Laura Ingalls Wilder, Farm Journalist

by Stephen Hines

  “Oh, for a little time to enjoy the beauties around me,” I thought. “Just a little while to be free of the tyranny of things that must be done!” A feeling of bitterness crept into my soul. “You’ll have plenty of leisure someday when you are past enjoying it,” I thought. “You know, in time, you always get what you have longed for and when you are old and feeble and past active use then you’ll have all the leisure you ever have wanted. But my word! You’ll not enjoy it!”

  I was horrified at these thoughts, which almost seemed spoken to me. We do seem at times to have more than one personality, for as I gave a dismayed gasp at the prospect, I seemed to hear a reply in a calm, quiet voice.

  “You need not lose your power of enjoyment nor your sense of the beautiful if you desire to keep them,” it said. “Keep the doors of your mind and heart open to them and your appreciation of such things will grow and you will be able to enjoy your well earned leisure when it comes even tho you should be older and not so strong. It is all in your own hands and may be as you wish.”

  We are all beginning to show the strain of the busy summer. Mrs. Menton has put up a full two years’ supply of canned and dried fruits and vegetables. She says that, even tho no part of it should be needed to save anyone from starving, she will feel well repaid in the smallness of their grocery bills the coming year. She also confessed she was glad the lull in work was in sight for there wasn’t “a whole pair of socks on the place.”

  Several women were comparing notes the other day. Said one, “My man says he doesn’t mind a decent patch but he does hate to go around with a hole in his khakis.” Everyone smiled understandingly and another took up the tale.

  “Joe said this morning that he wished I’d make a working and call the neighbors in to fix up his clothes,” she said, “but I told him you were all too busy to come.”

  There has been no time this summer to do the regular work properly. Mrs. Clearly says that if the rush of work does not stop soon she will have to stop anyway. She is a recent comer to the Ozarks and thru the dry seasons she has hoped for a good crop year. Now she does not know whether she will pray for rain next year or not. A good crop year does bring work with it and tho the worst may be over, there are still busy days ahead. There are the late fruits and garden truck to be put up, potato harvest and corn harvest, the second crop of timothy and clover and more cutting of alfalfa. There is the sorghum to make and the silos to fill and everything to be made snug for winter. Some of us will help in the actual work and others will be cooking for extra help. Whatever may be expected of us later, women have certainly done their utmost during this summer so nearly gone.

  The Man of the Place and I have realized with something of the shock of a surprise that we do not need to buy anything during the coming year. There are some things we need and much that we would like to get but if it were necessary we could go very comfortably thru the year without a thing more than we now have on the place. There is wheat for our bread and potatoes, both Irish and sweet, there are beans and corn and peas. Our meat, milk, cream, butter and eggs are provided. A year’s supply of fruit and sweetening are at hand and a plentiful supply of fuel in the wood lot. All this, to say nothing of the surplus.

  During the summer when I have read of the high wages paid in factories and shops there has been a little feeling of envy in the back of my mind, but I suppose if those working people had a year’s supply of fuel and provisions and no rent to pay they would think it wonderful good fortune. After all, as the Irishman said, “Everything is evened up in this world. The rich buy their ice in the summer but the poor get theirs in the winter.”

  The Man of the Place and I had known before that farmers are independent but we never had realized it and there is a difference between knowing and realizing. Have you realized it personally or do you just know in a general way? Thanksgiving will soon be here and it is time to be getting our blessings in order. But why wait for Thanksgiving? Why not just be thankful now?

  Get the Habit of Being Ready

  October 20, 1917

  Did the first frost catch you unready? It would be quite unusual if it didn’t because I never knew anyone to be ready for cold weather, in the fall, or for the first warm spell in the spring. It is like choosing the right time to be ill or an out-of-the-way place for a boil—it simply isn’t done!

  I know a man who had a little patch of corn. He was not quite ready to cut it and besides he said, “it is just a little green.” He let it wait until the frost struck it and now he says it is too dry and not worth cutting. The frost saved him a lot of hard work.

  This man’s disposition reminds me of that of a renter we once had who was unable to plow the corn in all summer. Before it rained the ground was so hard he could not keep the plow in, and besides if it did not rain there would be no corn anyway and he believed it was going to be a dry season. When it did rain it was too wet to plow and never was he ready and able to catch that cornfield when the ground was right for plowing.

