Little Town on the Prairie is an autobiographical children's novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published in 1941, the seventh of nine books in her Little House series. It is set in De Smet, South Dakota. It opens in the spring after the Long Winter and ends as Laura becomes a school teacher so she can help her sister, Mary, stay at a school for the blind in Vinton, Iowa. It tells the story of 15-year-old Laura's first paid job outside of home and her last term of schooling. At the end of the novel, she receives a teacher's certificate and is employed to teach at the Brewster settlement, 12 miles (19km) away.
The novel was a Newbery Honor book in 1942, as the fourth to eighth Little House books all were from 1938 to 1944.[4]
Plot summary
The novel opens in May 1881, after Hard Winter. At the Ingalls' claim, Pa begins planting the corn and oats that will serve as cash crops for the family, after which he builds the second half of the claim shanty, creating two small bedrooms. Meanwhile, Ma begins planting her new vegetable garden, while Mary, Laura, and Carrie happily help with the farm chores and housework and care for their youngest sister, Grace. After gophers begin eating Pa's seed corn and a mouse cuts his hair in his sleep, the family decides to get a cat, which quickly proves to be a skilled hunter despite being taken from its mother at only five weeks old.
One day at supper, Pa asks Laura whether she will accept a job in town helping to sew shirts; the surge in people newly arriving in town means a need for services such as this. She hates the work but continues because the money will help send her sister, Mary, to a college for the blind in Iowa. Some of the men in town organize horse races, and Laura's future husband, Almanzo Wilder, wins the buggy race with his two Morgan horses hitched to his brother's heavy peddler's wagon.
On the homestead, the Ingalls' crops of corn and oats are doing well, and Pa plans to sell them to pay for Mary to begin college that fall, but blackbirds descend and destroy both crops. Laura and Mary resign themselves to the fact that Mary will have to delay college, but Pa sells one of their cows to make up the amount. When Ma and Pa escort her there, Laura, Carrie, and Grace are left alone for a week. In order to stave off the loneliness stemming from Mary's departure, they do the fall cleaning; they succeed despite a few mishaps, surprising Ma and Pa when they return.
In the fall, the Ingalls move to town; they believe the coming winter will not be as hard as the previous one, but as the claim shanty is not weatherproofed, Pa thinks it is best not to risk staying in it. In town, Laura and Carrie attend school again, and Laura is reunited with her friends, Minnie Johnson and Mary Power. She also meets a new girl, Ida Brown, the adopted daughter of the town's new minister, Reverend Brown, who claims to be related to John Brown of Kansas. Nellie Oleson, her nemesis from Plum Creek, has moved to De Smet and is also attending the school. The teacher for the fall term is Eliza Jane Wilder, Almanzo's older sister, who has a nearby claim of her own. Nellie turns her against Laura, and Wilder loses control of the school for a time. A visit by the school board restores order; however, Wilder leaves at the end of the fall term.
For the winter term, Miss Wilder is replaced by Mr. Clewett. Laura sets herself to studying, as she only has one year left before she can apply for a teaching certificate, but relaxes when the town of De Smet begins having literary meetings at the school, where the whole town gathers for fun every Friday night: singing, elocution, a spelling bee, or plays and minstrel shows put on by the townspeople.
The winter is very mild, so Laura and Carrie never miss a day of school. Laura and her classmates become friendly after a birthday party for Ben Woodworth, and so she begins lagging in her studies, though she remains head of the class. She spends the summer studying to make up for lost time. The next school year, there will be another new teacher, Mr. Owen. During a week of church revival meetings, Almanzo asks to be escorted home from church. Ma is surprised at this because she is only fifteen, and he is a grown man.
Near Christmas, Mr. Owen organizes a school exhibition to raise awareness of the school's needs, as the school is becoming overcrowded. He assigns Laura and Ida the duty of reciting the whole of American history up to that point. Despite their nervousness, on the night of the school exhibition they perform perfectly, as does Carrie, who recites a poem. Almanzo once again sees Laura home, and offers to take her on a sleigh ride after he completes the cutter he is building.
