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Old 01-01-2018, 06:05 PM
 
35,508 posts, read 17,736,752 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Brynach View Post
I think it's important to remember that this was a very new town and settlement. Having a cat was probably a premium and a cat would command a fee. Why would there be cats when people hadn't been there before?
I was just recalling being amazed that there was a time when cats commanded a dear price. During my childhood, cats got pregnant all the time because no one spayed and neutered, so if your cat got out during heat, you'd have to struggle to find homes you could give the kittens to. It was a relief for neighbors to be able to give kittens away to homes they thought might take care of them.

I was amazed at the reality that someone would pay a very large amount for a kitten.
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Old 01-01-2018, 06:28 PM
 
Location: Southern Oregon
934 posts, read 1,121,918 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ClaraC View Post
I was just recalling being amazed that there was a time when cats commanded a dear price. During my childhood, cats got pregnant all the time because no one spayed and neutered, so if your cat got out during heat, you'd have to struggle to find homes you could give the kittens to. It was a relief for neighbors to be able to give kittens away to homes they thought might take care of them.

I was amazed at the reality that someone would pay a very large amount for a kitten.
I'm sure they were high demand!
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Old 01-01-2018, 06:30 PM
 
Location: Southern Oregon
934 posts, read 1,121,918 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pat Answers View Post
I read them as an adult because I'd missed a few growing up. There are a lot of facts in Pioneer Girl. I'm not a fan of Rose. One book I picked up told all about her and her politics, etc. But there is much information all over the internet about the real Ingals family. Pictures and all. Ma was not a looker. Pa wasn't handsome. In his later years they left their farm and took a house in town where he did carpentry work for people to support them. He left the farm because he couldn't do the farming any more.

He died first and Caroline took in boarders to support herself. They said she was a very shy person.

None of the kids had children except Laura I believe. I thought that was strange. She and Almonzo moved to the Ozarks, and I got the impression she never went back to visit. I read that Almonzo had some sort of club foot but it wasn't clear if he'd always had that or something happened later.

Lots of info all over the net with pictures, etc., very interesting. Yes, some of the writing in her books would not fly today, but back then yes that was the way things were.

They did go back to visit. I can't remember if it was once or twice.
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Old 01-01-2018, 06:37 PM
 
Location: Southern Oregon
934 posts, read 1,121,918 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rodentraiser View Post
I'm aware the books were classified as fiction (you'd be surprised at the number of people who don't know they're fiction) and that they are not true to life in the sequence of how things happened. But when you deal with other people today who hold these books up and use them to make an example of how life should be, like some politicians do, then you have to consider some of the contradictory things that appear in the books. Especially the outright untruths in the books.

For instance, Laura has been quoted as saying everything she put in the books happened, which could lead some people to believe everything in the books is true. But we already know from the first book that the statement that Ma had been very stylish and had her dresses made by a dressmaker in the East where she married Pa that that's not true at all. I think Ma was born and raised in Wisconsin.

I know Pa had wanderlust, and it's interesting to me that he wanted to go to Oregon. His reason for leaving the Big Woods was because he had been so tired of grubbing trees out of the ground to farm it. Had he ended up in Oregon, I think he would have been grubbing trees out of farmland again. And it's also interesting that if Ma wanted her daughters to get schooling, well, Oregon had been being settled for over 40 years at that time and there were well established towns and schools there then. Probably better than the ones in De Smet, South Dakota, where the family ended up staying.

But it is fascinating to think of what Laura might have written if she had added the last chapter in America's settlement about taking a covered wagon across the west to Oregon.
How can there be downright untruths when they are fiction? Laura herself said they were fiction. She added characters, combined characters, deleted periods of times and events in her life. Yes some of it is based on true events but it's still a fictionalized account.
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Old 01-20-2018, 01:16 AM
 
Location: East Side
522 posts, read 712,197 times
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I thought Mary was a pain in the ass and Laura should have had the blue hair ribbons.
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Old 01-20-2018, 02:00 AM
 
Location: Southern California
12,672 posts, read 14,811,469 times
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I see a few here have never read the books. I, too, have never read even one of these books, but I watched the TV show from start to finish when I was a child in the 80s. This was one of my favorite shows. Did anyone watch the show too (starring Michael Landon as Charles, Karen Grassle as Caroline, etc.)?

