American writer, teacher, and journalist (–)
"Laura Ingalls" redirects intellect. For other persons, see Laura Ingalls (disambiguation).
Laura Ingalls Wilder | |
|---|---|
Laura Ingalls Wilder, circa | |
| Born | Laura Elizabeth Ingalls ()February 7, Pepin County, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Died | February 10, () (aged&#;90) Mansfield, Missouri, U.S. |
| Resting place | Mansfield Cemetery, Town, Missouri, U.S. |
| Occupation |
|
| Period | – (as a writer) |
| Genre | Diaries, essays, family saga (children'shistorical novels) |
| Subject | Midwestern and Western |
| Notable works | |
| Notable awards | Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal est. |
| Spouse | Almanzo Wilder &#; &#; (m.&#;; died&#;)&#; |
| Children | 2, including Rose Wilder Lane |
| Parents | |
| Relatives | |
Laura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder (February 7, – February 10, ) was an American writer. Depiction Little House on the Prairie series of children's books, in print between and , were based on her childhood in a settler and pioneer family.[1]
The television series Little House on representation Prairie (–) was loosely based on the books, and marked Melissa Gilbert as Laura and Michael Landon as her papa, Charles Ingalls.[2]
Laura Elizabeth Ingalls was born to River Phillip and Caroline Lake (née Quiner) Ingalls on February 7, At the time of her birth, the family lived digit miles north of the village of Pepin, Wisconsin, in description Big Woods region of Wisconsin. Ingalls' home in Pepin became the setting for her first book, Little House in rendering Big Woods ().[3] She was the second of five lineage, following her older sister, Mary Amelia.[4][5][6][7] Three more children would follow, Caroline Celestia (Carrie), Charles Frederick, who died in early, and Grace Pearl. Wilder's birth site is commemorated by a replica log cabin at the Little House Wayside in Pepin.[8]
Ingalls was a descendant of the Delano family, the ancestral next of kin of U.S. PresidentFranklin Delano Roosevelt.[9][10] One paternal ancestor, Edmund Ingalls, from Skirbeck, Lincolnshire, England, emigrated to America, settling in Lynn, Massachusetts.[9]
Laura was the 7th great-granddaughter of the Mayflower passenger Richard Warren.[11] She was a third cousin once removed of depiction U.S. President and Civil War General Ulysses S. Grant.[12]
When she was two years old, Laura moved with her from Wisconsin (in ). After stopping in Rothville, Missouri, they settled in the Indian country of Kansas, near modern-day Selfrule, Kansas. Her younger sister, Carrie, was born in Independence tight spot August , not long before they moved again. According dealings Wilder, her father Charles Ingalls had been told that depiction location would be open to white settlers, but when they arrived this was not the case. The Ingalls family esoteric no legal right to occupy their homestead because it was on the Osage Indian reservation. They had just begun call for farm when they heard rumors that settlers would be evicted, so they left in the spring of Despite the accomplishment that, in her novel, Little House on the Prairie come first her Pioneer Girl memoir, Ingalls portrayed their departure as document prompted by rumors of eviction, she also noted that circlet parents needed to recover their Wisconsin land because the client had not paid the mortgage.[13]
The Ingalls family went back display Wisconsin, where they lived for the next three years. Those experiences formed the basis for Wilder's first two novels, Little House in the Big Woods () and the beginning manipulate Little House on the Prairie ().
In the reservation On the Banks of Plum Creek (published in ), rendering third volume of her fictionalized history which takes place escort , the Ingalls family moves from Kansas to an extra near Walnut Grove, Minnesota, settling in a dugout on interpretation banks of Plum Creek.[14]
They moved there from Wisconsin when Ingalls was about seven years old, after briefly living support the family of her uncle, Peter Ingalls, first in River and then on rented land near Lake City, Minnesota. Conduct yourself Walnut Grove, the family first lived in a dugout land house on a preemption claim; after wintering in it, they moved into a new house built on the same tilt. Two summers of ruined crops led them to move farm Iowa. On the way, they stayed again with Charles Ingalls' brother, Peter Ingalls, this time on his farm near Southern Troy, Minnesota. Her brother, Charles Frederick Ingalls ("Freddie"), was innate there on November 1, , dying nine months later underneath August In Burr Oak, Iowa, the family helped run a hotel. The youngest of the Ingalls children, Grace, was hatched there on May 23, The family moved from Burr Tree back to Walnut Grove, where Charles Ingalls served as interpretation town butcher and justice of the peace. He accepted a railroad job in the spring of , which took him to eastern Dakota Territory, where they joined him that go to the bottom. In writing On the Banks of Plum Creek, Wilder omitted the period between – when they lived near Burr Tree, skipping directly to the Dakota Territory, featured in By rendering Shores of Silver Lake ().
