A Little House on the Prairie Experiment

[RoseWilder]

I'm a huge Little House on the Prairie fan (both the show and the books.) Well there's a passage in Little House in the Big Woods that talks about how one of the ways that pioneers stayed warm when they were traveling in the winter was by putting baked potatoes in their pockets. So my sister and I tried it out. We went for a walk when it was 20 degrees outside with a baked potato in each pocket. And the crazy thing is IT WORKS. We stayed warm the entire time!

[Palimpsest]

But of course it did.  She was writing from experience.  I loved the books.  The TV series not so much.

You might like Pamela Smith Hill's  Laura Ingalls Wider: A Writer's Life and the annotated autobiography.  The latter only if you have an awful lot of time on your hands.   

http://www.amazon.com/Pioneer-Girl-The-Annotated-Autobiography/dp/0984504176/

[RoseWilder]

I was surprised that it worked so well when we were on a walk and not able to do all the other things they mentioned doing (flat irons for their feet, extra blankets to cover up with while in the wagon.) Just the potatoes alone made my whole body feel warm!

I have Pioneer Girl. And I loved it!  

I just ordered the book by Pamela Smith Hill last week, but it hasn't arrived yet. I also have a few other books about LIW in my to-read stacks that I just haven't gotten to yet. I'm a tad bit obsessed!

[Palimpsest]

Pamela Smith Hill did 2 free online courses last year on LIW.  I took them but didn't participate in the discussions.   I think a couple of other people here took them too. The videos may still be on youtube.

Some people got very, very, upset because the Little House books were crafted (and edited by Rose) and not the "absolute Gospel truth."

 

[RoseWilder]

The online course sounds fascinating. Did you learn anything new about Laura or the Little House books from the courses?

I'm always surprised when people get so upset when they find out how instrumental Rose was in bringing The Little House books to life. I read a book called The Ghost in the Little House a few years ago that dealt with this very issue, and so many people hated the book because of it. I think the book was flawed in some ways, but after reading the things that Rose and Laura wrote separately (Rose's other novels and Laura's newspaper column) I can see how neither one would have been able to create the Little House books without the other. There's just something lacking in the writing each woman did on her own. But together they created something beautiful and magical. It doesn't diminish my enjoyment of the Little House books, or my fascination with Laura's life, to know that Rose played such a huge role in creating the books. 

Have you ever watched this documentary about Laura: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00QHM4DI0?keywords=laura%20ingalls%20wilder&qid=1458611482&ref_=sr_1_2&s=movies-tv&sr=1-2

There wasn't a lot of new information the documentary, but I still really enjoyed it!

 

 

 

[MarblesMom]

13 hours ago, Palimpsest said:

Some people got very, very, upset because the Little House books were crafted (and edited by Rose) and not the "absolute Gospel truth."

You can imagine my dismay at the bookstore in 1972, when I found the books were listed under "fiction."  In my 7 year old mind, they WERE gospel.  I am still grateful for the very patient bookstore employee, who explained to me what the books were missing to make them true bio/non fiction pieces.   (Secretly, I was wishing her into the cornfield, but I am glad she took the time.)

[Palimpsest]

Oh, yes.  The "Ghost" book (Holz) went too far in the other direction, I think.  It was his doctoral dissertation so he wanted to make a big scandalous noise.   Susan Wittig Albert's book is interesting too, BTW, and more balanced.

The Smith Hill courses and her books are a lot more careful, and disappointed some people because they are rather academic.  Perhaps too academic for some people who dropped out of the courses.  People also seemed to get bored with the historical details that interested me because I'm a history nerd.

I think Smith Hill establishes clearly that the "voice" and the writing of the LH books are solidly Laura, but that there was a productive editorial collaboration between Laura and Rose.  Smith Hill  examines all the manuscripts and letters to look at Rose's suggestions and how Laura incorporates or rejects them.  I found it very interesting and it's a normal editorial process - with the difference that Rose established herself as a go-between (and interim editor) between Laura and the publisher.  One wonders whether that was really necessary.

Rose and Laura obviously had a very troubled relationship and Rose was very tough on her mother's writing and extremely bossy. I found myself very annoyed with Rose because she swiped her mother's characters for "Let the Hurricane Roar."  Where I came down in the end was that they were both very talented writers, interesting women, and well ahead of their respective times.  Rose is a fascinating person in her own right, of course.

