In Little House on the Prairie, Mrs. Scott tells Ma that she “can’t get those Minnesota massacres” out of her head. Ma makes a sharp sound, saying, “Little pitchers have big ears.” That tells Laura that whatever a massacre was, it was something that little girls shouldn’t know about.

The obvious issue, however, is that those “massacres” had everything to do with why Laura and her family were in Kansas, and later, able to homestead in Minnesota.

In 1862, Congress passed the Homestead Act, opening many territories formerly held by American Indians for settlement. In Minnesota, the Lakota and Dakota Indians–commonly, and derogatively, collectively called the Sioux– had earlier signed a treaty that ceded some of their lands to the U.S. government in exchange for money, food, and reservation lands. It’s important to note that while the Lakota and Dakota were and are related, they are not the same tribes.

In lieu of the gold promised for their lands, by 1862, many received luxury trade goods such as top hats, unsuitable for life on prairie and wood reservations. Many were angry, but particularly the Dakota. New white settlement had driven off much of the game that the Dakota relied on for protein, and a Dakota crop failure in 1861 had led to much hunger among the people. Their children, in particular, were suffering from vitamin deficiencies and malnutrition.

Their ways also were changing. New Indian agents in Minnesota were forcing many Dakota to exchange their established patterns of crop-raising and hunting for Euro-American ways, and the agents offered special privileges to those who made those changes. This made many of those who refused to change their ways angry; in many ways the Dakota war was a civil war among Dakota into which their white neighbors were drawn.

The young men formed soldier’s lodges at Shakopee, and began, in the summer of 1862, to agitate for war against the whites. Many Dakota disagreed with the move, especially those Christian Dakota from the northern tribes. Chief Little Crow, in talks with these young men, counseled patience, but in the end, he was persuaded to act as the chief of war. In Council, the Dakota present at Shakopee officially declared war. Some say Little Crow knew the war could not be won.

The Dakota were not a military organization. They did not have a structure such as the U.S. military, and individual warriors could choose to fight nor not; could choose to follow orders or not; could and did act on their own. When the annuity payment in August of 1862 failed to show up on time, Dakota warriors acted across south central Minnesota, routing the Little Sioux Agency and burning and pillaging their way through the homesteads of white settlers.

Witnesses to the destruction and brutality wrote of bodies hacked to pieces lying within steps of their homes; of dinner tables freshly laden with food that looked untouched, as settlers were startled from their meal times. White prisoners, mostly women and children, were taken, and later letters wrote of children being tortured, and women being raped by many Dakota in one evening.

When word reached Fort Ridgely that the Dakota had risen up against the white settlers, it was ill-prepared for any kind of assault. The fort’s young captain, who had the mumps, gathered up a detail to reinforce the Little Sioux Agency, despite being warned that he was riding into a trap.

He and his men were ambushed at Red Ferry. Most were killed.

The remaining soldiers at the fort began preparations for defense by creating barricades and breastworks. The fort had served as an artillery school, and it had cannon, but no walls. It was bare to the prairie around it.

Refugees from the country began pouring into the fort. Defenders expected that the Fort would be the next spot attacked, but fearing defeat, Little Crow went around the fort to attack the small German village of New Ulm.

New Ulm’s citizens, German farmers, had very few weapons, but they did have Jacob Nix Plat, a former soldier who urged all citizens behind hastily constructed barricades in a three-block area downtown. (Three buildings from this time survive.) Many were killed, and as the Dakota left the area, citizens of New Ulm buried their dead in the street and fled to Mankato.

In the end, more than 300 Dakota men, women and children were captured and marched to Fort Snelling, held responsible for the slaying of the white settlers. President Abraham Lincoln commuted the death sentences of all but 38 of the warriors being held. They were executed in the town square of Mankato on December 24, 1862. The remaining Dakota were driven out of Minnesota.

These events happened just five years before Laura was born, and certainly, the memory of the conflicts colored Caroline’s interactions with American Indians. These events also color relationships between whites and American Indians in Minnesota today, with conflict over reconciliation and memory in the commemoration of the tragedies of 1862.

Learn more about this and other related history this summer, at LauraPalooza 2012. Take a tour of the area by car with a map from the Greater Mankato Convention and Visitor’s Bureau, which conveniently points the way to major battle sites and interpretation. It’s well worth the effort.

And this one tells us that the Little House on the Prairie musical is coming back–in Nashville, for now–starting in late September! Hooray!

To underscore a few of the most important points:

1. The $275 bundle with everything is only the top level. Usually there are several versions of the bundle at different price ranges, and we don’t know what those are yet.
2. Money given to PBS is a tax-deductible donation.
3. This is just the first way the things in the bundle are being offered.

It’s true; $275 is indeed a heck of a lot of money. But we might want to look at the big picture . This pledge drive special is a good thing for the Laura Ingalls Wilder community. There is no way it will do anything but generate interest for her. This interest will, in turn, trickle down to the homesites and to groups like the Laura Ingalls Wilder Legacy and Research Association — the only group that promotes Laura-related research and hosts events like LauraPalooza to showcase it, and also hosts this blog. (LIWLRA was actually created because even 75 years after her books began to be published avenues for Laura-related research simply did not exist. Isn’t that crazy?)

Yes, Dean’s DVD is a wonderful production, and we all want to own it. But it’s worth considering that his projects have taken a lot of his personal capital. One can’t expect him not to recoup that if he can. Moreover, we would not have his quality Little House work if he did not care about the product. Registrants of the last LauraPalooza were lucky enough to see the documentary, and to his credit, he edited it afterwards to address the audience’s concerns. He didn’t have to invest that time, or that money.

