor" cassette from the Focus on the Family Broadcast on January 5, 1987 .

All the episodes within the Family Portraits collection were originally broadcast within the Focus on the Family radio show and had an introduction and post-discussion with Mike Trout and Dr. James Dobson. The wrap-arounds usually featured a discussion of the material covered in the episode and its application and relevance. For this episode Dr. Dobson introduced Steve Harris, the creator of the "new vehicle coming off of the assembly line."

Trivia
  • Jimmy, an employee at Whit's End, makes his first appearance in the series and later returns in FP #03: "The New Kid in Town", though Whit calls him 'Bob'. Bob reappears as 'Jimmy' in #17: “A Member of the Family, Part 1”.
  • In the opening introduction, Mike Trout states that Odyssey is "a small Midwestern town" in Ohio. The identity of the specific state has never been mentioned again once Odyssey USA and later Adventures in Odyssey launches.
  • Whit states that he moved to Odyssey in '71 and fell in love with the place as soon as he first laid eyes on it.
  • The first mention of the founding McAlister family is made when Whit talks about the town's name. The name was not based on the epic poem by Homer, by a colloquialism used when the townspeople got together about 100 years ago to give the town a name. When it came around to "Doc" McAlister, he said, "It's in a beautiful valley. A place everybody ought-a-see." This same quote is repeated much later in #636: “A Class Reenactment”, in which "Doc" McAlister is identified as Horace McAlister.
  • Whit and Tom's brief discussion about Robert Louis Stevenson is repeated in #7: “Promises, Promises” with slightly different wording.
  • The wrap-around of this broadcast contains Dr. Dobson and Steve Harris talking about the program and their ambitions for the entire Family Portraits series.
  • This was the only episode where the same person was writer, director, and production engineer: Steve Harris.
Goofs

NOTE: These episodes were an experiment, so no clear, long-term mythos was planned out. While many facts of Odyssey that started in Family Portraits remain true, there were some points that were re-written or dropped.

This episode has Whit stating in his opening monologue that he had no idea what he was going to do to make a living when he moved to Odyssey with his wife. He took inventory of his assets and realized he loved books and knew how to talk. Also, his wife Jenny could make a good cup of coffee and "some of the best apple pie you've ever tasted." Stating that he had no business sense whatsoever, he decided to open a bookstore, coffee-shop, conversation place called Whit's End.
In a future episode, #19: “Recollections”, we learn that Jenny was trying to save a building called the Fillmore Recreation Center which would later become Whit's End. She died in the middle of her efforts due to a complication from an infection in her kidneys. We also learn that Whit was involved with a large company called Universal Press Foundation and helped them to build Universal Encyclopedia proving that Whit did indeed have good business sense. Whit ended up buying the building for UFP away from the Webster Development Firm who also was trying to purchase the building.
  • Whit's House
Davey Morrison mentions that he "crawled through the doggy door" to get into Whit's garage. No episode to date has revealed an dog ever being owned by Whit or the Whittaker family, though such a door could still exist.

Quotes

There are no quotes listed for this episode. ».
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