Any Laura Ingalls Wilder fans?

[moondog]

I visited the LIW house and museum in Missouri a few weeks ago and it was one of the most moving experiences ever. I made a detour of thousands of miles to see it.
If anyone loves her just as much as I do I wanted the chance to tell you about it so that you can savour every delicious detail.

[moondog]

Oh LOVE Anne.
I shall visit Prince Edward island next.
My long suffering dh always most tolerant of my expeditions.

Japanese and Germans love both, thanks largely to mass shipments of them to both countries post WW2 in attempt to show them Yanks were not total shits.

[piprabbit]

The older Anne books have some very sad story lines; Matthew's death; the lady who is caring for her brain damaged husband and had to decide whether to risk surgery which might turn him back into the violent oaf that he was pre-accident; the friend who is writing his life story before he dies; the loss of Anne's baby.

[moondog]

And Katy books!
In retrospect, she is a bit of a prig but loved all the detail about clothes and travelling trunks and whatnot.

[HumphreyCobbler]

YY to Anne and Katy. Loved them both. Would love to go to PE Island, it sounded absolutely beautiful. I wonder if it still is?

[orangeandlemons]

Oh the loss of Anne's baby! I was thinking about that the other night. Was he called Gem?

[aJumpedUpPantryBoy]

The baby who died was Joyce, Jem was her eldest son

[thewhistler]

I love them too. Have always wanted to go there.

I always wondered how Mary coped after Laura had gone and Ma died, as there was noone on her intellectual level.

And Rose was obviously an editor of genius, but not such a good writer as Laura.

I have been reading the background that I can get hold of. As you say, some of the changes are heart breaking.

I've never managed to work out how many Wilder children there were. There are extra ones in at least one family photo. What happened to them all?

And I noted even as a child that although Ma hated Indians, perhaps not surprising not only given the period and her background but the fairly recent massacres, she and they were fine about the black doctor who cares for them when they get malaria. And I have always assumed that uncle George fought for the north.

Lovely to find others who can quote chapter and verse.

[aJumpedUpPantryBoy]

I love the Anne and Katy books - it was only via MN I discovered that there were several Katy books (5 I think) and I read them recently.

When I went to University one of my friends had the complete Anne set (I had only read the first two) and I can remember spending a weekend just sat in my room reading them one after the other

[aJumpedUpPantryBoy]

In Farmer Boy there are Almanzo, Royal, Eliza and Alice but I think were at least 2 other siblings

[thewhistler]

Am an Anne fan too, but also Emily. Did you know that Colleen Mccullough plagiarised a whole chunk of an LMM book called - I think- The blue castle?

Katy I find more tedious but feel sorry she never had children, yes I know its not real, and discovered more of them on my kindle.

Did Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm ever marry and was it Alan Ladd?

[moondog]

Tonnes of Wilders.
Eliza was Laura's teacher for a while and horrid to her (made her rock the desk) but also v tough. She had a homesterad claim as a lone woman.
I asked at the museum about how Almanzo asnd rest of family took to description of Eliza but he said it was deserved.
She persuaded his resonably well off parents to move to Loiusiana where they lost a tonne of $$$.

[CheerfulYank]

I love, love, love her. And I live in Minnesota, I really ought to go to the museum here!

[CheerfulYank]

Whistler She did?! I adore the Blue Castle!

[Bunbaker]

This has to be my favourite MN thread ever. I shall now go and browse through all the links. I shall expand my Christmas wish list to include all the books I haven't got.

[HumphreyCobbler]

I have always wondered about family relationships after the description of nasty Miss Wilder was published by Laura. I had forgotten that she was the cause of the family losing their money.

I liked the first Emily book a great deal, but thought that the other two were weak.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

moondog this is absolutely lovely. Thank you so much for this thread. I am loving it and re-living the books in my head (I must dig them out but they're in boxes propping up our sofa atm!).

I am so glad it was the way you describe - you could imagine it being all commercial and schmaltzy, and I'm really glad it wasn't.

As for Anne ... I love her too. I actually like that the books are so sad (though surely Rilla of Ingleside is the real tear jerker, what with it being WWI?), because she does it beautifully and it feels very real. This is going to sound stupid, but the bit where Anne slightly shocks her religious neighbours who're insisting she'll see her baby in heaven by saying she can imagine her at the age she would really be - that really struck a chord with me.

I read earlier today Almanzo had an older sister who'd left home before he was very old, and a younger brother born when he was nearly grown up, so I think that's why there aren't more in Farmer Boy. But then Almanzo's age is odd anyway, isn't it, something funny going on there.

[EvilTwins]

My class 2 teacher read Little House on the Prairie to us when I was 6 and I then read all the others myself - I remember totally burying myself in them. I stopped when Laura was a grown up (odd child, and slightly precocious- didn't like books where the main character was either a grown up or an animal). I bought the box set last Xmas for me for the DTDs. They adored the picture books when they were smaller and I'm just waiting for the right time to start LHITBW with them. We have looked at the Little House website and they loved the whole family tree thing- the books about Caroline and her mother and her mother as girls. I never watched it on TV. I would really like to read a decent biography- what's my best bet?

[moondog]

Me too but no it isn'ty! Museum is awful 70s extension, the peopel working there are really old (and the one who shows you around the house is snappy to the point of rudeness). Exhibition distincly amateur in terms of display. They get no govt. funding. Can you imagine!!
Almanzo was 10 years older than Laura.

[moondog]

Becoming Laura Ingalls Wilder.
See earleir link.
For a long time, the key authority on her was a boy who did a pamphlet on her as a school project when 14.

I have the cookbook too.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I'm really surprised they get no funding ... you'd think they'd be thrilled to make her into a 'national treasure' or whatever it would be in the US.

I know Almanzo was 10 years older in real life (well assuming his birth date is right) - but in the books he is only a few years older, and she also says he lied about his age so as to get a farm, so it's never very clear how old he is. Is that all just made up?

[moondog]

No. She does say in books he is 10 years older but when he makes a claim on a homestead she says he is 19 when in reality was 21 or 22.
Dramtic license.

[EvilTwins]

Thanks Moondog. I'll get over to Amazon.

[TunipTheVegemal]

Museum funding in the US isn't the same as here - there are far fewer publicly funded museums, lots more independent museums.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Ahhh, I see. I wonder why ... maybe she wished he was closer to her age. I found it so sad that her whole family died so long before her. Is it daft that I find it sadder that Mary died so long before her, than Almanzo?

tunip - ah, I see, thank you.

[SheelaNeGoldGig]

Which is the one that comes after 'the first 4 years'. I think maybe written by Rose or from her point of view? Their journey to Rocky Ridge.