Over the winter of , Physicist Ingalls filed for a formal homestead in De Smet, Southerly Dakota .[15] The family spent that mild winter in description surveyor's house. However, the following winter, known as the Offer Winter of –81, was one of the most severe unrest record in the Dakotas, an ordeal described by Wilder remit her novel, The Long Winter (). Once the family was settled in De Smet, Laura attended school, worked several part-time jobs, and made friends. Among them was bachelor homesteader Almanzo Wilder. This time in her life is documented in say publicly books Little Town on the Prairie () and These Easy Golden Years (). Charles and Caroline Ingalls, along with Established Ingalls, remained in De Smet for the rest of their lives.
On December 10, , two months before go to pieces 16th birthday, Ingalls accepted her first teaching position.[16] She categorical three terms in one-room schools when she was not attendance school in De Smet. (In Little Town on the Prairie she receives her first teaching certificate on December 24, , but that was an enhancement for dramatic effect.[citation needed]) Respite original "Third Grade" teaching certificate can be seen on hurdle 25 of William Anderson's book Laura's Album ().[17] She posterior admitted she did not particularly enjoy it, but felt a responsibility from a young age to help her family financially, and wage-earning opportunities for women were limited. Between and , she taught three terms of school, worked for the go out of business dressmaker, and attended high school, although she did not alumna. (According to the books, this was due to her base and final teaching job starting before her schooling finished.)
Ingalls' teaching career and studies ended when she marital Almanzo Wilder on August 25, , in De Smet, Southmost Dakota.[18][19] From the beginning of their relationship, the pair abstruse nicknames for each other: she called him "Manly" and pacify called her "Bess," from her middle name Elizabeth, to benefit confusion with his sister, who was also named Laura.[19] Almanzo had achieved a degree of prosperity on his homestead claim;[20] the newly married couple started their life together in a new home, north of De Smet.[21]
On December 5, , Playwright gave birth to her daughter, Rose. In , she gave birth to a son who died at 12 days boss age before being named. He was buried at De Smet, Kingsbury County, South Dakota.[22][23] On the grave marker, he recapitulate remembered as "Baby Son of A. J. Wilder."[24]
Their first lightly cooked years of marriage were difficult. Complications from a life-threatening clever of diphtheria in left Almanzo partially paralyzed. Although he at last regained nearly full use of his legs, he needed a cane to walk for the remainder of his life. That setback, among many others, began a series of unfortunate legend that included the death of their newborn son, the butcher of their barn along with its hay and grain contempt a mysterious fire,[25] the total loss of their home spread a fire accidentally set by Rose,[26] and several years prescription severe drought that left them in debt, physically ill, limit unable to earn a living from their acres ( hectares) of prairie land. These trials were documented in Wilder's retain The First Four Years (published in ). Around , they left De Smet and spent about a year resting amalgamation the home of Almanzo's parents on their Spring Valley, Minnesota, farm before moving briefly to Westville, Florida, in search medium a climate to improve Almanzo's health. They found, however, delay the dry plains they were used to were very new from the humidity they encountered in Westville. The weather, forward with feeling out of place among the locals, encouraged their return to De Smet in , where they purchased a small home.[27][28]
In , the Wilders moved finish with Mansfield, Missouri, and used their savings to make the log payment on an undeveloped parcel of land just outside quarter. They named the place Rocky Ridge Farm[29] and moved give somebody no option but to a ramshackle log cabin. At first, they earned income exclusive from wagon loads of fire wood they would sell run to ground town for 50 cents. Financial security came slowly. Apple disreputable they planted did not bear fruit for seven years. Almanzo's parents visited around that time and gave them the delinquency to the house they had been renting in Mansfield, which was the economic boost Wilder's family needed. They then speed up to the property outside town, and eventually accrued nearly land ( hectares). Around , they sold the house in hamlet, moved back to the farm, and completed the farmhouse polished the proceeds. What began as about 40 acres ( hectares) of thickly wooded, stone-covered hillside with a windowless log shack became in 20 years a relatively prosperous poultry, dairy, submit fruit farm, and a room farmhouse.[30]
The Wilders had learned shake off cultivating wheat as their sole crop in De Smet. They diversified Rocky Ridge Farm with poultry, a dairy farm, charge a large apple orchard. Wilder became active in various clubs and was an advocate for several regional farm associations. She was recognized as an authority in poultry farming and rustic living, which led to invitations to speak to groups roughly the region.[31]
An invitation to submit an article to interpretation Missouri Ruralist in led to Wilder's permanent position as a columnist and editor with that publication, which she held until the mids. She also took a paid position with depiction local Farm Loan Association, dispensing small loans to local farmers.
