The 32nd President of the United States was Laura’s distant cousin. The genealogical link goes back to Wilder’s great-grandfather, Samuel Ingalls, who married Margaret Delano, the daughter of Anne Ladd and Jonathan Delano. Samuel and Margaret produced Laura’s grandfather, Lansford Whiting Ingalls.

South Dakota in the winter is generally unpleasant and very cold. Back in 1880, when Laura and her family were living in De Smet, South Dakota, they experienced one of the worst winters on record. Ingalls recounted her experiences with this brutal winter in her book, appropriately named The Long Winter (1940).

Wilder mentions that her older sister, Mary went blind from contracting scarlet fever. The disease could cause temporary blindness but not the permanent kind . Modern-day researchers concluded that it was viral meningoencephalitis. Laura probably thought readers would understand scarlet fever better.

In 1911, Laura Ingalls Wilder started her writing career as a columnist for the Missouri Ruralist. Her column gave advice on a number of topics, even explaining how women could be equal partners to their husbands. It was a different time.

She was the second of five children. Her older sister was Mary and her younger siblings were Carrie, Grace, and Charles. Charles died when he was only nine months old. The mid-1800s was a time before modern medicine and survival was slim for rural homesteaders.

Charles and Caroline were homesteaders. That meant they took advantage of the Homestead Act approved by the US government. If they took claim to a piece of land by setting up a farm on it, they could purchase that land at a very low price or get it for free by cultivating it. They tried to homestead land that was a part of the Osage Indian reservation but that was constantly interrupted by bad luck, such as very harsh winters, crop loss, or loss of land.

Laura and her sisters were mainly home schooled since they moved a lot. They attended regular schools whenever possible alongside other homesteading families. But farm work and travel time still had them learning from home.

Laura wrote about a terrifying scene straight out of a horror movie. Locusts destroyed their wheat crop and tortured people in their area. This horrific event did happen. The Ingalls family lived in Minnesota during that time.

Laura passed the exam required to teach. Her family needed the money to send Mary to a special school for the blind. Laura received her teaching certificate in 1882 and went to teach at Bouchie School, just 12 miles away from her parents’ farm.

Almanzo Wilder was a family friend who would pick Laura up at her schoolhouse every Friday. He’d take her to her parents’ farm, and then bring her back to her workplace on Sundays. Those 12-mile carriage rides had Laura and Almanzo falling in love. They married on August 25, 1885.

The first few years of marriage were tough. Both contracted diptheria in the spring of 1888. Then Almanzo almost lost his life to a stroke during his recovery from the disease. Their second child was born in August of 1889 but the boy only lived for nine days. Then their house burned down later in that same month.

In 1894, Laura, Almanzo and daughter Rose moved to Mansfield, Missouri. The Wilders lived in the farm house – dubbed Rocky Ridge Farm – until their deaths. The house had two rooms but Almanzo would add more rooms later on.

Rose Wilder Lane, it was said, wrote most of, or at least part of, the Little House book series. Laura received very little formal education hence the theory. Some records proved that Rose helped with Pioneer Girl, Laura’s autobiography. Notes in the margins of the Little House manuscripts show that Rose did help with the editing process.

Little House on the Prairie ran from 1974 until 1983. It was broadcast on NBC, and was really successful. Nine seasons of the show had the Ingalls children growing up on the farm alongside their father Charles (Michael Landon) and mother Caroline (Karen Grassle).

Laura and Almanzo Wilder, together with daughter Rose, were victims of the Stock Market crash of 1929. It was the Great Depression that inspired Rose and Laura to turn Laura’s life into a series of books. Connections in the publishing industry turned their idea into a reality. As a result, the Wilders were able to recover some of the money they lost.

Laura Ingalls Wilder passed away in her sleep on February 10, 1957. She outlived Almanzo by 8 years and spent the last years of her life surrounded by friends and family. Laura connected with many of her fans. Rose Wilder passed away only 11 years later in 1968.

In her last book, “These Happy Golden Years,” Laura recounted the time she told Almanzo that she would not utter the word “obey” when it came time to say their wedding vows. Her reason was that she did not want to make promises she couldn’t keep. Almanzo could care less.

Laura’s work received its fair share of criticism due to its racist and dehumanizing portrayals of Native and Black Americans. The American Library Association renamed its Laura Ingalls Wilder Lifetime Achievement Award to “The Children’s Literature Legacy Award” in 2018. Some parts of her books have been edited with scholars and authors calling for the books to be taught to children within the proper context.

General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), granted permission for “The Long Winter” to be published under the title “Nagai Fuyu” in 1949. The books recounted tales of hardships and rugged individualism while finding joy in simplicity which resonated in Japan, quickly gaining widespread popularity.

The original manuscript of “Pioneer Girl” was preserved and posthumously published in 2014 — 84 years after it was written. The annotated autobiography for adult audiences rocketed to the top of bestseller lists around the country. Laura’s successes with her other novels were all sprung from this very first memoir.