Little House on the Prairie: The Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder DVD Now Available at Legacy Documentaries Site

photo credit: www.legacydocsshop.com

Now available for purchase from Legacy Documentaries is the "untold story of Laura’s life from both a fictional and historical perspective." Little House on the Prairie: The Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder is the story of one of the world's most beloved children's authors. With her Little House series, Laura Ingalls Wilder captured the pioneering spirit for generations of young people.

Dean Butler portrayed Almanzo Wilder on the classic family drama, Little House on the Prairie. As president and executive producer at Peak Moore Enterprises, Butler's Legacy Documentaries brand and his continued interest in Wilder's legacy led to the documentary DVD release of Almanzo Wilder: Life Before Laura, in addition to bonus content for the Little House on the Prairie TV show DVD set. Now, Wilder fans can add to this collection with a new DVD about Wilder's life that includes "literary and history experts, excepts from the Little House books, Helen Sewell illustrations, dramatic reenactments, digital animations, archival photographs and a beautiful original score."

Visit www.legacydocsshop.com to purchase this DVD. 

Alison Argrim on HuffPost Live Tonight!

Alison Arngrim (Nellie Oleson, Little House on the Prairie NBC) will be interviewed tonight at 4PM Pacific at HuffPost Live. Follow this link for more information: http://live.huffingtonpost.com/#r/segment/alison-arngrim-little-house-on-the-praire-/513f7f272b8c2a0bc50000db

This Day in History During Laura's LifeTime

In the ninety years that Laura Ingalls Wilder lived, she witnessed or read about many events. I thought it might be interesting to mention some historical events that took place in America and abroad during Wilder's life. Here is what happened on March 8th.*


1884 - 1st performance of Edward MacDowell's 2nd Piano suite
1884 - Susan B. Anthony addresses the U.S. House Judiciary Committee arguing for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution granting women the right to vote. Anthony's argument came 16 years after legislators had first introduced a federal women's suffrage amendment
1887 - Everett Horton, CT, patents fishing rod of telescoping steel tubes
1894 - The state of New York enacts the nation's first dog-licensing law
1896 - Volunteers of America forms (NYC)
1898 - Richard Straus' "Don Quixote," premieres in Keulen
1900 - NL decides to go with 8 teams. They exclude Baltimore, Cleveland, Louisville & Washington (in 1953 Boston Braves move to Milwaukee)
1902 - 1st performance of Jean Sibelius' 2nd Symphony
1904 - Hugh Trumble takes a hat-trick in his final Test Cricket match
1906 - Stanley Cup: Ottawa Silver 7 sweep Smiths Falls (Ont) in 2 games
1908 - Dutch utopist Frederick of Eden speaks in Carnegie Hall, NY
1910 - Baroness Raymonde de Laroche of Paris is 1st licensed female pilot
1911 - 1st International Woman's Day. International Women's Day is launched in Copenhagen, Denmark, by Clara Zetkin, leader of the Women's Office for the Social Democratic Party in Germany.
1913 - Federal League organizes with 6 teams
1913 - Internal Revenue Service begins to levy & collect income taxes
1915 - 1st US navy minelayer, Baltimore, commissioned
1916 - US invades Cuba for 3rd time, this to end corrupt Menocal regime
1917 - Russian revolution breaks out [OS=Feb 24] (in Petrograd)
1918 - The first case of Spanish flu occurs, the start of a devastating worldwide pandemic.
1920 - Denmark & Cuba join the League of Nations
1921 - Spanish Premier Eduardo Dato Iradier is assassinated while exiting the parliament building in Madrid
1924 - Coal mine explosion kills 171 at Castle Gate Utah
1927 - Pan American Airlines incorporates
1929 - US worker union commission reports of slavery in Liberia
1930 - Mahatma Gandhi starts civil disobedience in India
1930 - Babe Ruth signs 2-year contract for $160,000 with NY Yankee GM Ed Barrow, wrongly predicts "No one will ever be paid more than Ruth."
1934 - Edwin Hubble photo shows as many galaxies as Milky Way has stars
1936 - The first stock car race is held in Daytona Beach, Florida
1939 - Lenore Coffee & William Joyce Cowan's "Family Portrait," premieres
1941 - 1st baseball player drafted into WW II (Hugh Mulcahy, Phillies)
1942 - Japanese forces captures Rangoon Burma
1942 - KNIL, Dutch colonial army on Java, surrenders to Japanese armies
1943 - 335 allied bombers attack Neurenberg
1943 - Limited gambling legalized in Mexico
1943 - US Ladies Figure Skating championship won by Gretchen Merrill
1943 - US Mens Figure Skating championship won by Arthur Vaughn
1944 - US resumes bombing Berlin
1945 - "Kiss Me Kate" opens in Britain
1945 - 53 Amsterdammers executed by nazi occupiers
1945 - International Women's Day is 1st observed
1945 - Phyllis M Daley is 1st black nurse sworn-in as US Navy ensign
1946 - 1st helicopter licensed for commercial use (NYC)
1948 - Supreme Court rules religious instructions in pub schools unconstitutional
1949 - WAGA TV channel 5 in Atlanta, GA (CBS) begins broadcasting
1949 - WBAP-FM, Fort Worth Texas, begins broadcasting
1950 - 1st woman medical officer assigned to naval vessel (BR Walters)
1950 - Marshall Voroshilov of USSR announces they developed atomic bomb
1951 - Intl Table Tennis Federation bans Egypt (for refusing to play Israel)
1952 - Antoine Pinay forms French government
1953 - "Two's Company" closes at Alvin Theater NYC after 90 performances
1953 - Census indicates 239,000 farmers gave up farming in last 2 years
1953 - KSWO TV channel 7 in Lawton, OK (ABC) begins broadcasting
1953 - Patty Berg wins LPGA Jacksonville Golf Open
1953 - WFMJ TV channel 21 in Youngstown, OH (NBC) begins broadcasting
1954 - Herb McKinley sets quarter mile record of 0:46.8 in Melbourne, Australia



