The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder
Page 30
I am glad you have recovered your health and are teaching again. Yes! I do remember your calling on me.
Love to you and the children,
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
My mistake in naming the lake
Dorothy Smith of Malone, New York, noted that the lake mentioned in Farmer Boy was Chateaugay, not Chautauqua. Miss Smith researched the Wilder family, hosted interested visitors to Malone, and founded the organization that restored the house described in Farmer Boy.
JANUARY 31, 1951
Dear Miss Smith,
Thank you for your letter telling me of my mistake in naming the lake. I have asked Harpers to correct the spelling. It is interesting to know you are a granddaughter of Almanzo’s aunt. That would make you his second cousin, would it not?
Perhaps you know Almanzo died in October 1949.
Again, thank you for telling me of my mistake, I am with kindest regards,
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
I thank them all and send my love
Docia Holland was the Wright County, Missouri, librarian. She knew Laura Ingalls Wilder from her weekly Wednesday visits to the Mansfield library. The library staff sent thousands of penny postcards to libraries from coast to coast, asking for greetings to be sent on Laura’s February 7 birthday. The response was staggering.
FEBRUARY 24, 1951
Dear Mrs. Holland,
I thank you for the lovely birthday card. You will do me a great favor if you will explain to library patrons that I cannot answer all cards and letters received. There are between 800 and 900 of them.
Tell them, please, that I thank them all and send my love.
Yours gratefully,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Our old school crowd is vanished
Ada Scott Keating attended the De Smet school with the Ingalls girls.
FEBRUARY 26, 1951
Dear Ada,
It is nice to have your birthday greetings and most especially your letter inside.
You have done a much better job in raising such a nice family than you would have writing no matter how successful you might have been.
My one child, Rose Wilder Lane, is so far away from me, but is planning to come this Spring for a long visit.
It is so lonely without Mr. Wilder that at times I can hardly bear it, but one has to bear what comes.
Our old school crowd is vanished as you say, but we did have good times together, even if we didn’t have all these modern things.
With lots of love,
Your old school friend,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
I have always been so active
MARCH 8, 1951
Dear Miss Webber,
I am so pleased with the stationery of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Room and thank you for sending it. . . .
My books have been translated into German, as well as Japanese, but so far as I know that is all.
My health is very good now, but I still have to treat my heart with respect. I have always been so active that it is hard to be careful. . . .
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
The library here . . . has been named for me
Daphne Serton of the children’s department at Harper & Brothers was assigned to handle mail sent to Laura Ingalls Wilder.
MAY 26, 1951
Dear Miss Serton,
I do appreciate your sending replies to letters for me which pass through your office. My eyes are troubling me lately and I cannot answer letters as I have been doing so they go unanswered as there is no one here to write but me.
The library here, a branch of the Wright Co. Libraries, has been named for me—“Laura Ingalls Wilder Library.” I would like very much to give a picture of myself to the library, but have none. Please send me one for the purpose.
Except for my eyes I am very well and getting along fine.
We are now having our blackberry winter—the cold spell that comes when the wild blackberries are in full bloom. Almanzo, Rose and I used to gather wild blackberries and I put them up in glass jars for winter. Later I picked them by myself, canned and made jam of all we could not eat fresh. Now I simply eat all I can which I buy from the neighbor boys.
The Hills are beautiful now. Humming birds and bumble bees are feasting on the honeysuckle blooms on the vine over the well at my back door.
With kindest regards to all in your office and thanks for replying to letters that come for me.
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Please do open and answer all my mail
JUNE 4, 1951
Dear Daphne Serton,
Thank you for the photos. I will give one to the L.I.W. library here and one to the library at our county seat.
Please do open and answer all my mail and you need not send it on to me unless it is something special. I greatly appreciate your kindness.
My eyes have been overworked and with rest and new glasses I am told they will be all right.
Kindest regards to you and the others in your office,
Sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Please take charge of my house
Silas and Neta Seal were surrogate children for Laura and Manly. The Mansfield couple provided companionship and security for the aging Wilders. When Manly died, the Seals were the first people Laura summoned. Laura was 84 when she penned this note to Neta. Another note said, “Dear ones, Have dinner with me. It is my turn to treat. Lots of love, Laura Wilder.”
AUGUST 3, 1951
Dear Neta,
If anything happens to me please take charge of my house and its contents until Rose can do so.
I am sure Rose will make it right with you for your trouble. Better keep this [note] with the key.
