That Time I Wanted to be Laura Ingalls When I Grew Up

I was four or five, I don’t remember exactly, the first time I watched Little House on the Prairie. It was an afternoon re-run on our old black and white TV. The TV had dials to change the channels and an antenna on top to help them come in. That was my first introduction to Laura, and I was hooked.

At first, it was probably the costumes that drew me in. A little girl who adored playing dress up, I was taken with Laura and Mary’s long calico dresses, pinafores and bonnets. Then I fell in love with the characters and became enamored with the time period.

I spent hours pretending to be Laura Ingalls. I wore a dress my mom sewed for me and a bonnet I purchased at a historical village on vacation. A blanket fort served as my dug-out home. I kept house with my toy dishes and broom. I imagined that my bed was a wagon in summer and a sleigh in winter. I tried making rag rugs and doing embroidery like the Ingalls girls. I twisted newspaper into fuel for my make-believe fire, pretending it was the straw they used to stay warm during The Long Winter.

For Christmas my parents bought me the entire set of Little House on the Prairie books. I found them weeks early when I was poking around in their closet one day, probably looking for a piece to add to one of my get-ups. Not old enough to read them on my own, my Mother read the entire series to me out loud at bedtime, one chapter at a time. The books captured my imagination even more than the TV show. When I was old enough, I read all the books myself several times over.

I read anything else I could find: biographies, books by Laura’s daughter Rose, cookbooks based on the series. I continued to watch reruns of the show for years. I was fascinated with pioneer life in America. When I ran out of Laura material, I moved on to other historical fiction and non-fiction.

I dreamed of visiting the Laura Ingalls Wilder Museum at Rocky Ridge Farm in Mansfield, MO. With no internet, all I could do was look at brochures I requested through the mail. I was in Jr. High when I finally visited. To walk through her house and see her personal affects, many mentioned in her books, was the ultimate fan-girl experience. There were even letters and manuscripts in her own handwriting.

Now, this week for the first time we’ll get to read Laura’s previously unpublished autobiography. Her handwritten pages that were once turned down by publishers for being too dark because of the realities of life on the prairie. It is the gritty, true story that eventually spawned the famous series in which she edited and sweetened her narrative for the public’s taste. Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography releases this Thursday. I pre-ordered it from Amazon in August. To say I’m a little excited about it is an understatement.

Laura provided hours of entertainment and fodder for my imagination as a child. She launched my interest in books and history that has lasted a lifetime. She inspired my passion to write in elementary school and it still burns today. I can’t wait to curl up with Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography, a cup of coffee and visit with my old friend again.

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