At home, Laura is met by Mr. Boast and Mr. Brewster, who saw her perform at the exhibition and want her to take a teaching position at Brewster's settlement, twelve miles (19km) from town. The school superintendent comes and tests her; although she is not yet sixteen, he grants her a third-grade teaching certificate. The novel ends with her preparing to teach school.
Historical context
Though Wilder began writing the books as autobiographical recollections, they are considered historical fiction and have won a number of literary awards. In 1941, this novel was awarded a Newbery Honor for exceptional children's literature.
To encourage settlement of the mid-west part of the United States, Congress passed the Homestead Act in 1862. It divided unsettled land into sections, and heads of households could file a claim for very little money. A section is 1-square-mile (2.6km2), and a claim was ¼ of a section. A township is made of 36 sections. A section is identified by three numbers, for example NW quarter of Section 18, Township 109, Range 38. By paying $10.00 plus other filing fees, a man could get 160 acres (0.65km2) of land for his use if he could live on it for 5 years and not give up to go back east. The Ingalls staked one claim near Plum Creek. In spring 1880, Charles filed a homestead claim south of De Smet for the NE quarter of Section 3, Township 110, Range 56.[5]
The novel takes place between the summer of 1881 and December 24, 1882. Mary enrolled in the Iowa School for the Blind in Vinton on November 23, 1881. Although the Dakota territorial government paid the tuition for blind persons to attend the college, if the person was a Dakota resident, Wilder's income was still necessary to help the family financially with Mary's absence.
In the context of Wilder's books, the "Nellie Oleson" here is the one from On the Banks of Plum Creek, although her character was a conflation of two girls Wilder knew: Nellie Owens in Plum Creek and Genevieve Masters here. In reality, she never saw the "Nellie" from Plum Creek again after her family left the town.
Subsequent events
Although the novel ends with Wilder's start as a schoolteacher, her life and that of her family continued. At age 18 she married Almanzo Wilder.[6] Together they homesteaded and raised horses, which he loved. They had a daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, and lost a son in infancy. Lane grew up to become an author, among other things. Wilder wrote over the years in the form of essays and articles for newspapers and magazines, mostly articles related to homesteading.[7] She wrote out the manuscript for each of her books by hand, and Lane helped her type and edit them. The well-known illustrations by Garth Williams appeared in the revised editions about 20 years later.
Reception
Virginia Kirkus had handled Wilder's debut novel Little House in the Big Woods for Harper and Brothers as its book editor from 1926 to 1932. In Kirkus Reviews, her semimonthly bulletin from 1933, she had awarded the 3rd to 6th novels starred reviews. There would be no more. Of this novel she advised, "These books are written in the third person, as if they were fiction, but actually each successive volume provides another panel in Wilder's autobiography. This one is for distinctly older girls than its predecessor, as Wilder secures her first post as school teacher, and puts her own school days behind her.... For some reason, the almost-a-young lady Wilder isn't quite as real as the child of the wilderness."[3]
The novel was the fourth of five Newbery Honor books for Wilder, books 4 to 8 in the series.[4]
Modern influence
The Surveyors House is a Laura Ingalls Wilder historic site in De Smet, South Dakota
Today, De Smet, South Dakota attracts many fans with its historic sites from the books By the Shores of Silver Lake,The Long Winter, Little Town on the Prairie, These Happy Golden Years, and The First Four Years. From 1879 to 1894 the Ingalls lived in De Smet and the family homestead, a house in town built by Charles, the Brewster School where Wilder taught, and the surveyor's home the Ingalls lived in between 1879 and 1880 are open to visitors.
In addition to the Little House series, four series of books expand the Little House series to include five generations of Wilder's family. The success of the Little House series has produced many related books including two series (Little House Chapter Books and My First Little House Books) that present the original stories in condensed and simplified form for younger readers. Additional series have been written to tell the stories of Wilder's mother, The Caroline Years, her grandmother, The Charlotte Years, " and her daughter, The Rose Years. There are also Little House themed craft, music, and cookbooks.
Related Research Articles
De Smet is a city in and the county seat of Kingsbury County, South Dakota, United States. The population was 1,056 at the 2020 census.