It's like "Did Shakespeare write Shakespeare?"  Who cares if the writing is good!

Thanks for the link to the documentary @RoseWilder.  I haven't seen it.

[RoseWilder]

3 hours ago, Palimpsest said:

Susan Wittig Albert's book is interesting too, BTW, and more balanced.

I read that book too. I got really annoyed with Rose while reading that book. She seemed so disrespectful of Laura. I kept thinking well gosh Rose, maybe Laura just doesn't want all of her furniture to smell like smoke. 

I think my biggest problem with The Ghost in the Little House was that the author only seemed to use Rose's diaries as fact. I don't remember there being any information from Laura's side to balance it out. Anyone whose ever had a difficult relationship with someone knows that it's human nature for a person to paint themselves in the best possible light and paint the other person in a very negative one, and yet the author seemed to take everything Rose said as fact. 

And yeah, I agree with you about Let the Hurricane Roar. So irritating. 

[ofDany]

I loved the little house books as a kid - especially Farmer Boy and These Happy Golden Years.  I never watched the TV show, but I never wanted to either after I found out it wasn't true to the books!  I took my daughter on a trip to visit some of the little house sites when she was a young teenager and our favorite part was spending the night in a covered wagon on the prairie. It was free from the noises we were used to and so dark that it was eerie - just the never-ending rustling of the tall grasses...

I never enjoyed reading Rose's journals etc. as much as Laura's books.  Even if Rose helped with them or ghost-wrote them, they were based on Laura's experiences and memories, and they were placed in real places that you can go to visit.  That appealed to me both as a kid and as an adult.  I feel the same way about them that I felt about Lucy Maude Montgomery's books about Anne of Green Gables - despite being fiction,  I could go and visit Prince Edward Island and see all the places that were mentioned in the books thus they felt very real..

[BlessingsVonFundiePants]

I had to drive 1800km by myself so I downloaded the Little House audio books for "free" to listen to to pass the time.  My favourite part when I was a kid was when Laura told Almanzo that she could not promise to obey him when they got married. I almost drove off the road when I realised this scene had been omitted from the audio books. I looked into it and found i had inadvertently downloaded an audio book published by the American Homeschool Press or something similar. Sigh.

 

[Scribber]

LOVE Little House

We homeschool (with a real curriculum and real testing with the state.) and on top of our regular curriculum we have added "Prairie Primer" to our daily studies.

It's this awesome workbook that goes along with the series - it gives you activities/experiments to do with each chapter to make the book come to life. (Basically in the book if they cook it, craft it or make it in anyway? We do too.) it's been a super fun "extra" to our school work.

[theinvisiblegirl]

I love Little House on the Prairie. The books, the shows, the biographies, the annotated autobiography. Everything about it just fascinates me.

Don't get me wrong, I love my technology. Give me all the antibiotics and laptops and iPhones. But if I absolutely had to move to a different time period, it would be to the Little House on the Prairie days.

[RoseWilder]

On 4/2/2016 at 5:02 PM, ofDany said:

I took my daughter on a trip to visit some of the little house sites when she was a young teenager and our favorite part was spending the night in a covered wagon on the prairie.

I've been trying to talk my sister into sleeping in a covered wagon with me. I think it sounds like so much fun!

On 4/18/2016 at 5:31 AM, BlessingsVonFundiePants said:

I had to drive 1800km by myself so I downloaded the Little House audio books for "free" to listen to to pass the time.  My favourite part when I was a kid was when Laura told Almanzo that she could not promise to obey him when they got married. I almost drove off the road when I realised this scene had been omitted from the audio books. I looked into it and found i had inadvertently downloaded an audio book published by the American Homeschool Press or something similar. Sigh.

 

That's so interesting/horrifying that they removed that part. I've always wondered how/why the fundies let their kids read those books when Laura was so independent and kind of an early feminist

On 4/18/2016 at 9:06 AM, Scribber said:

LOVE Little House

We homeschool (with a real curriculum and real testing with the state.) and on top of our regular curriculum we have added "Prairie Primer" to our daily studies.

It's this awesome workbook that goes along with the series - it gives you activities/experiments to do with each chapter to make the book come to life. (Basically in the book if they cook it, craft it or make it in anyway? We do too.) it's been a super fun "extra" to our school work.

That sounds like a lot of fun!