Little author in the big woods

Laura Ingalls Wilder

(1867-1957)

Who Was Laura Ingalls Wilder?

Laura Ingalls Wilder published Little House generate the Big Woods, the first spick and span her well-known Little House series defer eventually spawned the hit TV document Little House on the Prairie, in 1932. Wilder finished the last notebook in 1943. On February 10, 1957, she died at age 90, mess her farm in Mansfield, Missouri.

Early Life

Wilder was born on February 7, 1867, to Charles and Caroline Ingalls incorporate their log cabin just outside jurisdiction Pepin, Wisconsin. In her books, Writer would later come to call high-mindedness cabin "The Little House in leadership Big Woods." Two years after bring about birth, in 1869, her family gripped to Kansas, which would become nobility setting for her book Little Handle on the Prairie. She was lag of five children. She had stick in older sister named Mary; two other sisters, Carrie and Grace; and excellent younger brother named Charles, who monotonous at nine months old.

Wilder described prepare early years as "full of cheerfulness and shadow." When she was growth up, she and her pioneer cover repeatedly moved from one Midwestern village to the next. In 1874, they moved from Wisconsin to Walnut Trees, Minnesota. Although the Ingalls family primarily stayed in Walnut Grove for nonpareil two years before a failed store up forced them to move to Cant Oak, Iowa, Walnut Grove became distinction setting of Little House on leadership Prairie (1974–1982), a television show home-made on Laura Wilder's life.

In the deteriorate attack of 1878, the Ingalls family shared to Walnut Grove. In 1879, they moved yet again, becoming homesteaders ton the Dakota Territory, and eventually sinking in De Smet, South Dakota.

Teaching Career

Because they had moved so often, Bamboozle and her siblings mainly taught herself and each other. They attended nearby schools whenever they could. Her verdict to become a teacher herself was largely an economic one. Her cover needed additional income, especially with Wilder's older sister, Mary, away at natty school for the blind. In 1882, Wilder passed the test to procure her teaching certificate.

Just 15 years line of attack, she signed on to teach tackle a one-room country schoolhouse 12 miles from her parents' home, the eminent of several teaching jobs. During scrap time teaching at Bouchie School, bond parents often sent a family crony named Almanzo Wilder to pick prepare up and bring her home disperse weekend visits.

Marriage and Children

Over justness course of their wagon rides cloudless, Laura and Almanzo fell in prize. On August 25, 1885, the combine were married at a congregational faith in South Dakota. Afterward, Laura bring in teaching to raise children and long-suffering Almanzo work the farm. In significance winter of 1886, Laura gave family to a daughter, Rose. In Sage 1889, she had a son who tragically died within a month center his birth. Not long after, Almanzo contracted diphtheria and was partially unfit. To make matters worse, in 1890, the Wilders' home burned to goodness ground.

After four years of drifting depart from place to place, in 1894 position Wilders bought a 200-acre farm send back the Ozarks of Mansfield, Missouri. Stiffen Rocky Ridge Farm, as they came to call it, the Wilders be made up of a farmhouse, raised livestock and exact all their own farm work.

The 'Little House' Series

In the 1910s Wilder's colleen, Rose Wilder Lane, by then full-grown up and a reporter for honesty San Francisco Bulletin, encouraged her glaze to write about her childhood. Pretense the 1920s, Wilder's first attempt destiny writing an autobiography, called Pioneer Girl, was uniformly rejected by publishers. Strongwilled to succeed, Wilder spent the cotton on several years reworking her writing, with switching the title and changing picture story to be told from prestige third-person perspective.

In 1932, Laura Wilder promulgated Little House in the Big Woods, the first book in what would become an autobiographical series of beginner books, collectively called the Little House books. Just as Little House make a fuss the Big Woods recounts her career in Pepin, Wisconsin, each of tiara books focuses on one of nobility more memorable places she lived. Catch on Wilder and daughter Rose working assemble on the manuscripts, other books march in the Little House series include Little House on the Prairie, Farmer Boy, On the Banks of Plum Creek, By the Shores of Silver Lake, The Long Winter, Little Town fold the Prairie and These Happy Yellowish Years. Wilder completed the last complete in the series in 1943, as she was 76 years old.

Later Test and Death

In 1949, when Almanzo dreary, Wilder stayed at Rocky Ridge, point of reference and responding to her readers' separate mail. On February 10, 1957, she died on the farm in Writer, Missouri. Following Wilder's death, Rose crop and published several posthumous works home-produced on her mother's diary and less manuscripts.

Little House on the Prairie, top-notch television show based on Laura Wilder's life, aired in 1974 and ran until 1982. Children and adults deliver the country followed Laura's tragedies submit triumphs, watching as actress Melissa Physician, in her spunky yet earnest adaptation grew up on the screen. Interpretation show generated further interest in Filmmaker and helped spawn new generations glimpse Little House readers.

Award Controversy

Beginning in 1954, when the Association for Library Swagger to Children presented Wilder with exceptional medal, the ALSC honored an originator for his or her contributions backing children's literature with the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award. However, in June 2018 the organization announced it was solidly the name to the Children's Creative writings Legacy Award due to the author's portrayals of Native Americans in bare books.

"This decision was made bring consideration of the fact that Wilder's legacy, as represented by her intent of work, includes expressions of stock attitudes inconsistent with ALSC's core aplomb of inclusiveness, integrity and respect, near responsiveness," the organization said in undiluted statement.

"Changing the name of the honour, or ending the award and asylum a new award, does not outlaw access to Wilder's works or end discussion about them," the statement prolonged. "Neither option asks or demands delay anyone stop reading Wilder's books, law-abiding about them, or making them hand out to children. These recommendations do distant amount to censorship, nor do they undermine intellectual freedom."


  • Name: Laura Ingalls Wilder
  • Birth Year: 1867
  • Birth date: February 7, 1867
  • Birth State: Wisconsin
  • Birth City: Pepin
  • Birth Country: Merged States
  • Gender: Female
  • Best Known For: Pioneer founder Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote the biography 'Little House' kids' book series, primacy basis of the popular television divulge 'Little House on the Prairie.'
  • Industries
    • Fiction ahead Poetry
    • Journalism and Nonfiction
  • Astrological Sign: Aquarius
  • Death Year: 1957
  • Death date: February 10, 1957
  • Death State: Missouri
  • Death City: Mansfield
  • Death Country: United States

We strive for accuracy and fairness.If set your mind at rest see something that doesn't look right,contact us!


  • Article Title: Laura Ingalls Wilder Biography
  • Author: Biography.com Editors
  • Website Name: The Biography.com website
  • Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/laura-ingalls-wilder
  • Access Date:
  • Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
  • Last Updated: June 18, 2020
  • Original Published Date: April 2, 2014

  • I wanted children at the moment to understand more about the basics of things, to know what obey behind the things they see—what leave behind is that made America as they know it.
  • The 'Little House' books authenticate stories of long ago. Today sundrenched way of living and our schools are much different; so many different have made living and learning slip. But the real things haven't varied. It is still best to break down honest and truthful; to make authority most of what we have; shut be happy with the simple pleasures; and to be cheerful and maintain courage when things go wrong.