* Source for this information is http://www.historyorb.com/

Funny Valentine

I couldn't help but think of The Long Winter when I saw this.  Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Birthday Almanzo!

Oh, how my life would be different if Laura Elizabeth Ingalls had never met Almanzo James Wilder. I would never have met many of my online chums. Historic sites would never have existed. And television shows and movies about life on the prairie as seen through the eyes of a young girl might never have been inspired by a set of books that might never have been written.

Thankfully, a young Laura Ingalls did meet the dashing hero we read about in The Long Winter. Almanzo Wilder would court her. He would go and fetch her from her teaching job with his beautiful Morgan horses. And a couple of years later, the two would marry.

Now, we have books, televisions shows, movies, and annual events to remember the legacy created by the Wilders. We are grateful for all this pioneer family has meant to us. We are thankful for the small screen portrayals of Almanzo that actors Dean Butler and Walter Goggins brought us.

On Almanzo's 156th birthday, we fondly remember everyone's favorite farmer boy. Happy birthday, Almanzo!

Happy Birthday, Laura!

Happy 146th birthday to Laura Ingalls Wilder! Her work has brought many wonderful people and experiences into my life.

I joined Prairie Talk many years ago, where I met other Laura fans. That led to me creating a Yahoo Group for Dean Butler with the goal of bringing him to the World Wide Web. Once Dean created his Legacy Documentaries website, he also shared with us how he was creating a documentary about Almanzo Wilder, which can me ordered through the Wilder Homestead. Butler's Little House on the Prairie work did not stop there, however. He created a documentary about Laura that has been viewed at Laura Ingalls Wilder events around the country, and worked on the Pa's Fiddle project, which was showcased on PBS during last year's pledge drive, and is now available for purchase.

I'm also part of another LHOP forum, where I talk with fans from all around. The funny thing is that I know them from other forums, too: Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman and Downton Abbey.

While I came to the books later in life, Michael Landon's Little House on the Prairie was an always watched show in our house while I was growing up. Between reruns, fan fiction stories, and forums, my love for Laura Ingalls Wilder's work continues to grow.

Hope you'll join Sarah Uthoff tonight to celebrate Laura's birthday at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/trundlebedtales. She'll be talking with fans on her show tonight about Laura Ingalls Wilder effected our lives and our favorite Laura related memories and experiences. Show starts at 9PM Eastern/8 PM Central. You can all in at (877) 633-9389.

