My Prairie Cookbook (21 page)

Let me start by saying that there was no way for us to stick strictly to the
Little House
books. If we had done that, there would have been only nine episodes of the show, instead of the hundreds we filmed over nine seasons. The producers took a great deal of dramatic license by adding characters and situations that didn't exist or happen in the books. For example, the Ingalls family moved
a lot
in real life. They did not live out the majority of their years in Walnut Grove.

And for the record, there was no Albert Ingalls in real life. Nor was there a James or a Cassandra Ingalls. Mary Ingalls never married in real life, therefore there was no Adam Kendall, nor was there a baby boy who died in a fire. I could go on and on with this list, but if you have read the books, you know what's what. And this book is about the TV series, after all.

That, however, doesn't let us off the hook for some pretty glaring and hilarious bloopers and goofs. Here are a few courtesy of Lennon Parker at the
PrairieFans.com web site, with additional commentary from yours truly:

1.
Laura must have carried her baby, Rose, for more than a year. In the season seven episode “I Do, Again,” Laura announces she's pregnant, and it's warm enough for Charles and Almanzo to be working outside without coats. Then in “A Wiser Heart,” a pregnant Laura (who isn't even showing yet) goes to Arizona to attend a seminar with Eliza Jane over the summer when they're off from school. In the episode “A Christmas They Never Forgot,” Laura is really showing, and in the episode “Stone Soup,” a very pregnant Laura suffers heatstroke while trying to water the apple orchard during a drought, which means it must have been late spring or summer again.

My take:
I had never noticed this before.
Hmmm
. . . nothing was ever easy back in those days! My first baby, Dakota, was two weeks late. I was miserable. Poor Laura, pregnant for more than a year!

2.
In the episode “His Father's Son,” John Jr. finds out that Isaiah can't read. At the end of the episode, we see Isaiah up in the tree house with a McGuffey Reader, starting the process of learning. Then in “To Live with Fear,” which is several episodes later, Isaiah picks up a telegram from Charles and Caroline about Mary's condition, and when Grace asks him what it says, he shakes his head to indicate that he can't read it. I thought it was a little strange that he forgot how to read!

My take:
This is a nice catch. Maybe all that spitting made him forget? Or perhaps he was swigging that moonshine again?

3.
In the season five episode “The Cheaters,” Andrew asks his mom to walk home with him after school. Mrs. Garvey says to Andrew, “I can't right now, I need to stop at the grocery store.” She slipped up and called it a grocery store instead of the Mercantile! (The word
groceries
didn't become common until after 1913, when an American firm copyrighted the word
groceteria
.)

My take:
Yes, and if you listen to the school kids in the background, you can hear some saying “Right on!” and “All right!” What can I say? We tried, but sometimes the 1970s slipped into the 1870s.

4.
Almanzo didn't call Laura “Bess” in the books, but he called her that in real life. So why was her nickname “Beth” on the TV show? Maybe Michael Landon thought Melissa Gilbert seemed more like a Beth than a Bess, or maybe they thought “Beth” would be easier for viewers to hear.

My take:
I have no idea. Nor did I ever ask. Beth, Bess—they kind of sound the same. I don't know why the producers would have changed the nickname. And I have no idea why Almanzo called Laura “Bess” in the first place. Her middle name was Elizabeth, so Beth makes more sense than Bess—unless Almanzo had a lisp.

5.
Whatever happened to Doc Baker's assistant, Dr. Caleb Ledoux? He appeared in one episode, “Dark Sage,” in season eight as a black doctor working for Doc Baker. He faced the skepticism and prejudice of the town until he saved a pregnant woman's life, and at the end of the episode, the townspeople convince him to stay on in Walnut Grove. Where'd he go?

My take:
We had a lot of characters who popped into town and then up and disappeared. But if we'd kept everyone who moved to Walnut Grove on the show, the final episode would have been six hours long instead of two.

6.
In “Bless All the Dear Children,” Laura's baby, Rose, is kidnapped. It was Christmastime and in Minnesota it would have been extremely cold. But not one person is wearing a jacket and there is no snow to be seen! I'm not saying that it snows every year for Christmas, but at least it should have been cold.

My take:
That is because we shot it in old Tucson over the summer—misery personified. And, might I add, this is my least favorite performance of my own during the run of the show. I really phoned this one in. I'm not sure why, but I just couldn't connect to this particular story. Maybe it's because I wasn't a parent yet. All I know is that I was in way over my head in this one, and I was really sweaty too!

7.
In season three's “Little Girl Lost” episode, Mary is shown closing the cabinet in the kitchen. Then the camera focuses on Laura and the cabinet is still open, and it's even open a little while later when they leave.

My take:
It's those haunted prairie cabinets. Or maybe it was the Creeper of Walnut Grove!

