Little House On The Prairie - General Discussion

[jird]

I saw Trick 'R Treat tonight, and in one scene I recognized the background schoolyard noise from LH (where you can hear Laura yelling "Nellie!"). It's funny enough in LH episodes where Laura's the teacher and they're still using it, but I was not expecting it here. 

[debraran]

Speaking of over the top "mean" guys or totally bizarre, the football coach is one of them. Had it on as background while I had dinner. I forgot how bad it was and how Albert with his 3 broken ribs and coaches son with his bloody nose, dominated the script of work harder, play harder, have your grades drop, complain, go back and do it again, get beat up, etc etc.

The lovely demure wife with a** husband was meant to represent some bad coaches but really can any "extra" be a good dad. He didn't have horses to sell, he didn't drink, but still. He wants to trade his son for Albert after one meeting.....please take him. ; )

Also a small thing in the missing items category, but did the blind girls painting she gave Caroline (pretty large) end up with the glass dishes?  : )

Edited October 23, 2022 by debraran

[Blergh]

1 hour ago, debraran said:

Speaking of over the top "mean" guys or totally bizarre, the football coach is one of them. Had it on as background while I had dinner. I forgot how bad it was and how Albert with his 3 broken ribs and coaches son with his bloody nose, dominated the script of work harder, play harder, have your grades drop, complain, go back and do it again, get beat up, etc etc.

The lovely demure wife with a** husband was meant to represent some bad coaches but really can any "extra" be a good dad. He didn't have horses to sell, he didn't drink, but still. He wants to trade his son for Albert after one meeting.....please take him. ; )

Also a small thing in the missing items category, but did the blind girls painting she gave Caroline (pretty large) end up with the glass dishes?  : )

 What I also thought was bogus re the coach episode was that he was utterly oblivious to his poor wife's pleadings (and it seemed she'd been doing so for YEARS) to become more reasonable and try to be a better father to their offspring, yet Albert at the end just makes an offhand remark about how football loses its appeal when it become too intense instead of fun and THAT alone causes the coach to do a 180 re his entire life priorities and philosophy. Yeah, that's as believable as an old hermit having convinced himself for decades that his beautiful wife would one day return once she got bored with theater life and Laura leaving a single Bible verse for him to find got him to face the reality of his wife's death!

 Of course, both these characters were one-shots so who knows if they didn't go back to their old ruts the very next day!

[ctlady]

While watching Laura Ingalls-Wilder Pt1 yesterday.  I just realized a weird inconsistency.  At the end of He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not 2 , Percival doesn't want to get married in a church because he's Jewish, yet here - and in a few episodes after that - he's seen attending Sunday mass with Nellie and her family.  If he was staunch about not getting married in church, why would he attend regular mass?

I also have to admit that I searched all over the internet to find a chunky, black, locked diary similar to the one Eliza Jane had.  I just love the look of that little book

[Zella]

4 minutes ago, ctlady said:

Percival doesn't want to get married in a church because he's Jewish, yet here - and in a few episodes after that - he's seen attending Sunday mass with Nellie and her family.  If he was staunch about not getting married in church, why would he attend regular mass?

I agree it's a very weird inconsistency, but I don't think they were attending mass. I could be wrong, but to me, that's specifically a Catholic service, and their church was always depicted as being a Protestant service. 

[ctlady]

15 minutes ago, Zella said:

but to me, that's specifically a Catholic service, and their church was always depicted as being a Protestant service. 

I just used the term 'mass'.  Regardless of the denomination, it was Sunday church service/worship as opposed to Friday night through Sat afternoon Shabbat temple worship as we see Percival and his father do in Come Let Us Reason Together

[jason88cubs]

Do you think if i went to a store and made a younger person mad to where they wanted to fight me  and started throwing wild punches, do you think if I kept saying "i don't wanna hit you son" over and over they would start crying and hug me?

[Mr. Sparkle]

14 minutes ago, jason88cubs said:

Do you think if i went to a store and made a younger person mad to where they wanted to fight me  and started throwing wild punches, do you think if I kept saying "i don't wanna hit you son" over and over they would start crying and hug me?

I would bet the worst farm in Hero Township on it! 

[Blergh]

6 hours ago, Superclam said:

I would bet the worst farm in Hero Township on it! 

Which one? The Ingallses or the Garveys? BTW, when Alice was teaching,grading papers,etc. was she ALSO doing all the cooking, cleaning,etc. since I never heard a hint that either of the males were attempting to do so?

