The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder

by William Anderson

  We are safe from floods but our gardens were simply drowned and crops could not be planted until late. We are having hot, dry weather now.

  I hope you are not suffering too much from the eastern heat wave.

  Sincerely yours,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  Canning berries and garden stuff

  Laura and Rose offered information for Irene Smith’s article in the Horn Book Magazine.

  JULY 20, 1943

  Dear Miss Nordstrom,

  Sorry to have delayed so long in answering your letter. I have been very busy and canning berries and garden stuff. But the real reason for my slowness has been the difficulty of filling in detail that might be of use to you.

  There are of course a number of books that might be written of our ups and downs, of sickness and loss, of gains and successes, for as with everyone our life has been full of such things, but for purpose of Miss Smith’s article, they would go too far afield.

  I am sorry I have no large envelop, but must crowd this into a smaller one. Hoping it will be in time for Miss Smith, I will mail it at once.

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  It is like getting a letter from home

  In 1942 Harper & Brothers printed a four-page promotional brochure on the Little House books. Biographical information and photos of Laura at seventeen and seventy were included, to answer questions about her life and requests for photos. Aubrey Sherwood used material and book jackets from the brochure for articles in the De Smet News.

  NOVEMBER 22, 1943

  Dear Mr. Sherwood,

  Many thanks for the Nov. 11th copy of the “News” just received. Although most of the names mentioned are strange to us, still it is like getting a letter from home.

  I thank you too for your nice feature on my books and family and am looking forward to seeing the next issue featuring my books as a series with reproductions of the covers.

  Please send a copy of that number to Rose Wilder Lane, Route 4, Box 42, Danbury, Connecticut, and also one to Ralph O. Watters, editor, Mansfield Mirror, Mansfield, Missouri.

  Mr. Wilder and I are as well as usual and wish you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  Beginning in 1942, Harper and Brothers printed a four page brochure on Laura Ingalls Wilder and her books. Thousands were sent to readers by Harper and by Laura herself.

  CHAPTER 5

  THE LAST GOLDEN YEARS (1944–1949)

  Laura and Manly at home on Rocky Ridge Farm, May 1947.

  As Laura neared eighty and Manly neared ninety, they were content with their peaceful retired life on Rocky Ridge. The farming years were over. Laura’s writing years were over. They had finally reached a safe haven of financial security.

  Laura was asked continually to write another book. But she considered her story told. And her collaborator, Rose, was finished with fiction. Rose was committed to write what Laura called “American propaganda,” referring to Rose’s passion for a return to small government, absolute individual freedom, and a life free of interference by politicians in office. Those were underlying political subtexts that flowed as philosophical threads through the Little House books.

  The closing years of Laura and Manly’s companionable life together were sweet ones. As Laura wrote of their early married life, “It was a carefree, happy time, for two people thoroughly in sympathy can do pretty much as they like.” It was always that way for Laura and Manly, and their years together ended as they had started.

  We have shared so many nearly alike experiences

  JANUARY 28, 1944

  Dear Miss Redmond,

  Your letter is very amusing and interesting. There certainly should be a bond of sympathy and understanding between us, we have shared so many nearly alike experiences.

  The Hambletonians were grand old horses, our favorites after the Morgans. They could travel so beautifully and swiftly. Mr. Wilder and I often bewail the fact that there are no such horses in these mechanized days.

  I am sorry but I cannot tell you how to make those vanity cakes that Ma used to make.

  It seems strange that I never learned to make them. I know they were mostly egg and were fried in deep fat as doughnuts are. They were to be eaten hot. Were crunchy, not sweetened and were so light, really a bubble that they seemed almost nothing in one’s mouth. They were yellow in color when fried. I suppose the egg yolks helped in their coloring. They simply puffed up when fried until they were nothing but a bubble. Vanity cakes.

  I have thought I would experiment and try to make some, but never have. Mother was gone when I got around to wanting to know and my sisters did not know. Sorry!

  Sincerely yours,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  All the children are begging for another book

  FEBRUARY 9, 1944

  Dear Miss Nordstrom,

  The Horn Book containing Miss Smith’s article is a grand piece of writing and I am greatly pleased with her appreciation of the Little House books.

  I would like some copies of the brochure on my books. I get so many requests for my photo, which I cannot afford to send, and one of the brochures would do even better.

  It is out of the question for me to get any photos now. We had Pa’s fiddle photographed just in time, for the studio is closed now, the photographer gone to the war.

  All the children are begging for another book, and I must begin to think about it. . . .

  They think of me as I am in the books

  Schoolchildren from Saginaw, Michigan, developed a long correspondence with Laura Ingalls Wilder.

  MARCH 27, 1944

  Dear Miss Dunning,

  It is sweet of your boys and girls to call me “Laura.” Of course they think of me as I am in the books when I would have been their playmate.