Laura I. Wilder
From my heart, I thank you
On September 28, 1951, the community of Mansfield dedicated their library in honor of Laura Ingalls Wilder. The honoree attended the function and read this message to the crowd.
Dear Friends:
I am happy that Mansfield has a public library. Its being named for me is an honor of which I am very proud and that the city I have loved since first I saw it as a little town 57 years ago should celebrate the dedication and naming of the library as it has done leaves me at a loss for words to express my feelings.
I cannot tell you how much I value your friendship and the honor you have done me. I can only say I thank you all!
From my heart, I thank you.
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Just as described in Farmer Boy
Florence Anderson of Grand Gorge, New York, inquired about Almanzo’s early home.
OCTOBER 29, 1951
Dear Miss Anderson,
Your letter forwarded by Harpers has just reached me.
The house where Almanzo was brought up as a small boy still stands on the Vincent Road, east of Malone. It is now just as described in Farmer Boy.
It is described in The Post Standard of Syracuse, N.Y. of Sunday, Dec. 3d 1950.
The barn of Almanzo’s boyhood burned down and has been replaced. The house is at the approach to Adirondack Quarries and is as Almanzo left it so many years ago, except for added coats of paint.
Our daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, of Danbury, Conn. saw the place a few years ago.
I hope you will be able to find the old house.
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
I have so many letters and callers
NOVEMBER 5, 1951
Dear Mrs. Weldon,
I am pleased that you and your pupils like my stories and glad indeed that you love me. The reason the stories seem so real is because they are true.
When I was a small child I lived with my parents and sisters in Burr Oak two years. The reason I did not put it in my stories was that it would bring too many characters. You know in writing a story the reader’s interest must be held to the principal p
eople, not scattered among so many. I remember Burr Oak with pleasure. My daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, visited the town some years ago. . . .
Plum Creek is about 2½ miles north of Walnut Grove. I recently had a letter from people who had just visited the place and found the site of our old dugout on the bank.
Silver Lake was ½ mile east of De Smet. It has been drained so there is no lake there now. It was a small lake, fed by springs that were destroyed in the draining.
I have so many letters and callers that I cannot remember any individuals. My memory is not what it used to be.
With love to you and your pupils,
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Now and then I find a familiar name
NOVEMBER 19, 1951
Dear Aubrey Sherwood,
Thank you for the copy of The De Smet News. I read every word of it for it carries me back. Now and then I find a familiar name, children and grandchildren of those I used to know, I suppose.
I am sorry but I have not Pa’s old ledger nor do I know what became of it. When Spring comes and it is warm enough to rummage in the attic I may find something that would be of interest among the county historical items. If so I will send it to you.
Quite often I have a letter telling of some tourist’s visit to De Smet, of how nicely they have been treated by you and shown around to the places of interest.
The postcard you have in mind would certainly be interesting.
With kindest regards to you and yours.
Sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
They are beautiful books
JANUARY 5, 1952
Dear Miss Nordstrom,
Thank you so much for the books “Dizzy” and “The Home Bible.” They are beautiful books, but I have had no time yet to read them, only to look.
Have just finished answering my Christmas mail, 175 cards and letters that I felt I must answer.
Now I shall rest my eyes a bit and then read and read.
Best regards to your office force and a Happy New Year to you all.
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
I am sure you will like it here
The 1949 translation of The Long Winter into Japanese won many readers. The postwar shortages and austerity endured in Japan mirrored hardships in the Little House books. Yoshihiko Sato, a thirteen-year-old boy, corresponded with Laura several times.
Mansfield, Missouri, U.S.A.
JANUARY 18, 1952
Dear Yoshihiko,
I thank you for your nice letter. You did well with the English.
When you grow up and come to America I am sure you will like it here.
I wish you a year of happy days.
Almanzo would have been pleased with the pretty card you sent him but he died in October 1949. I thank you for sending the card to him. He was 92 years old.
With kindest regards and best wishes,
Your friend,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Her choice of names was unfortunate
FEBRUARY 11, 1952
Dear Miss Webber.
I thank you and the children for the beautiful birthday card and I am indeed proud that my name was on so many links of the chain on your Christmas tree.
My daughter’s book “Let the Hurricane Roar,” is fiction with a background of facts I told her many times when she was a child. The characters in the story have no connection with my family. Her choice of names was unfortunate and it creates confusion. I had no brothers.