I wonder how similar or different the show was from the books. Someone in here said that Mary never married, but she did in the TV show. She married a lawyer (Adam Kendall was his character name) who could see at one point but became blind as well due to scurvy, if I recall. They later ran a blind school together.
Actually, I just Googled it & got a little mixed up. Her husband was blind since a child, I guess (which I never remember that ever being revealed in the show) & his eyesight was restored as an adult. Here's the page that shows it if you're interested:

Adam Kendall | Little House on the Prairie Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia

Do the books have the wealthy Oleson family with the two kids Nellie & Willie?
Was there a character named Elmer Miles in the books?
Just throwing a couple of random things out there that I'm wondering.

I can't say how the books were, but I loved the show! Many of you may be interested to see what's on this site & there's a Books section & a tiny discussion forum too (don't know how active it is):

Little House on the Prairie Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia
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Old 01-20-2018, 07:29 AM
 
4,707 posts, read 4,370,172 times
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I have only now just read read Little House in the Big Woods, and Little House on the Prairie.
I don't really see much disturbing (though from reading this thread it sounds more like you are referring to much later on). I find it very interesting just to think about being that remote and what a big deal it is to be around other people. At this point they are leaving their lovely home because it is in Indian Territory and it is not legal to be there. I don't focus much on the details of building and such but it is fascinating how things got done with next to no help......and that a neighbor was so important even if you only saw them every few months.
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Old 01-21-2018, 09:17 AM
 
5,111 posts, read 3,376,093 times
Reputation: 11547
I have fond memories of reading the books because I read them to my daughter when she was little, as bedtime stories. I later read the more adult accounts on my own. The Long Winter is the one that stands out to me the most today and the one that made the biggest impression on both of us. The imagery was vivid as to how hard it was to survive under those conditions. I thought my daughter might be interested in watching the TV series after reading the books, but she didn't. She said the books were better.

Btw I visited De Smet last year on a cross-country road trip. It's kind of a sad place with most of the things open dedicated to Laura tourism. I couple of the buildings have been moved from their original locations, but it was still interesting to see them.
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Old 01-27-2018, 12:14 PM
 
Location: Southern Oregon
934 posts, read 1,121,918 times
Reputation: 1134
Quote:
Originally Posted by Forever Blue View Post
I see a few here have never read the books. I, too, have never read even one of these books, but I watched the TV show from start to finish when I was a child in the 80s. This was one of my favorite shows. Did anyone watch the show too (starring Michael Landon as Charles, Karen Grassle as Caroline, etc.)?

I wonder how similar or different the show was from the books. Someone in here said that Mary never married, but she did in the TV show. She married a lawyer (Adam Kendall was his character name) who could see at one point but became blind as well due to scurvy, if I recall. They later ran a blind school together.
Actually, I just Googled it & got a little mixed up. Her husband was blind since a child, I guess (which I never remember that ever being revealed in the show) & his eyesight was restored as an adult. Here's the page that shows it if you're interested:

Adam Kendall | Little House on the Prairie Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia

Do the books have the wealthy Oleson family with the two kids Nellie & Willie?
Was there a character named Elmer Miles in the books?
Just throwing a couple of random things out there that I'm wondering.

I can't say how the books were, but I loved the show! Many of you may be interested to see what's on this site & there's a Books section & a tiny discussion forum too (don't know how active it is):

Little House on the Prairie Wiki | FANDOM powered by Wikia

Which is funny, because if you never had sight, you wouldn't be able to have your sight restored and be able to see like anyone else. Sight is not just what your eye recieves and sends to the brain; it's what the brain has learned since birth to interpret and understand and interact with. Things like direction, size, depth perception aren't just built in knowledge. It's information that your brain has decoded through trial and error.

No, Mary never got her sight back.

And Yes, I read all the books and enjoy them much more than the series.
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Old 01-27-2018, 12:16 PM
 
Location: Southern Oregon
934 posts, read 1,121,918 times
Reputation: 1134
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gorges View Post
I have fond memories of reading the books because I read them to my daughter when she was little, as bedtime stories. I later read the more adult accounts on my own. The Long Winter is the one that stands out to me the most today and the one that made the biggest impression on both of us. The imagery was vivid as to how hard it was to survive under those conditions. I thought my daughter might be interested in watching the TV series after reading the books, but she didn't. She said the books were better.

Btw I visited De Smet last year on a cross-country road trip. It's kind of a sad place with most of the things open dedicated to Laura tourism. I couple of the buildings have been moved from their original locations, but it was still interesting to see them.

I've never visited DeSmet, but my impression is pretty much what you describe. I think if I went there, the one thing I'd like to see is the line of Cottonwood trees where the Claim shanty was, if they are still there. I know they were still standing there alive 20 years ago. I think that living connection is amazing.
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