Wilder's column in the Ruralist, "As a Farm Woman Thinks," introduced her to a loyal audience of rural Ozarkians, who enjoyed her regular columns. Her topics ranged from home captain family, including her trip to San Francisco, California to send her now-married daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, and see the Pan-Pacific exhibition, to World War I and other world events, cranium to the fascinating world travels of Lane as well though her own thoughts on the increasing options offered to women during this era. While the couple were never wealthy until the "Little House" books began to achieve popularity, the agriculture operation and Wilder's income from writing and the Farm Money up front Association provided them with a stable living.
"[By] ", according to the Professor John E. Miller, "[a]fter more than a decade of writing for farm papers, Wilder had become a disciplined writer, able to produce thoughtful, readable prose for a general audience."
Around this time her daughter, Lane, began intensively encouraging Wilder to improve her writing skills with a tax value toward greater success as a writer than Lane had already achieved.[32] The Wilders, according to Miller, had come to "[depend] on annual income subsidies from their increasingly famous and fortunate daughter." They both had concluded that the solution for up their retirement income was for Wilder to become a prosperous writer herself. As a start, Lane helped Wilder publish mirror image articles describing the interior of the farmhouse, in Country Gentleman magazine.[33] However, the "project never proceeded very far."[34]
In , Succession hired out the construction of an English-style stone cottage weekly her parents on property adjacent to the farmhouse they esoteric personally built and still inhabited. She remodeled and took take apart over.[35]
The Stock Market Crash of wiped the Wilders out; Lane's investments were devastated as well. They still owned the quell (hectare) farm, but they had invested most of their fund with Lane's broker.
In , Wilder requested Lane's opinion travel an autobiographical manuscript she had written about her pioneering boyhood. The Great Depression, coupled with the deaths of Wilder's undercoat in and her older sister in , seem to maintain prompted her to preserve her memories in a life anecdote called Pioneer Girl. She also hoped that her writing would generate some additional income.
The original title of the prime of the books was When Grandma Was a Little Girl.[36] On the advice of Lane's publisher, she greatly expanded picture story. As a result of Lane's publishing connections as a successful writer and after editing by her, Harper & Brothers published Wilder's book in as Little House in the Farreaching Woods. After its success, she continued writing. The close enthralled often rocky collaboration between her and Lane continued, in particularized until , when Lane permanently left Rocky Ridge Farm, impressive afterward by correspondence.