[Zella]

10 minutes ago, Blergh said:

Which one? The Ingallses or the Garveys? BTW, when Alice was teaching,grading papers,etc. was she ALSO doing all the cooking, cleaning,etc. since I never heard a hint that either of the males were attempting to do so?

LHOTP was always so bad about the actual logistics of pioneer life. I've ranted about this before but they ignore the importance of boardinghouse life for single people, and the burden of domestic chores was a big factor in it. So many of the characters would have been in a boarding house IRL.

[Mr. Sparkle]

7 hours ago, Blergh said:

Which one? The Ingallses or the Garveys? BTW, when Alice was teaching,grading papers,etc. was she ALSO doing all the cooking, cleaning,etc. since I never heard a hint that either of the males were attempting to do so?

It's a good question, since terrible things happened to both families. 

In this case, I was thinking Ingalls, if only for the tornado that only got them. 

[jason88cubs]

it's been awhile since I have seen any of the later episodes but did Caroline work evenings at the restaurant ?

How would Charles eat? Did eh go there to eat and get it for free?

[debraran]

I thought Caroline was supposed to work for a short time to get money for the blind schoolor something they needed. Money was good and she promised to keep everything at home fine.

I thought the restaurant brought some humor and storylines but it never made sense that anyone living hand to mouth could afford it and why would Walnut Grove have that many outsiders coming through that would waste money there vs eating a sandwich from home?

I suppose you suspend reality of how they afforded all the food and how much money they actually made but it helped give them another place to be other than the store or church.

I always wondered why no matter how many good contracts Charles got, extra money Caroline made, extra jobs, they always seemed the same. What really shocked me is when Albert and Laura had so much money from their honey business they could pay for Mary and Adam to go somewhere (and we know what a disaster that was) but it was a LOT of money back then. 60.00! That was a lot of money. I thought when Charles did a dangerous job for 100 it was a lot but his daughter and son hustled that amount with just bees. ; ) Too bad it was "lost" in a sense on the trip. Ingall's curse.

Edited October 29, 2022 by debraran

[Blergh]

18 hours ago, debraran said:

I thought Caroline was supposed to work for a short time to get money for the blind schoolor something they needed. Money was good and she promised to keep everything at home fine.

I thought the restaurant brought some humor and storylines but it never made sense that anyone living hand to mouth could afford it and why would Walnut Grove have that many outsiders coming through that would waste money there vs eating a sandwich from home?

I suppose you suspend reality of how they afforded all the food and how much money they actually made but it helped give them another place to be other than the store or church.

I always wondered why no matter how many good contracts Charles got, extra money Caroline made, extra jobs, they always seemed the same. What really shocked me is when Albert and Laura had so much money from their honey business they could pay for Mary and Adam to go somewhere (and we know what a disaster that was) but it was a LOT of money back then. 60.00! That was a lot of money. I thought when Charles did a dangerous job for 100 it was a lot but his daughter and son hustled that amount with just bees. ; ) Too bad it was "lost" in a sense on the trip. Ingall's curse.

IIRC, Charles had been injured by the millstone hitting him in the chest and arm but sparing his lower body so Caroline went to work at Nellie's Hotel supposedly as a stop-gap measure until Charles's ribs and arm knitted but she was there until she and the rest of them decamped for the mean streets of big bad Burr Oak, Iowa! Anyway, consider the HUGE amount of sheer time and hard work it would have taken Caroline for her farm chores and housework to keep her large family well-fed, cleanly and intactly clothed,etc., I thought it was bogus that neither she nor Charles even thought to ask (much less did the individuals consider volunteering) Laura, Albert or Carrie to take over her tasks while she was working the hotel shift with Grace somehow perfectly fine staying in the high chair  watching Caroline cook and wash dishes the whole time. Yeah, her middle three would have had less time to have adventures or get into mischief and it would have presented a writing challenge but families from way back had had to learn to somehow keep things going on the homefront when both parents (or their single parent) worked!

[debraran]

3 hours ago, Blergh said:

IIRC, Charles had been injured by the millstone hitting him in the chest and arm but sparing his lower body so Caroline went to work at Nellie's Hotel supposedly as a stop-gap measure until Charles's ribs and arm knitted but she was there until she and the rest of them decamped for the mean streets of big bad Burr Oak, Iowa! Anyway, consider the HUGE amount of sheer time and hard work it would have taken Caroline for her farm chores and housework to keep her large family well-fed, cleanly and intactly clothed,etc., I thought it was bogus that neither she nor Charles even thought to ask (much less did the individuals consider volunteering) Laura, Albert or Carrie to take over her tasks while she was working the hotel shift with Grace somehow perfectly fine staying in the high chair  watching Caroline cook and wash dishes the whole time. Yeah, her middle three would have had less time to have adventures or get into mischief and it would have presented a writing challenge but families from way back had had to learn to somehow keep things going on the homefront when both parents (or their single parent) worked!