Little House on the Prairie - Historical or Fictional Characters

Every once in a while, a question will come up about characters on television's Little House on the Prairie. Since the show was based upon Laura Ingalls Wilder's books, some not familiar with Wilder's real life aren't sure which characters are historical figures and which were created solely for the show. Here's a good place to start.

The Ingalls family included: Caroline and Charles and their children Mary, Laura, Caroline Celestia (Carrie), Charles Frederick (Baby Freddie), and Grace. Popular characters though they were, the Ingallses never adopted an orphan boy named Albert or the Cooper children.

Mary Ingalls went blind as a teenager. Her hopes of being a teacher were quickly dashed. While she was sent away to a college for the blind and learned many things, she never married. She remained single, living with her parents until their deaths (Charles in 1902 and Caroline in 1924), and then with Grace and her husband in the Ingallses home in De Smet. She died in 1928 while visiting her sister Carrie. So, Adam Kendall was a made for TV husband.

Reverend Edwin Hyde Alden was minister of the Congregational Church in Walnut Grove, Minnesota. Known as Robert, the real life minister who started the church in Walnut Grove, was a home missionary with a wife and daughter back east. He rode the train west and preached in New Ulm, Sleepy Eye, Barnston, Walnut Grove, Saratoga and Marshall. He would preach in schoolhouses, private homes, and railroad depots. He was known to have built small chapels and churches in pioneer communities.

When the Ingalls family was staying in the Surveyor's House in De Smet, Reverend Alden visited them. He had left Minnesota and entered the missionary field in Dakota. The community wasn't yet know as De Smet, but Reverend Alden held the first church service ever held there right in the Surveyor's House. He would stop by De Smet during his journeys, holding services in an unfinished depot until a new minister was appointed, Reverend Edward Brown.

Dabbs Greer played Reverend Alden on Little House on the Prairie. He traveled to other communities, just like his real life counterpart. He was single in the show, however, until Season 6, when he married widow Anna Craig.

Kevin Hagen played kindly Doctor Baker on the show. He is not based on any real life character that I know of. When the Ingalls family lived in Kansas, a black homeopathic doctor named George Tann treated them for malaria.

In the television show, Doc Baker took care of everyone's aches and pains. He delivered babies and acted as the town's veterinarian. In Season 8, Doc Baker decides he needs some help, so he hires black doctor Caleb Ledoux, who moves to town with his wife, Maddie. Racist sentiments in town almost drive them away, but they agree to stay in Walnut Grove, though we never see them again.

After the pilot episode, the Ingalls family leaves Kansas and journeys to Walnut Grove, Minnesota. Though the real life Ingalls family only stayed in Walnut Grove a couple of years (1874 - 1876) before crop failures forced them to leave, and then returned again for another two years (1877 - 1879), living in town before moving to their final home in De Smet, South Dakota, the majority of the show took place in Walnut Grove.

When the TV Ingalls and the real life Ingalls stop at Plum Creek, they purchase a dugout house on the banks of the creek from Mr. Hanson. Mr. Hanson was a Norwegian settler who itched to go west, but on television, he was one of the founders of Walnut Grove, and remained there until his death.

Mr. Edwards was a neighbor of the Ingalls family when they lived in Kansas. A bachelor, originally from Tennessee, he lived across the creek. Identifying who he was and what his occupation was is difficult. In Donald Zochert's book Laura, he says he might have been J.H. Edwards, who ran Ed's Saloon and dealt in "liquor and cigars" in Fort Scott, but Zochert says that would make him too far away to be the man Wilder mentions in her books.

In the show, the character of Mr. Edwards is first introduced in the pilot, helping the Ingalls family and befriending Laura. They have a teary-eyed parting when the Ingalls family is forced to leave Kansas, but Mr. Edwards shows up in Walnut Grove. This time, he has a backstory: his wife and daughter died and it was his fault for moving them so far away from medical help, which accounts for his excessive drinking. 

Nellie Oleson, while featured in the books and on the television series, was a totally fictional character made up by Laura Ingalls Wilder. She is a composite of three of Wilder's classmates: Nellie Owens, Genevieve Masters, and Stella Gilbert. Nellie Owens had a brother named Willie and her parents (William and Margaret) ran a mercantile in Walnut Grove. Sound familiar TV lovers?

I hope you have enjoyed this discussion. Comments are always welcome.