  And that reminds me of the other renter who was always ready to take advantage of his opportunities. His horses would break into the cornfield at night, or were turned in (we never knew which), and in the fall, when The Man Of the Place wanted a share of what corn was left, he was told that the horses had eaten all his share.

  These anecdotes are not intended as any reflection on renters. I could tell some in which the joke is on the other side if I had the space.

  The tragedy of being unready is easy to find for, more often than not, success or failure turn upon just that one thing. There was a time, perhaps long ago, when you were not ready for examinations and failed to pass, then there was the time you were not ready to make that good investment because you had been spending carelessly. We can all remember many times when we were not ready. While being ready for and equal to whatever comes may be in some sense a natural qualification, it is a characteristic that may be cultivated, especially if we learn easily by experience.

  It was interesting to see the way different persons showed their character after the first frost. One man considered that the frost had done his work for him and so relieved him of further effort. Others went along at their usual gait and saved their fodder in a damaged condition. They had done the best they could, let providence take the responsibility. Still others worked thru the moonlight nights and saved their feed in good condition in spite of the frost. They figured that it “was up to them” and no little thing like the first frost should spoil their calculations.

  It does not so much matter what happens. It is what one does when it happens that really counts.

  “Thoughts Are Things”

  November 5, 1917

  As someone has said, “Thoughts are things,” and the atmosphere of every home depends on the kind of thoughts each member of that home is thinking.

  I spent an afternoon a short time ago with a friend in her new home. The house was beautiful and well furnished with new furniture but it seemed bare and empty to me. I wondered why this was until I remembered my experience with my new house. I could not make the living room seem homelike. I would move the chairs here and there and change the pictures on the wall, but something was lacking. Nothing seemed to change the feeling of coldness and vacancy that displeased me whenever I entered the room.

  Then, as I stood in the middle of the room one day wondering what I could possibly do to improve it, it came to me that all that was needed was someone to live in it and furnish it with the everyday, pleasant thoughts of friendship and cheerfulness and hospitality.

  We all know there is a spirit in every home, a sort of composite spirit composed of the thoughts and feelings of the members of the family as a composite photograph is formed of the features of different individuals. This spirit meets us at the door as we enter the home. Sometimes it is a friendly, hospitable spirit and sometimes it is cold and forbidding.

  If the members of a home are ill-tempered and quarrelsome, how quickly you feel it when you enter the house. You may not
know just what is wrong but you wish to make your visit short. If they are kindly, generous, good-tempered people you will have a feeling of warmth and welcome that will make you wish to stay. Sometimes you feel that you must be very prim and dignified and at another place you feel a rollicking good humor and a readiness to laugh and be merry. Poverty or riches, old style housekeeping or modern conveniences do not affect your feelings. It is the characters and personalities of the persons who live there.

  Each individual has a share in making this atmosphere of the home what it is, but the mother can mold it more to her wish. I read a piece of poetry several years ago supposed to be a man speaking of his wife and this was the refrain of the little story:

  “I love my wife because she laughs,

  Because she laughs and doesn’t care.”

  I’m sure that would have been a delightful home to visit, for a good laugh overcomes more difficulties and dissipates more dark clouds than any other one thing. And this woman was the embodied spirit of cheerfulness and good temper.

  Let’s be cheerful! We have no more right to steal the brightness out of the day for our own family than we have to steal the purse of a stranger. Let us be as careful that our homes are furnished with pleasant and happy thoughts as we are that the rugs are the right color and texture and the furniture comfortable and beautiful!

  Everyone Can Do Something

  November 20, 1917

  How many women have said, “If I were a man I would go and fight for my country?” And how many men who are exempt from the draft for any reason have said, “If I were young”—or “If I could pass the physical examinations, I would be glad to go and help?”

  If you ever have said these things, you now have a chance to show your good faith and prove that you meant what you said.

  If you are a woman, you can fight for your country at home in your own kitchen. If you are a man who cannot pass the physical tests, you can help, even without bodily strength, at home in your own dining room.

  “Your country needs you,” say the posters at the recruiting stations. Our country needs us all and the issue of the war depends a good deal upon those who stay at home.

  We must fight our appetites, overcome our inclinations and conquer our selfishness. The self-government of our republic, of which we are so proud, is nothing after all but the governing of self and the whole cannot be greater than the sum of the parts. The work for those who cannot go and fight is to so govern themselves that they may not cast discredit upon a free country.