  I thank you for your appreciation of my work and the kind things you say about it.

  You must be a delightful teacher for those little third graders and I want to thank you also for the pictures they drew for me.

  It was, I am sure, your idea and it must have taken a great deal of kindly patience to help them in their work.

  With best regards I am

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  We would leave the violin with some museum

  In 1931 Laura and Manly brought Pa’s fiddle, the most treasured family heirloom, from South Dakota to Rocky Ridge. No one knew how Charles Ingalls acquired it on the frontier; it was likely an inexpensive German copy of the work of the Italian violin maker Nicolò Amati of Cremona. When Ursula Nordstrom proposed a department store window display of the Little House books in New York, she asked Laura for family artifacts to exhibit. “She sent us Pa’s fiddle!” Miss Nordstrom exclaimed. A label on the violin suggested it was an authentic Amati. Harper could not be responsible for an Amati, and returned it promptly. In 1944 Laura offered the fiddle to the South Dakota State Historical Society.

  APRIL 11, 1944

  Dear Mr. Fox,

  I am sure you will pardon my delay in replying to your letter when you learn that I have been quite ill and unable to attend to it.

  Today I am mailing you autographed books as you requested and I take pleasure in presenting to South Dakota Historical Society the three volumes needed to complete the set of my “Little House Books.”

  I have the old violin, “Pa’s fiddle” that he played through all my books. It is a “Nicolaus Amati Cremonensis” and still has a beautiful voice.

  Would your historical society like to have this violin to keep on exhibition with my books? If so what arrangements could be made and what assurance could you give me that the instrument will be preserved safely and with the care necessary?

  Neither my daughter Rose Wilder Lane, nor my sister Mrs. Caroline Swanzey of Keystone, South Dakota, has anyone to whom to bequeath the violin and none of us can play it. No one else has any interest in it a
s we are the only ones of the family living.

  We have thought we would leave the violin with some museum or the like. It only remains to decide where.

  If you are interested please let me hear from you.

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  My favorite . . . is the very first one

  MAY 6, 1944

  Dear Miss Fosness and Pupils,

  I am very glad you like my Little House books so much, and I thank you for your nice letters.

  It must be great fun to go to such a small school. Really, your letters made me rather homesick for the little schools I used to go to when I was your age and for the two nice ones I taught. The first one I taught was pretty bad, but there are not many like that.

  I think my favorite among the books is the very first one, “Little House in the Big Woods.” I always loved the stories Pa used to tell us.

  Again thanking you for the kind things you say of my stories and for recommending them to others for reading, I remain

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  Today I am sending you . . . my father’s violin

  Lawrence Fox commented, “I have read of your career with much interest and I rejoice at the success you have attained. I don’t see how you found time for everything.”

  MAY 15, 1944

  Mr. Lawrence. Fox

  Pierre, S. Dakota

  Dear Sir,

  I hope you have quite recovered from your indisposition by now. Spring here is very backward also, rainy and cold.

  Today I am sending you, by express, collect, my father’s violin.

  My sister, my daughter and I have . . . the stipulation that it be played at least four times a year. Kept in a case on display the rest of the time.

  Perhaps your Society has meetings where its music would be suitable or you may have, in your city, violinists who would find it interesting to play this violin. As no doubt you know, if it is played its tone will constantly improve . . . but if it is not played it will deteriorate. If it is kept in voice there is no reason why it shouldn’t be playing the old music in South Dakota a hundred years from now. It has not been played for over a year and I am anxious it should be as soon as possible.

  As you see, the bow is not in shape. It needed re-stringing, but the attempt was a failure and the mother-of-pearl holder was broken. Another bow would need to be used in playing the violin.

  I am enclosing copy for a card, I should like to have printed and placed on display with the violin.

  As you see the violin is the property of your Historical Society. I am trusting it to your care with the feeling that it has found its proper home and I trust it will create interest and give pleasure for many years to come.

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  They are poor little rich children

  Dorothy Nace Tharpe read the Little House books to her students in Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1940s. “We’ve been reading them all year,” she wrote. “I just had to pick up the book to have complete expectant silence waiting for me. . . . I hope that when I have a family of my own, I may be able to read all the books as part of the household tradition.” As a professor’s wife, Dorothy Tharpe introduced the books to her own children. The family traveled to the books’ sites. Dorothy researched and wrote on the subject, and gave many presentations about Little House lore.

  MAY 19, 1944

  Dear Miss Nace,

  It pleases me very much that you have enjoyed my books and perhaps they have had a good influence on the children in your school.

  The children today have so much that they have lost the power to truly enjoy anything. They are poor little rich children.

  I fear my letter is late for your school term, but perhaps you can let the children know that I answered their letter.