Yes, that was the "suspend reality" part for sure. It took very long hours to get things done. Grace must have had diaper changes and had to be fed. When viewers watched, I bet many of them thought of their chores getting done quickly with dishwashers, laundry washers and dryers, grocery stores with premade meals and stoves that cooked things much faster. But at least Saint Charles had her work, others were "I'd rather starve".lol.  Funny when Harriet, a woman, was running the store most of the time. I guess the "educated" ones even back then were shown with more sense but I'm glad they had Charles be the somewhat sensible one at times, just a little over the top. Percival was also that way but a city boy.

I had forgotten myself of the outside chores, feeding, milking, getting eggs, tending garden, etc.  It would have been nice to see even a minute clip of kids doing barn work or milking cow etc to make it more believable. Maybe Carrie could have been shown doing something too. ; )

Edited October 30, 2022 by debraran

[jird]

That's what always drove me crazy about the episode where pregnant Laura keels over trying to maintain the orchars while Charles and Almanzo are out of town. She couldn't see the sense in James and Albert splitting up or sharing the chores at her farm and theirs? Or having Carrie and Cassandra at least come help her a little bit? But I guess then we wouldn't have gotten wise Ma telling parables to the kids at the end.

[debraran]

31 minutes ago, jird said:

That's what always drove me crazy about the episode where pregnant Laura keels over trying to maintain the orchars while Charles and Almanzo are out of town. She couldn't see the sense in James and Albert splitting up or sharing the chores at her farm and theirs? Or having Carrie and Cassandra at least come help her a little bit? But I guess then we wouldn't have gotten wise Ma telling parables to the kids at the end.

Yes, and another odd thing. I'm watching the "Adam can see" episode and forgetting the strange story line, why was HIS medical expenses not ever mentioned but Charles had Mary almost get kicked out because he couldn't pay. They don't have money. How did other people they show in the hospital pay? I thought of it when they said he was out of surgery.

I thought the pioneers, like the Amish, were more helpful to each other. Like when they were rabid over the guy who had an accident delivering their seed and his pregnant wife wanted to leave, they helped him out. I thought it took a while for others to help Charles with his broken ribs stack the grain, watching the kids, but I guess that was for effect. ; )

[Zella]

2 hours ago, debraran said:

I thought the pioneers, like the Amish, were more helpful to each other. Like when they were rabid over the guy who had an accident delivering their seed and his pregnant wife wanted to leave, they helped him out. I thought it took a while for others to help Charles with his broken ribs stack the grain, watching the kids, but I guess that was for effect. ; )

The townspeople in that episode are so awful. If that woman had sat the whole town on fire before leaving, I wouldn't have blamed her. 

[Mr. Sparkle]

42 minutes ago, Zella said:

The townspeople in that episode are so awful. If that woman had sat the whole town on fire before leaving, I wouldn't have blamed her. 

Seriously. They went from zero to angry mob in about 20 seconds. 

And of course, even though they said they were staying, we never saw them again. 

[debraran]

2 hours ago, Zella said:

The townspeople in that episode are so awful. If that woman had sat the whole town on fire before leaving, I wouldn't have blamed her. 

Best part was Harriet kicking the ignoramus's out.  ; )

[Blergh]

On 10/30/2022 at 4:14 PM, Superclam said:

Seriously. They went from zero to angry mob in about 20 seconds. 

And of course, even though they said they were staying, we never saw them again. 

That's not the only incident of vigilantism that happened. Let's not forget that when Adam stupidly defended the property fraud who'd swindled virtually all of Walnut Grove, someone threw a brick through his window frightening Adam's still-blind wife Mary. Yet, not only was this individual never charged or even caught, but not even Adam himself considered attempting  to find out WHO deliberately broke his window. So, they and the Ingalls had to live with the knowledge that there was at least one fellow citizen who was willing to vandalize with the probable intent to terrorize them.

[jird]

It's Election Day (in the US) - everybody remember to vote for Elmer!

[Mr. Sparkle]

4 minutes ago, jird said:

It's Election Day (in the US) - everybody remember to vote for Elmer!

For whatever reason, that's one I either missed or skipped. I've only seen it once or twice. 

We never saw Elmer again, did we? 