The fact is, after investigating different methods of getting this documentary out there for three years, this was the best avenue he could find. Heck, if it wasn’t for this PBS-related release, it might have been a lot longer before it was released in any form at all. Or, worst of all, it might never have been released for sale to the public; many documentaries aren’t.

If you can’t or won’t be pledging to get it, don’t despair! As time goes on, it’s highly likely you will be able to obtain it another way. The biggest implication of the pledge drive is that the people who are willing to pledge will be the pioneers and will get it first.

The best thing we can do, as ambassadors of Laura, is to spread the word about the pledge drive. Contact our local stations to make sure they run it, whether we plan on pledging or not. Pledge if we can. And if we can’t, we can wait patiently until the DVD is ready for individual sale. I haven’t been told that will happen, but I’m comfortable in saying that it seems like something that would logically follow.

I know this is disappointing to some, especially in these economic times. Perhaps Laura herself said it best. Remember the sage/onion fight in the beginning of The Long Winter? Laura first retold that story in The Missouri Ruralist. After relating how in the end how Pa didn’t even get the goose, she said:

“This little happening has helped me to be properly thankful even tho at times the seasoning of my blessings has not been just such as I would have chosen.”

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been smitten with Kara Lindsay and Kevin Massey ever since they played Laura and Almanzo, respectively, in the Little House musical. Sadly Little House never made it off the tour and onto Broadway, but the two actors have been keeping busy just the same. Kevin’s currently on Broadway in “Memphis” (as an understudy for Huey), and Kara just this month made her debut starring in a stage version of the 1992 musical film “Newsies.” You can read about the show in an inerview with Kara here.

Admittedly, part of my longstanding dedication to Kara and Kevin is the fact that they fell in love while playing Laura and Almanzo–and they’re still together. (I interviewed them twice about their roles and their relationship in the Homesteader, issue 14 and issue 16.) In the interview linked above, she says they’ll probably be together “forever.” Yes, it brings a tear to my eye, that does.

If you’re in or around the NYC area, catch Kara in “Newsies”! Here’s a cool preview. Kevin also maintains a Facebook page where he updates when he’s going on as Huey.

Reader Kirsten Johnsen was wondering what in the world was up with this documentary. People want to see it! Sarah Sue Uthoff responded that basically, we have no update, but she suspected that the upcoming PBS pledge drive special might give the distribution a boost.

In fact, she’s on the right track. And there is an update. It just came in over the weekend, and I have not had a chance yet to post it.

The documentary will be available not singly as we’d been expecting, but as part of a package for PBS’s pledge drive special in June. From Dean:

I’m delighted to announce that LHOP: The Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder will be available through PBS as part of “The Pa’s Fiddle Collection” that supports PA’S FIDDLE: THE MUSIC OF AMERICA.

The Pa’s Fiddle Collection is composed of five items available exclusively on PBS for a $275 pledge to your favorite PBS member station:

1. Pa’s Fiddle Concert DVD
2. Pa’s Fiddle Concert CD
3. Making of Pa’s Fiddle DVD
4. Pa’ Fiddle Primer CD
5. LHOP: Legacy of Laura Ingalls Wilder DVD

So although we cannot obtain it singly, by pledging to PBS, we can obtain it.

 See the video preview for the PBS event here.

I’m sure the button collectors featured in this article on the St. Louis Today website have some interesting buttons. It inspired me to continue my search!

It seems this is the perfect time to be doing our read-along to These Happy Golden Years!

The Herbert Hoover Presidential Library has included her entire speech from her visit complete with lots of photos.
Wendy McClure at Hoover Presidential Library

And while you are on the Hoover YouTube page, check out their Laura exhibit from the 1990s.
Laura Ingalls Wilder Exhibit

Sarah S. Uthoff blogs at TrundleBed Tales; look for her on Twitter and YouTube and Blog Talk Radio
Laura Ingalls Wilder Legacy and Research Association, Vice-President and Membership Chair

And FYI to the director/commentator: It’s Charles Philip Ingalls, not Charles Paul. [Edited to add: Thanks to Carole Nebhut, who informed us that he's saying "Pa," not "Paul." How could I have mistaken that!?]

I never have been in favor of making good resolutions on New Year’s Day just because it was the first day of the year. Any day may begin a new year for us in that way, but it does help some to have a set time to go over the year’s efforts and see whether we are advancing or falling back.

If we find that we are quicker of temper and sharper of tongue than we were a year ago, we are on the wrong road. If we have less sympathy and understanding for others and are more selfish than we used to be, it is time to take a new path.

I helped a farmer figure out the value of his crops raised during the last season, recently, and he was a very astonished person. Then when we added to that figure the amount he had received for livestock during the same period, he said: “It doesn’t seem as if a man who had taken in that much off his farm would need a loan.”

This farmer friend had not kept any accounts and so was surprised at the money he had taken in and that it should all be spent. Besides the help in a business way, there are a great many interesting things that can be gotten out of farm accounts, if they are rightly kept.

The Man of the Place and I usually find out something new and unexpected when we figure up the business at the end of the year. We discovered this year that the two of us, without any outside help, had produced enough in the last year to feed 30 person for a year — all the bread, butter, meat, eggs, sweetening and vegetables necessary — and this does not include the beef cattle sold off the place.

I do not know whether Mr. Hoover would think we have done as much as we should, but I do think it is not so bad. I had been rather discouraged with myself because I have not had so much time to spend with Red Cross work as some of my friends in town, but after I found out just what we have done, I felt better about it.

The knitting and making of garments for the Red Cross is very necessary and important but the work of making the hens lay and filling the cream can is just as commendable. Without the food which the farm women are helping to produce, the other work would be of no value.

If you have not already done so, just figure up for yourselves and you will be surprised at how much you have accomplished.

“Make a New Beginning”  by Laura Ingalls Wilder, published in The Missouri Ruralist, January 5, 1918