8.
In the first episode of season nine, called “Times are Changing,” Almanzo says he hasn't seen his brother Royal in more than ten years. But didn't he show up in the season seven episode “The Nephews”? Had ten years elapsed between season seven and season nine? Wow, they aged nicely! And whatever happened to the nephews? When Royal shows up with Jenny, the nephews aren't even mentioned. It was also funny when Laura said it was nice to finally meet both of them, after she had already met Royal. When Royal tells them Jenny has no other family, you have to wonder what happened to the boys who supposedly grew up to be a preacher and a doctor.

My take:
Okay, here's an example of dramatic license gone horribly awry. Remember when I said earlier that some characters pop into Walnut Grove and then disappear? Well, that is exactly what happened here. I don't know why the boys came to visit! And I don't know where they disappeared to! I don't know why Royal came back! I'm just a puppet, a slave to the whim and will of the show's creators.

9.
In the season five episode “The Enchanted Cottage,” Mrs. Oleson talks to Mrs. Foster and calls her Matilda. But in the episode “Stone Soup,” Harriet calls her Anne, and in “If I Should Wake Before I Die,” she is called Ruth. It's strange how many names she's been called in this series.

My take:
The actress's real name is Ruth Foster. I'm not sure what exactly happened here myself. Perhaps Mrs. Foster has multiple personalities. Or maybe Mrs. Oleson never really learned her name. I'm fresh out of excuses.

10.
In the season four episode “Freedom Flight,” there's a big but very funny blooper: After MacGregor and the others find out that Charles is hiding the Indians at his place, a scene follows where Charles and Doc Baker drive the Indians away to get them to safety. Then a hand appears at the bottom right of the screen. It is the person who was shaking the wagon for the camera! He is even wearing a watch!

My take:
Sure, all wagons back in the 1800s came with a shaker who wore one of them newfangled timepieces!

11.
In the season nine episode “Home Again,” Laura comes by the house and Charles pours her a cup of coffee. In previous episodes, when they pour coffee, they have a cloth around the handle to keep from burning their hands. In this episode, Charles just picks the pot up with no cloth on the handle.

My take:
He had asbestos hands. He was impervious to pain or heat. He was Super Pa! I don't know! These bloopers are starting to hurt my head.

12.
In the season one episode “Plague,” Charles goes to Eric's house, and he finds him sitting underneath a tree. While he's telling Charles about what a great day it is for his son to be out of school, the boy's fingers twitch. Twice. And his eyelids flutter. Very strange, since the boy is supposed to be dead.

My take:
The living dead, apparently. We were
waaaay
ahead of our time with the zombie theme.

13.
At the end of the season eight episode “A Wiser Heart,” Laura asks for a train ticket to Walnut Grove. Since when did the train go to Walnut Grove? The closest connection was Sleepy Eye or Mankato.

My take:
Oh, just cut it out, will ya?! Some people are so picky . . . and so right!

14.
In the season nine episode “Rage,” when Laura takes Rose from Mr. Stark, you can see that he is holding a doll. You can see blond doll hair peeking through the blanket.

My take:
Would you let that man hold a real baby?! He was out of control. Perhaps Laura was being extra sneaky. Okay, okay, you caught us using a doll instead of the real baby—we did that a lot. Especially when the babies were wrapped for the day or we were doing something dangerous like letting a crazy man hold a baby while waving a gun and knocking over a kerosene lamp. In all seriousness, working with Robert Loggia was a joy and an honor. He remains a friend to this day.

15.
In the season two episode “Remember Me,” Mary and Laura jump into the water to save some puppies from drowning. When they jump in, they're both wearing their shoes and stockings. When they are swimming, both of them are barefoot. And when they get out of the water, they have their shoes and stockings back on again!

My take:
Yes. Those are my magic shoes. No, wait, that's from
Forrest Gump
. Actually, this is a pure and simple continuity mistake, sorry.

16.
At the end of the season two episode “For My Lady,” Laura says that Ma uses the dishes that Pa gave her every day because special dishes aren't for special occasions but for special people. Nice sentiment, but we never see those dishes again!

My take:
Yes. That's because I sold the dishes to get Ma a stove . . . wait . . . I sold my pony to get the stove, so maybe the dishes broke in a tornado or a hailstorm, or maybe the raccoon broke them. Actually, I think everyone forgot about them. Oh well.

17.
In season one, Laura trades her horse, Bunny, to Nellie in exchange for a stove from the Mercantile. We don't see or hear about Bunny until season three. What happened to Bunny during all of season two?

My take:
Bunny was very busy pulling a stagecoach filled with all of the made-up characters.

18.
At the end of the season nine episode “Home Again,” where Albert kicks his morphine addiction, Laura tells the audience that Albert comes back to Walnut Grove years later as a doctor. But at the end of “Look Back to Yesterday,” it's implied that his death is imminent. Does he come back as a doctor or does he die?

My take:
Ah yes, this is a tricky one. Albert did come back—as a zombie doctor. Okay, he wasn't a zombie, though that would have been a fun twist. This is one of the great glaring mistakes the creators of the show made. But let's be honest—would any of you love
Little House
less without this blooper? Isn't it bloopers like these (and the hunt for them) that are among the things that make
Little House
so endearing in the first place?