[Blergh]

22 minutes ago, Superclam said:

For whatever reason, that's one I either missed or skipped. I've only seen it once or twice. 

We never saw Elmer again, did we? 

Nope but somehow the class managed to limb along without a visible class president(and they evidently did NOT let Nellie run things in his place as the runner up).

[jird]

If I had to see this, so do you. 

[Katy M]

19 minutes ago, jird said:

If I had to see this, so do you. 

Whiz Kids. I vaguely remember that show.  I hated break dancing even in the '80s. But, even so, that did not look like particularly good breakdancing.  I think I see why they deleted the scene.

[CountryGirl]

It's better than his letter writing skills. 

[ctlady]

3 hours ago, Superclam said:

For whatever reason, that's one I either missed or skipped. I've only seen it once or twice. 

We never saw Elmer again, did we?

Never saw Dr. LeDeaux again either - even though he agreed to stay on

[Mr. Sparkle]

1 minute ago, ctlady said:

Never saw Dr. LeDeaux again either - even though he agreed to stay on

If I had the time and interest, I would make a list of "important" characters that were around for 1-2 episodes at the most and then were quietly dropped. 

Olga, Mary's friend from "Country Girls," Kezia, the list goes on... 

[jird]

5 minutes ago, Superclam said:

If I had the time and interest, I would make a list of "important" characters that were around for 1-2 episodes at the most and then were quietly dropped. 

Olga, Mary's friend from "Country Girls," Kezia, the list goes on... 

Tinker Jones, Little Lou, stuttering Anna, Jimmy Hill . .  

[Mr. Sparkle]

The Edwards family for a couple seasons there... 

[ctlady]

36 minutes ago, Superclam said:

Olga, Mary's friend from "Country Girls," Kezia, the list goes on...

Wasn't Christy Mary's friend?  When asked how school was, Mary replied, "there's a girl named Christy.  I think she's going to be my best friend".  Olga was the girl with the one leg shorter than the other from Town Party, Country Party.

We first meet Kezia in Castoffs and when the town goes to get her at the end, I believe there's a voice over by LI that she stayed in WG until she died.

We do see her again in The Lake Kezia Monster in S5 so there's some follow up

I would also liked to have seen what became of Anna, Laura's stuttering friend in The Music Box.  And what ever happened to Jason - Laura's friend whom Nellie also liked - from Bunny

Yeah - so many one-offs

[Egg McMuffin]

Rev Alden’s wife, Anna.

[Mr. Sparkle]

Sean Penn. 

[jird]

Jenny who cut off all her hair, along with her Ma and Mr. Mayfield. 

[Blergh]

5 hours ago, CountryGirl said:

It's better than his letter writing skills. 

Or Albert's photographic SPFX ( the girl pen pal couldn't tell every other boy in the shot was about six-years-old and the football itself somehow was gigantic next  to them?!- d'oh).

[jason88cubs]

In the tornado episode where Charles and them were going to head back home and sell their property to that one couple, was that the couple the originally bough it from?

[Mr. Sparkle]

If I'm not mistaken, they bought it from Hanson in "Harvest of Friends." Now that I mention it, I don't think we saw Paddy O'Stereotype again. 

[CheshireCat]

On 10/26/2022 at 11:49 AM, ctlady said:

While watching Laura Ingalls-Wilder Pt1 yesterday.  I just realized a weird inconsistency.  At the end of He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not 2 , Percival doesn't want to get married in a church because he's Jewish, yet here - and in a few episodes after that - he's seen attending Sunday mass with Nellie and her family.  If he was staunch about not getting married in church, why would he attend regular mass?

It probably was just a continuity mistake but I can see why he would do one but not the other.

I think getting married is more meaningful as in, he professes his love and commitment to Nellie before God and this would not be a God he believes in. Whereas a regular service is, well, a regular service. He could still observe his own religious rituals (this may be the wrong word but I don't know what else to call it) and attend church with Nellie.

12 hours ago, Superclam said:

If I had the time and interest, I would make a list of "important" characters that were around for 1-2 episodes at the most and then were quietly dropped.

That would be a very long list. Very, very long.

[Snow Apple]

Another one off was Albert's girlfriend who Nancy almost murdered.

Edited November 9, 2022 by Snow Apple

[debraran]

7 hours ago, Snow Apple said:

Another one off was Albert's girlfriend who Nancy almost murdered.

When LHOP really started to "jump the shark".