  Did you know that the United States will not be able to send France the amount of sugar that country has asked for?

  A certain amount of sugar is needed, especially by growing children, to keep the body in proper condition. A child’s craving for sweets is a call of nature. It is necessary to the proper development of their bodies. The sugar beets and refineries of France and Belgium have been destroyed by the enemy and the people are starving for sugar while we have eaten so much that we cannot send them what they need. We could all do with a little less and a little saved from each home would amount to a great deal.

  We would not revel in plenty while the family of a neighbor was starving. Let’s divide with our neighbors overseas!

  Our harvests have been so bountiful this year that we have more than we can possibly use for ourselves. We have done our duty by working almost day and night to save it, but if we do not understand and rightly use what we have saved, we will not have helped so much as we should after all.

  There are some things that can be used at home that are too perishable to ship to Europe. Surely we can use those things and save from our abundance, the wheat and meat and sugar to feed our soldiers and the dear ones of those who are standing shoulder to shoulder with them in the fight—the hungry women and children of Belgium and France.

  If We Only Understood

  December 5, 1917

  Mrs. Brown was queer. The neighbors all thought so and, what was worse, they all said so.

  Mrs. Fuller happened in several times, quite early in the morning and, altho the work was not done up, Mrs. Brown was sitting leisurely in her room or else she would be writing at her desk. Then Mrs. Powers went thru the house one afternoon and the dishes were stacked back unwashed, the beds still airing, and everything “at sixes and sevens,” except the room where Mrs. Brown seemed to be idling away her time. Mrs. Powers said Mrs. Brown was “just plain lazy” and she didn’t care who heard her say it.

  Ida Brown added interesting information when she told her schoolmates, after school, that she must hurry home and do up the work. It was a shame the neighbors said, that Mrs. Brown should idle away her time all day and leave the work for Ida to do after school.

  It was learned later that Mrs. Brown had been writing for the papers to earn money to buy Ida’s new winter outfit. Ida had been glad to help by doing the work after school so that her mother might have the day for study and writing, but they had not thought it necessary to explain to the neighbors.

  I read a little verse a few years ago entitled, “If We Only Understood,” and the refrain was:

  “We would love each other better,

  If we only understood.”

  I have forgotten the author and lost the verse, but the refrain has remained in my memory and comes to my mind every now and then when I hear unkind remarks made about people.

  The things that people do would look so differently to us if we only understood the reasons for their actions, nor would we blame them so much for their faults if we knew all the circumstances of their lives. Even their sins might not look so hideous if we could feel what pressure and perhaps suffering had caused them. The safest course is to be as understanding as possible and where our understanding fails call charity to its aid. Learn to distinguish between persons and the things they do, and while we may not always approve of their actions, have a sympathy and feeling of kindness for the persons themselves.

  It may even be that what we consider faults and weaknesses in others are only prejudices on our own part. Some of us would like to see everybody fitted to our own pattern and what a tiresome world this would be if that were done. We should be willing to allow others the freedom we demand for ourselves. Everyone has the right to self expression.

  If we keep this genial attitude toward the world and the people in it, we will keep our own minds and feelings healthy and clean. Even the vigilance necessary to guard our thoughts in this way will bring us rewards in better disciplined minds and happier dispositions.

  * * *

  1. From a folk song, writer anonymous.

  2. Charles Frederick Ingalls, born November 1, 1875, died August 27, 1876.

  3. This story appears in Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House in the Big Woods (New York: Harper and Row, 1971), chapter 10.

  1918

  Make a New Beginning

  January 5, 1918

  We should bring ourselves to an accounting at the beginning of the New Year and ask these questions: What have I accomplished? Where have I fallen short of what I desired and planned to do and be?

  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 persons 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.

  Santa Claus at the Front

  January 20, 1918

  A Santa Claus went from San Francisco to the battle front in France carrying with him more than $600 worth of presents for the French soldiers. This Santa Claus was Alphonse Gabriel Nicole. When the war began he was a waiter in one of San Francisco’s restaurants. He went at once to Europe and has fought in the French army ever since. He has been wounded twice and wears a cross given him by the French government for bravery in battle.

  Alphonse was in the battle of the Marne, the battle of the Somme and at Verdun. Once he was buried beneath the ground for 40 minutes and at another time he was hurled into the air and fell to the ground unconscious where he remained for some time apparently dead.