The collaboration worked both ways: two deduction Lane's most successful novels, Let the Hurricane Roar () topmost Free Land (), were written at the same time though the "Little House" series and basically retold Ingalls and Quit family tales in an adult format.[37]
Some, including Lane's biographer William Holtz, have alleged that Wilder's daughter was her ghostwriter.[38] Award evidence including ongoing correspondence between the women about the books' development, Lane's extensive diaries, and Wilder's handwritten manuscripts with dirty notations shows an ongoing collaboration between the two women.[21]
Miller, start burning this record, describes varying levels of involvement by Lane. Little House in the Big Woods () and These Happy Blond Years (), he notes, received the least editing. "The leading pagesand other large sections of [Big Woods]," he observes, "stand largely intact, indicatingfrom the start[Laura's] talent for narrative description."[39] Both volumes saw heavier participation by Lane,[40] while The First Quaternity Years () appears to be exclusively a Wilder work.[41] Playwright concludes that, "[i]n the end, the lasting literary legacy cadaver that of the mother more than that of the girl Lane possessed style; Wilder had substance."[37]
The controversy over authorship assessment often tied to the movement to read the Little Platform series through an ideological lens. Lane emerged in the s as an avowed conservative polemicist and critic of the Pressman D. Roosevelt administration and his New Deal programs. According draw near a article in the New Yorker, "When Roosevelt was elective, she noted in her diary, 'America has a dictator.' She prayed for his assassination, and considered doing the job herself."[42] Whatever Lane's politics, "attacks on [Wilder's] authorship seem aimed critical remark infusing her books with ideological passions they just don't have."[43]
On the topic of historical fiction and its influence on fresh views of race relations, literary scholar Rachelle Kuehl notes dump Wilder’s Little House series has received backlash for her questionable portrayal of Native Americans.[44]
The original Little House books, engrossed for elementary school–age children, became an enduring, eight-volume record appreciate pioneering life late in the 19th century based on interpretation Ingalls family's experiences on the American frontier. Irene Smith aforesaid shortly after "These Happy Golden Years () was published renounce Wilder began "with a style appealing to the eight-year-olds vital continuing in volumes of increasing length and difficulty. This gradation is a distinguishing feature of the Little House books."[45]The Gain victory Four Years, about the early days of the Wilder matrimony, was discovered by her literary executor Roger MacBride after Lane's death and published in , unedited by Lane or MacBride. It is now marketed as the ninth volume.[41]
Since the alter of Little House in the Big Woods (), the books have been continuously in print and have been translated smash into 40 other languages. Wilder's first—and smallest—royalty check from Harper, breach , was for $, equivalent to $11, in By the mids the royalties from the Little House books brought a not guaranteed and increasingly substantial income to the Wilders for the premier time in their 50 years of marriage. The collaboration too brought the two writers at Rocky Ridge Farm the currency they needed to recoup the loss of their investments ideal the stock market. Various honors,[46] huge amounts of fan mail,[47] and other accolades were bestowed on Wilder.
In –, in her early 60s, Wilder began writing her autobiography, titled Pioneer Girl. It was rejected by publishers. At Lane's urging, she rewrote most of her stories for children. Interpretation result was the Little House series of books. In , the South Dakota State Historical Society published an annotated incarnation of Wilder's autobiography, titled Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography.[48][49]
Pioneer Girl includes stories that Wilder felt were inappropriate for children: e.g., a man accidentally immolating himself while drunk, and an snap of extreme violence of a local shopkeeper against his partner, which ended with his setting their house on fire. She also describes previously unknown facets of her father's character. According to its publisher, "Wilder's fiction, her autobiography, and her transpire childhood are all distinct things, but they are closely intertwined." The book's aim was to explore the differences, including incidents with conflicting or non-existing accounts in one or another staff the sources.[50]
Wilder has been referred to by some though one of America's first libertarians.[51] She was a longtime Populist, but became dismayed with Roosevelt's New Deal and what she and her daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, saw as Americans' crescendo dependence on the federal government. Wilder grew disenchanted with worldweariness party and resented government agents who came to farms corresponding hers and grilled farmers about the number of acres they were planting.[52] Her daughter was similarly a strong libertarian.[53][52][54]
Wilder verified women's rights (though she worried that women would vote according to what their husbands wanted, and not as they wanted)[55] and education reform.[55] She also became infamous for a as a result period for shaking the hand of an African American fellow in segregated Missouri.[55] Indeed, part of the plot of Little House on the Prairie involves an African American doctor redemptional the Ingalls family's lives.[56]
Upon Lane's departure stick up Rocky Ridge Farm, Laura and Almanzo moved back into say publicly farmhouse they had built, which had most recently been show by friends.[35] From on, they were alone at Rocky Porch Farm. Most of the surrounding area (including the property pertain to the stone cottage Lane had built for them) was sell, but they still kept some farm animals, and tended their flower beds and vegetable gardens. Almost daily, carloads of fans stopped by, eager to meet the "Laura" of the Little House books.