[Blergh]

Backing back a little bit. .. I wonder what might  have happened with Christy Kennedy (Tracie Savage)  who was first seen standing up to Nellie and whom Mary said 'was going to be her best friend'! I can only recall her having one big episode in which her father sided against Mrs. Oleson providing the church with a bell in 'Voice of Tinker Jones', then evidently she was in roughly ten episodes as background over the first two seasons before she faded away altogether. Significantly, Miss Anderson herself in her autobio said Tracie Savage HAD been her actually best friend on set.

 I wonder if she might have somehow clashed with Miss Gilbert for daring to be civil to Miss Anderson and that might have hastened her end.

[greekmom]

Was re-watching Come Let us Reason Together.  Never understood why Percival changed his name to Percival from Isaac.  Isaac could have just been a first name coupled with the last name Dalton wouldn't have indicated he was Jewish (since he wanted to drum up business). 

I wonder what type of business his parents had since they don't mention particulars except that ("I had a shop like this back in '66").

Also the dad was really stereotyped.

[Egg McMuffin]

I can’t imagine why anyone would change his name to Percival. Or Perciville, as Nellie would say.

[CountryGirl]

So many tertiary characters - so little time. Let’s see how many I can remember off the top of my head.

Dumb Abel McKay 

Henry Henderson - the guy Laura was so ga-ga over, she used Willie to make him jealous and I’m side-eyeing ML for having siblings MG and JG have this storyline, no matter how innocent  

Plague Dad (he was in both plague episodes and lost his wife and son in both, IIRC

Solomon 

Gideon and his wolf-dog

Baby Message in a Bottle (so much for Laura never forgetting her)

Patrick (the hot one, not the Bobby Brady cameo one)

Cass the full of hot air fugly guy whom I’m sure no one was sorry to never see him again

Amy “I Faked My Own Death” Hearn

Fake Reverend Johnny Cash and June Cash

Bobby Ford and the James Brothers

The Widow Thurman

Uncle Chris who Buck-rogered Ma

Spotted Eagle, his mother, grandfather, and Willy Ames’ Seth

My Ellen

Bart who bullied Ms Wilder

Bubba and his brothers, who bullied the whole town, especially Ma, for her farm fresh eggs

Blind Madeline Stowe before Daniel Day-Lewis found her

Blind Jane, who was retconned as Laura’s BFF, and fell in love with Mr. Edwards

Mr. Pike

Buzzby (from My Ellen)

Jonah, Laura’s Fool’s Gold buddy

Dylan, who wanted to see the ocean

Daniel, whom Laura taught sign language

Little Lou, who rescued Nancy from a well…or something, I have blocked most of S9 out of mind

Loudy, who helped rescue Carrie from a well

[Blergh]

On 11/9/2022 at 8:34 PM, Egg McMuffin said:

I can’t imagine why anyone would change his name to Percival. Or Perciville, as Nellie would say.

Well, the Old Testament Isaac got his name because when God told his father Abraham that his wife Sarah would bear a son in her 90's and both his parents laughed at the idea! IOW, Isaac means 'he will laugh' in Hebrew. So I suppose he might have preferred the tougher name of Percival which means 'one who pierces the valley!' in Old French! Names can have some fascinating meanings!

Or, maybe ML thought Percival  sounded funnier (and/or more out of place on the frontier)  than Isaac!

[Zella]

On 11/9/2022 at 7:20 PM, greekmom said:

Isaac could have just been a first name coupled with the last name Dalton wouldn't have indicated he was Jewish (since he wanted to drum up business). 

Agreed. Biblical names were definitely a thing then and didn't automatically indicate someone was Jewish. He could have gone by Ike like another frontier Isaac, Ike Clanton. 😂

[greekmom]

Goodbye Mrs. Wilder was on yesterday. 

I still can't believe that Mrs. Olsen was ok with showing the art to the kids. It's the freaking 1880s with people who we can say are not as cultured as people in the bigger cities like NYC.

The new kid's dad was hilarious as he was looking at the pictures and commenting.

That would have been Mrs. Olsen if it was Laura's idea.

[ctlady]

3 hours ago, greekmom said:

Goodbye Mrs. Wilder was on yesterday. 

I still can't believe that Mrs. Olsen was ok with showing the art to the kids

She's become a lot more open minded since scolding Willie for peeking into Sylvia's window!

[debraran]

6 hours ago, ctlady said:

She's become a lot more open minded since scolding Willie for peeking into Sylvia's window!

She's always thought of herself as more educated and cultured (and Nel's went to Princeton) but although I could see "art" being different than ogling a peer in her home, she picked "The Rape of the Sabine Women" if i remember correctly for one? Mythology? The writers had fun with that one.