This movie won a Special Merit Award by 'Parents Magazine'.
This movie's working title was High Noon. This title was not this movie's final title (apparently this movie was shot in secrecy) but producer Stanley Kramer did use this title three years later when Kramer as an uncredited producer made High Noon.
This was the first Hollywood movie to be officially be permitted to use the word "nigger" after The Emperor Jones. Previously, the Hays Code had forbidden it since 1934.
Upon its initial theatrical release, this film was considered a "Negro problem picture". Moreover, this movie was one of four problem pictures of 1949 according to academic, novelist, literary critic, writer, and scholar, Ralph Ellison in his essay, "The Shadow and the Act". The other films were Intruder in the Dust ; Lost Boundaries and Pinky, all triggering a nerve in a "deep center of American emotion."