Guest post by Leslie Sakaguchi
I apologize in advance, but I have some confessions to make.
Confession the First: There are some bits of Little House that I always thought the series could do without. Prime example: “Springtime.” This is the one chapter in this book that manages to both greatly delight me and, well, bore me to tears as no other chapter in the whole series does. Let me ‘splain.
The good stuff: this chapter starts out with Laura and her best buddies sharing a moment while walking home from school. They speak of the near future, of the end of the school term, and even touch on—ooo!—the topic of hanging out with guys. Totally something most girls could relate to, right? Love it.
Then we meet Uncle Tom, Ma’s brother, who relates news of the family. Coming from a very large family myself, I always loved this part. As a reader and a fan, I really look forward to any chapters that brought back the relatives, as I often wondered about their parallel lives. Plus it’s always fun revisiting past characters. Bonus—later on, he works nicely as a foil to see some of Almanzo’s truly romantic interest in Laura. Love it more!
The end of this chapter has one of my favorite scenes in the entire series. Love the buggy ride, Almanzo’s bit of jealousy, the camaraderie of Laura, Mary, Cap, and Almanzo, the general light-heartedness of the whole scene, and for me, one of the most succinctly descriptive lines of the series: “It was so easy to laugh in the springtime.” But then, this brings me to…
…Confession the Second. In the {mumble-mumble} years that I’ve been reading the Little House books, I have always read “Springtime” in the following order:
1) Everything up to “Mercy on us!” Ma softly exclaimed. “Do tell us all about it.”
2) Then maybe—maybe—every 42nd word until: Laura thought: “All this happened to Uncle Tom while we were living on Plum Creek.”
3) From that point on through to the end of the chapter.
Yup, NO exaggeration. Prior to this assignment, I only ever read about one-third to one-half of this chapter. Ever. Which now brings me to Confession the Third. When I volunteered to do a read-along chapter, I was reeeeally kinda hoping to not get this one. Which, of course I did. Nuts.
Okay, well, so as not to embarrass myself—more than I already am here, that is—I reread the chapter. I mean, I really, really read it. I read it with an open mind, truly hoping to find a whole new world, maybe some previously-undiscovered nuggets of Laura-lore.
No joy. It was not as interesting as I’d hoped and it still took me three tries to really get through the whole chapter.
Luckily, my attention span has matured more than my writing style, so off to the Internets I go, to see if I can find anything snazzy and true about Uncle Tom’s narrative. And mercy on us! Uncle Tom really did have quite the adventure! Who knew?
Okay, maybe everyone else did, but please don’t judge. Being from the Golden State, I had to take California history in the 4th grade, South Dakota history was never a curriculum option for me. So, for those who did not have to learn the history South Dakota, here’s the short version: Due to a treaty between the U.S. and the local tribes-peoples, that part of the Dakota territories was originally earmarked as Native American-owned land. However, when General Custer came through that area, gold was found, the news and amount of which was apparently highly exaggerated by a journalist traveling in General Custer’s party. Thus began a great gold rush. Now here’s where it gets a bit interesting. According to History of Dakota Territory, Volume 1, by George Washington Kingsbury, the gold-seeking Gordon-Witcher party—the party with which Uncle Tom Quiner was traveling—actually was one of the first Caucasian, non-military groups to set foot in that region. But they did so illegally and they knew it! Oh myyy!
The only female member of the party, Mrs. Annie D. Tallent, later published a memoir of this expedition in 1899, in which she describes the secrecy with which they carried out their journey preparations and the routes they took in order to best avoid observation by the U.S. military. Naughty Uncle Tom et al!
When I thoroughly read this chapter, initially I agreed with Pa and got all riled-up on behalf of what sounded like horribly unfair treatment of the Gordon-Witcher party. (The soldiers killed the oxen, for cryin’ out loud! Why? Were they rifle-totin’, claim-jumping cattle?!?) Emotionally, I was pacing back and forth in front of the fire and waving my fist along with Pa. Even when Uncle Tom admits, “It was Indian country…Strictly speaking, we had no right there,” I still found myself feeling indignant, much in the same way I did when the Ingalls were forced to leave their house in Kansas. But after doing my research, I realized that 1) the Gordon-Witcher party fully and consensually pre-meditated their illegal journey for sake of the lure of golden riches and 2) once again, the light placed on any wrong-doing member of “Team Laura” in the Little House series was greatly softened. (I know, a whole other topic for a whole other discussion.) Even in his one line of admission, the party’s guilt-level was unclear. I initially construed the situation to be that they did not know they were in Indian Territory until after the Army got there.
Hence, the research and the truth, a truth that on one level made me a little bit sad. See, once more, digging deeper threw another layer of shadow onto the Little House world, MY Little House world. Maybe it’s good that my seven year-old, Laura-idolizing self never got that.
But then I remember that now I am an adult and that adult says, you know what? I get it. The Ingalls/Quiners/Wilders weren’t saints, any more than any of us are. Just like us, they were decent folks just trying to make it in this life, sometimes having to take risks, sometimes having to decide where to draw lines when the actual lines seem to be on the fuzzy side. As an adult, it’s oddly comforting to know that even that epic, pioneer life sometimes wasn’t as black and white and rosy as a primary school-aged girl needs it to be.
I will say that, surprisingly, I got a great deal of pleasure in (finally) reading the description of the journey provided by Uncle Tom. I especially enjoyed his description of the Bad Lands, that “heathenish place” where “those tall things seemed to turn as you went by.” Naturally, I found it very similar to Laura’s style of description, as when she is seeing aloud for Mary, and I found that familiarity delightful as well.
Which brings me back to a great part of my love for the Little House series. I love that it’s a fact-based narrative, and although sometimes fictional is always more enjoyable to read than any old history text or even other published narratives. (My apologies to Mr. Kingsbury and Mrs. Tallent.) Thankfully, Laura’s books always manage to draw me back to a time and place about which I am free and able to romanticize away, from the comfort of my 21st century computer. Yet somehow it still teaches me something new every time. And that is a legacy worth breaking laws—or at least crossing fuzzy lines—for.