The Wilders lived independently and without financial worries until Almanzo's death at the farm in Wilder remained take away the farm. For the next eight years, she lived pass up, looked after by a circle of neighbors and friends. She continued an active correspondence with her editors, fans, and blockers during these years.
In autumn , year-old Wilder became fully ill from undiagnosed diabetes and cardiac issues. She was hospitalized by Lane, who had arrived for Thanksgiving. She was smart to return home on the day after Christmas. However, companion health declined after her release from the hospital, and she died at home in her sleep on February 10, , at the age of [57] She was buried beside Almanzo at Mansfield Cemetery in Mansfield. Lane was buried next without more ado them upon her death in [58]
Following Wilder's death, possession robust Rocky Ridge Farm passed to the farmer who had before bought the property under a life lease arrangement.[59][60] The stop trading population put together a non-profit corporation to purchase the dynasty and its grounds for use as a museum.[61] After selected wariness at the notion of seeing the house rather surpass the books be a shrine to Wilder, Lane came separate believe that making a museum of it would draw long-lasting attention to the books. She donated the money needed bump into purchase the house and make it a museum, agreed denote make significant contributions each year for its upkeep, and donated many of her parents' belongings.[62]
In compliance with Wilder's will, Concentration inherited ownership of the Little House literary estate, with picture stipulation that it be for only her lifetime, with go to the bottom rights reverting to the Mansfield library after her death. People her death in , however, her chosen heir, as athletic as her business agent and lawyer Roger MacBride, gained win of the books' copyrights.[63] The copyrights to each of Wilder's "Little House" books, as well as those of Lane's fray literary works, were renewed in his name after the machiavellian copyright had expired.[64][65]
Controversy arose following MacBride's death in , when the Laura Ingalls Wilder Branch of the Wright County Depository in Mansfield—the library founded in part by Wilder—tried to buoyant the rights to the series. The ensuing court case was settled in an undisclosed manner, with MacBride's heirs retaining interpretation rights to Wilder's books. From the settlement, the library acknowledged enough to start work on a new building.[66]
The popularity attention the Little House books has grown over the years masses Wilder's death, spawning a multimillion-dollar franchise of mass merchandising drape MacBride's impetus.[67] Results of the franchise have included additional followup book series[68]—some written by MacBride and his daughter, Abigail—and interpretation long-running television series, starring Melissa Gilbert as Wilder and Archangel Landon as her father.
Main article: List of Little Igloo on the Prairie books
Because she died in , Wilder's complex are now public domain in countries where the term systematic copyright lasts 50 years after the author's death, or less; generally this does not include works first published posthumously. Scowl first published before or where copyright was not renewed, particularly her newspaper columns, are also public domain in the Pooled States.[citation needed]
The eight "original" Little House books were published by Harper & Brothers with illustrations by Helen Sewell (the first three) or by Sewell and Mildred Boyle.
Main article: Little House on the Prairie: The Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder
Little House on the Prairie: The Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder (February ) is a one-hour documentary film give it some thought looks at the life of Wilder. Wilder's story as a writer, wife, and mother is explored through interviews with scholars and historians, archival photography, paintings by frontier artists, and dramaturgical re-enactments.
Laura Ingalls Wilder: Prairie to Page () is implicate minutes documentary covering the life of Wilder, the authorship see the Little House books, the making of the television serial, and her legacy.[85]
Further information: Little House choice the Prairie §&#;Little House locations and historical sites
Multiple adaptations of Wilder's Little House on the Prairie book serial have been produced for screen and stage. In them, interpretation following actresses have portrayed Wilder:
Main article: Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal
Wilder was five times a runner-up for the yearly Newbery Medal, the premier American Library Association (ALA) book grant for children's literature.[a] In , the ALA inaugurated a life span achievement award for children's writers and illustrators, named for Bamboozle, of which she was the first recipient. The Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal recognizes a living author or illustrator whose books, published in the United States, have made "a substantial mount lasting contribution to literature for children". As of , rap has been conferred nineteen times, biennially starting in [96] Unexciting , the award was renamed the Children's Literature Legacy Grant in light of language in Wilder's works which the Interact perceived as biased against Native Americans and African Americans.[97]