There is no one in the family to carry on the name of Almanzo. I am very sorry and wish someone would so name a son. My Almanzo only has distant relatives left and as you know my branch of the Ingalls family ends with me and Rose.
I hope the Laura Ingalls Wilder Room will be carried on to the new building, but am sorry I have no ideas at present that might help. If I should have later, I will let you know.
I would love to visit you in Pomona and will do so if it is ever possible. With love to you all,
Your friend,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
More lonely than I can tell without Mr. Wilder
APRIL 17, 1952
Dear Miss Hillson,
The children’s letters were interesting and I thank you for the kind things you say about my books.
All the children who write as well as my publishers want more stories but I am not writing anymore. I have written only the series of eight Little House books.
Our spring weather has been so unsettled, cold one day, warm the next, but no snow or frost.
I am very well, though more lonely than I can tell without Mr. Wilder.
With kindest regards,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
I would so love to see Dakota again
MAY 8, 1952
Dear Aubrey Sherwood,
Thank you so much for your invitation to Rose and me for Old Settlers Day.
If I were only able I would be delighted to visit De Smet at that time but Dr’s orders are that I must keep quiet and when I disobey him it puts me in bed. So it is not possible for me to make the trip and stand the excitement however great the pleasure would be.
Things from our old home were scattered as were Carrie’s later and I do not know what became of them.
Some were sent me and those are in the museum of State Historical Society at Pierre.
I enclose a clipping from a Springfield [Missouri] daily describing the dedication of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Library here which may interest you. I thought I had sent you a paper of Mansfield Mirror.
The dedication date was September 28 [19]51. The bookmarks were given as favors at the open house.
Pictures of the affair were taken and I am trying to get a set to send you. It has been so long since, I may not succeed in getting them but if I do they will represent me on Old Settlers Day.
I would so love to see Dakota again.
With kindest regards to yourself and family,
Yours sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Rose is very much pleased
Aubrey Sherwood’s postage meter in the newspaper office bore the words “Little Town on the Prairie of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books.”
MAY 16, 1952
Dear Aubrey Sherwood,
It has taken me some time to track one down, but I am sending you on this mail a Mansfield Mirror with the write up of the dedication of Laura Ingalls Wilder Library here, which you should have had last October.
Also I am having sent you a marked copy of this week’s paper.
Again I thank you for the postmark. It must have taken time and know-how to get permission to use it. Rose is very much pleased.
With kindest regards,
Sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
There must be many changes
MAY 26, 1952
Rev. R. E. Marks
Sleepy Eye, Minnesota
Dear Sir,
I thank you for the kind things you say of my little books.
The Little House on Plum Creek was just a little way north from the creek which we crossed on our way to the town of Walnut Grove.
I cannot locate it any closer than I have done in the story. You know I was a child and have not seen the place since.
My memory is that the house was in a bend of the creek, which was on the south and east sides, a short distance away.
Across the creek to the east was Mr. Nelson’s place to which we went by a footpath and a footbridge across the creek. Our road to town was to the south and a shallow ford across the creek.
I hope this may help in locating the site of the house. It was all so long ago that there must be many changes. . . .
With kindest regards,
Sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
It makes me very proud
JUNE 14, 1952
Dear Yoshihiko Sato,
I am glad to have your letter with the good n
ews. It is nice that you introduced my letter in all Japan.
I am sorry I cannot give you a story or a poem.
You see, my dear friend, I am 85 years old and not very well. I cannot write those things any more. I can only send you and your friends my love and good wishes.
Sincerely,
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Among names of Old Settlers were only 12 familiar to me
JUNE 23, 1952
Dear Aubrey Sherwood,
At last I have been able to get pictures taken at the dedication of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Library here. I am sorry I could not get them in time for Old Settlers Day but think you may like to add them to your collection.
Pictures are numbered. In No. 1 I am standing by myself at right side of window. The others are librarians of the county.
In No. 2 I am standing by a case presented to the library by the state library association. The case is filled with presents sent me by children who have read my books. The dolls on top of the case are supposed to represent Laura and Almanzo.
No. 3 left to right. Paxton P. Price, state librarian, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Docia Holland, county librarian.
No. 4 left to right, Florence Williams, librarian of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Library in Mansfield and Laura Ingalls Wilder at the reception after the dedication of library.
The dedication was on Sept. 28, 1951 and pictures are of course nearly a year old, but people say I have not changed. Even the mumps left no marks.
We are having an awful drought here, the worst on record and the heat has been terrible all through June.
Rose is well and suffering from too much rain.