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  Much different from the schools I knew

  MAY 19, 1944

  Pearl Creek School

  Dear Fourth Graders,

  Your letter is very interesting. It must be fun to ride in the busses to school and it certainly is much different from the schools I knew when I was young.

  We have only one child, our daughter Rose Wilder Lane. You may know of her for she writes stories. She lives in Connecticut.

  We moved from De Smet nine years after the time of “These Happy Golden Years” so you see we have lived here a long time.

  Wishing you all a happy vacation,

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  Such terrible things are happening in the world

  A few days after D-Day, the 1944 Allied invasion of France on the Normandy beaches, Laura wrote to George Bye and alluded to the war.

  JUNE 10, 1944

  Dear Mr. Bye,

  Please use your own judgment in selling The Long Winter to Columbia Broadcasting System . . . whatever you do will be perfectly all right with me.

  I shall be pleased to have the book used in a broadcast. . . .

  The Ozarks are beautiful now and in our quiet home it seems impossible that such terrible things are happening in the world.

  Please do excuse the writing in this. It looks like a fan letter from one of my nine year old readers. My ink is poor but not pale.

  Sincerely yours,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  Hope I have not bored you with my reply

  In June 1944, Mrs. George Jones of Rocky Hill, New Jersey, wrote: “I read the Little House books to my small son who is 7 years of age. He enjoyed them and now wants me to start all over again. . . . Haven’t you ever read a wonderful story and then said to yourself, ‘I would like to know the author?’ That is the way I feel.”

  JUNE 27, 1944

  Dear Mrs. Jones,

  It was a pleasure to have your letter, but I have been so busy with the last of house-cleaning and company that I have been slow in answering. I do all my own work and a ten room house takes some doing. . . .

  You are right in thinking I am the Laura of the books, which are altogether my memories.

  These Happy Golden Years is the last book I expect to write, though there are many stories in the years that followed. But I will answer some of your questions.

  We have one child, our daughter Rose, born in the little house. You may know of her—Rose Wilder Lane. She is a writer of short stories, books and magazine articles. Her home is in Connecticut. She has no children, so I am not a grandmother. Carrie and Grace married, but had no children. . . . Carrie and I are the only ones of our family now living. Mary never recovered her sight and did not marry.

  De Smet is a large, very modern town now, but we left there fifty years ago and have lived here ever since.

  I have worn my hair short for a good many years, tailored cut in the back and long enough in the front to curl and fluff around my face. No permanents, just a homemade curl.

  I never smoked nor drank nor do I wear skirts so short as the fashion is. Do not paint my finger nails nor use rouge, just keep my complexion good and powder lightly. My hair is perfectly white. By no stretch of the imagination could I ever be called ultra-modern. My wedding band was a medium wide, plain gold band.

  Almanzo and I live by ourselves on our farm, but we do not farm now. The farm at one time was 200 acres and we kept a herd of cows, mostly Jerseys. Also we kept a flock of leghorn hens, which were my especial care. And always we had fine horses.

  Now we have only three milk goats—Saanens. We have sold the land until we only have 75 acres with the old farm house.

  The land is all meadow, pasture and timber, for Almanzo is 87 years old and I am 77, not able to do so much work now, glad and thankful we are still able to care for ourselves and each other. We have no horses now. Drive a Chrysler car instead.

  I thank you for your kind letter and hope I have not bored you with my reply.

  Yours sincerely,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder


  I am glad you like my stories

  Gloria from Greenwich, Connecticut, wrote praising the Little House books. She prized her answer from Laura, and later sent her a picture she drew. Laura responded: “It is a fine drawing and you are a fine artist. I thought you might like to see what I really looked like when I was seventeen. The printed pictures were taken from photos.” (Laura sent the Harper & Brothers promotional brochure.)

  AUGUST 8, 1944

  My dear Gloria,

  I am glad you like my stories. . . .

  All my schoolmates were scattered long ago. I know of none of them still living.

  Almanzo is very well. We still live by ourselves in our home here.

  Our house burned many years ago and the rag doll Charlotte burned with it.

  With best regards,

  Laura Ingalls Wilder

  You must be very proud of your son

  Carrie Ingalls Swanzey made her final visit to Rocky Ridge Farm in October 1944. Laura and Manly took Carrie sightseeing and they talked over old times. Laura’s pleasure over the family reunion is indicated in this letter, as well as her admiration for the McCallum family’s sacrifices for the work of the war.

  OCTOBER 23, 1944

  Dear Mrs. McCallum,

  Your letter should have been answered before now, but sister Carrie has been visiting me and there seemed no time for letter writing. Carrie and I are the only ones of our family still living and our talks brought the old days back very realistically. She has returned now to her home in the Black Hills of South Dakota and I miss her so much.