The Little House on the Prairie books comprise a series of American children's novels written by Laura Ingalls Wilder. The stories are based on her childhood and adolescence in the American Midwest between 1870 and 1894. Eight of the novels were completed by Wilder, and published by Harper & Brothers in the 1930s and 1940s, during her lifetime. The name "Little House" appears in the first and third novels in the series, while the third is identically titled Little House on the Prairie. The second novel, meanwhile, was about her husband's childhood.
Laura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder was an American writer. The Little House on the Prairie series of children's books, published between 1932 and 1943, were based on her childhood in a settler and pioneer family.
Almanzo James Wilder was the husband of Laura Ingalls Wilder and the father of Rose Wilder Lane, both noted authors.
Caroline Lake Ingalls (; née Quiner (later Holbrook); December 12, 1839 – April 20, 1924) was an American schoolteacher who was the mother of Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the Little House books. She is depicted as the character "Ma" in the books and the television series.
Charles Phillip Ingalls was an American pioneer, farmer, government official, musician, and carpenter who was the father of Laura Ingalls Wilder, known for her Little House series of books. He is depicted as the character "Pa" in the books and the television series.
De Smet Cemetery is a cemetery located southwest of the town of De Smet in Kingsbury County, South Dakota, United States. Numerous family members from the Laura Ingalls Wilder Little House books are buried there.
Nellie Oleson is a fictional character in the Little House series of autobiographical children's novels written by Laura Ingalls Wilder. She was portrayed by Alison Arngrim in the NBC television show Little House on the Prairie, where her role is much expanded. Three different girls from Laura Ingalls Wilder's childhood — Nellie Owens, Genevieve Masters and Stella Gilbert — were the basis for the fictional Nellie Oleson.
The Long Winter is an autobiographical children's novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published in 1940, the sixth of nine books in her Little House series. It is set in southeastern Dakota Territory during the severe winter of 1880–1881, when she turned 14 years old.
The First Four Years is an autobiographical novel by Laura Ingalls Wilder, published in 1971 and commonly considered the last of nine books in the Little House series. The series had initially concluded at eight children's novels following Wilder to mature age and her marriage with Almanzo Wilder.
Little House in the Big Woods is an autobiographical children's novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published by Harper in 1932. It was Wilder's first book published and it inaugurated her Little House series. It is based on memories of her early childhood in the Big Woods near Pepin, Wisconsin, in the early 1870s.
On the Banks of Plum Creek is an autobiographical children's novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published in 1937, the fourth of nine books in her Little House series. It is based on a few years of her childhood when the Ingalls family lived at Plum Creek near Walnut Grove, Minnesota, during the 1870s. The original dust jacket proclaimed, "The true story of an American pioneer family by the author of Little House in the Big Woods".
By the Shores of Silver Lake is an autobiographical children's novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published in 1939, the fifth of nine books in her Little House series. It spans just over one year, beginning when she is 12 years old and her family moves from Plum Creek, Minnesota to what will become De Smet, South Dakota.
These Happy Golden Years is an autobiographical children's novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published in 1943, the eighth of nine books in her Little House series – although it originally ended it. It is based on her later adolescence near De Smet, South Dakota, featuring her short time as a teacher, beginning at age 15, and her courtship with Almanzo Wilder. It spans the time period from 1882 to 1885, when they marry.
Farmer Boy is a children's historical novel written by Laura Ingalls Wilder and published in 1933. It was the second-published one in the Little House series but it is not related to the first, which that of the third directly continues. Thus the later Little House on the Prairie is sometimes called the second one in the series, or the second volume of "the Laura Years".
Little House on the Prairie is an autobiographical children's novel by Laura Ingalls Wilder, published in 1935. It was the third novel published in the Little House series, continuing the story of the first, Little House in the Big Woods (1932), but not related to the second. Thus, it is sometimes called the second one in the series, or the second volume of "the Laura Years".
Little House on the Prairie is a book musical adapted from the children's books, Little House on the Prairie, by Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Little House on the Prairie: The Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder is a documentary film about the life of American author Laura Ingalls Wilder. She is best known for her Little House on the Prairie book series.
1 2 "Little Town on the Prairie". Kirkus Reviews. November 1, 1941. Retrieved 2015-10-02. Online the review header shows a recent front cover and states "illustrated by Garth Williams".
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