WEBVTT - 1. "Now is Now" 0:00:06.400 --> 0:00:10.480 There are towns all over America you've never heard of. Oh, 0:00:10.520 --> 0:00:14.640 welcome to independence. Oh my god, I just said that. Okay, 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:19.239 it's not twenty cars. They're not easy to get to. 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:22.799 The nearest airports are almost always hours away by car, 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:30.160 three hours of my destination. The roads wind through farmland, prairies, forests, mountains, 0:00:30.720 --> 0:00:36.479 desolate spaces. The farthest feels like the smallest, most remote 0:00:36.479 --> 0:00:42.000 place there. But every year the people come. They arrive 0:00:42.080 --> 0:00:46.000 in droves. It's like something out of field of dreams. 0:00:46.640 --> 0:00:49.720 A dirt lot becomes a parking lot, a prairie becomes 0:00:49.720 --> 0:00:50.239 a stage. 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:53.080 I think there's so many cars here you would think 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:56.000 you were a county fair even you say. 0:00:55.840 --> 0:01:00.160 Five hundred cars. Families pile out of cars and costumes 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:08.160 because they're fantastic. They're wearing dresses, aprons, bonnets. Of course 0:01:08.200 --> 0:01:12.679 it too, and last summer we joined the pilgrimage and 0:01:12.760 --> 0:01:16.440 came here too. We arrived in the middle of vast 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:20.160 fields to discover entire towns right out of the eighteen hundreds, 0:01:20.800 --> 0:01:25.120 covered wagons, actual horses, a cow. 0:01:26.120 --> 0:01:28.800 They're all four aged cows, and that's why they're moderately 0:01:28.800 --> 0:01:30.760 well mannered and only people's aprons. 0:01:31.040 --> 0:01:33.400 Hundreds of thousands of people have flocked to these places 0:01:33.400 --> 0:01:36.400 for nearly five decades, literally from all. 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:43.640 Over the world, people from like Italy, Germany, like Japan. 0:01:44.440 --> 0:01:47.880 It's like really like all the way over there to hear, 0:01:48.280 --> 0:01:49.800 Like y'all know about this place? 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:56.480 What is bringing people here? What inspires this devotion? Or 0:01:56.520 --> 0:01:58.200 should we say who? 0:01:59.880 --> 0:02:05.640 Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Laura Ingalls Wilder, 0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:10.320 and I'm here Laura Ingle Wilder's day. 0:02:12.000 --> 0:02:15.760 Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the children's book series Little 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:16.679 House on the Prairie. 0:02:16.720 --> 0:02:19.639 When people ask me who Laura Ingles Wilder is. 0:02:20.600 --> 0:02:23.360 I usually tell them that she is one of the 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:30.799 most important American children's book authors of the twentieth century. 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:34.160 Which was turned into the hit TV show Little House 0:02:34.200 --> 0:02:37.160 on the Prairie. I literally wake up in the middle 0:02:37.160 --> 0:02:40.239 of the night and go, somebody somewhere is watching the 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:43.400 last of the group. Laura is the subject of entire 0:02:43.480 --> 0:02:49.240 academic fields of scholarship annual conferences. She has inspired fashion lines, 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:55.200 cultural trends, and entire lifestyle industry, and about seventy five 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:58.800 years after her death, thousands of people still flock to 0:02:58.919 --> 0:03:07.560 tiny towns in the middle of nowhere to celebrate her. 0:03:10.080 --> 0:03:13.880 I think I've been happy in a long time. This 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:20.280 right here, this is my childhood fantasy come to life. 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:25.400 Laura's books have been read by millions. In many ways, 0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:27.480 her story is the American story of being on the 0:03:27.600 --> 0:03:30.799 road as a young girl. She traveled thousands of miles 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:33.200 in a covered wagon her family in search of a 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:38.320 better life. She's a Hollywood Western She's Jack Kerouac, but 0:03:38.560 --> 0:03:39.920 in a nap dress with braids. 0:03:40.040 --> 0:03:42.920 It's almost this mascot of American settlers. 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:45.960 She witnessed the birth of modern America, and she wrote 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:47.120 down everything she saw. 0:03:47.520 --> 0:03:51.680 Everybody who's lived from covered wagons to airplanes, is a 0:03:51.720 --> 0:03:55.080 time machine. But not very many people wrote down what 0:03:55.160 --> 0:03:56.520 their experience. 0:03:56.240 --> 0:04:00.200 Was, or nearly everything. Her books are based on her life, 0:04:00.880 --> 0:04:03.720 but in the process of telling her story, she erases 0:04:03.760 --> 0:04:04.720 a lot of others. 0:04:05.120 --> 0:04:09.880 It requires putting yourself in the shoes of an individual 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:14.960 embedded and really complicated, sometimes violent systems. 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:18.880 That mythology of the frontier, the mythology of manifest destiny. 0:04:19.000 --> 0:04:22.080 I think the pressures of the narrative were really heavy. 0:04:22.600 --> 0:04:26.960 If we pretend to past was not as controversial and 0:04:27.040 --> 0:04:31.039 difficult and racist as it was, then, how are we 0:04:31.120 --> 0:04:34.080 going to deal with the racist issues we're grappling with today. 0:04:36.279 --> 0:04:37.840 I didn't think about any of this when I read 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:39.960 these books as a kid. I just fell in love 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:43.880 with Laura and basically mainlined her story straight into my DNA, 0:04:44.240 --> 0:04:47.279 which is where they stayed for a long time. But 0:04:47.360 --> 0:04:50.680 with any kind of love comes responsibility. One of the 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:53.039 reasons for this trip is my desire to look honestly 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:55.920 at the thing I loved the most. What am I loving? 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:58.680 Should I love it? Will I still be able to 0:04:58.680 --> 0:05:03.320 love it? On the other side, lor Anglees Wilder, whose 0:05:03.360 --> 0:05:06.840 stories embody the best and the worst of America, who 0:05:06.880 --> 0:05:10.720 seems to reincarnate with each generation. Her problems are still 0:05:10.760 --> 0:05:14.560 our problems. But who is she really? And what can 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:18.040 she tell us about the America we live in today, 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:23.000 in a country currently at odds with itself and its history. 0:05:23.440 --> 0:05:27.480 Could there be a better time for this exploration? There's 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:32.960 never been a better time than now. I'm Glennis McNichol, 0:05:33.839 --> 0:06:14.440 and this is Wilder. This is my parents Atlas from 0:06:14.480 --> 0:06:18.120 when I grew up. National Geographic Atlas of the World Revised, 0:06:18.160 --> 0:06:25.440 third edition, and it comes in a box these days. 0:06:25.440 --> 0:06:27.400 When I pick up a little House book, I'm immediately 0:06:27.440 --> 0:06:31.479 time traveled into nineteen eighty two. I'm in Kitchener, Ontario, 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:34.640 an hour west of Toronto. I'm sitting on the brown 0:06:34.680 --> 0:06:38.000 braided rug in my family's wood paneled living room. I'm 0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:45.280 seven years old. In my memory, I would come downstairs, 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:47.320 would be like a Saturday morning, and every one would 0:06:47.320 --> 0:06:50.920 be asleep in the house, and I'd pull this out 0:06:50.920 --> 0:06:52.880 from the bottom shelf of the bookcase in the family 0:06:52.920 --> 0:06:56.520 room because I would want to look at where Laura 0:06:56.640 --> 0:07:00.400 Ingalls lived. There's nine books in the little House. In 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:03.080 the last five of them, she lives in a place 0:07:03.120 --> 0:07:06.360 called De Smet South Dakota. Here it is, it's in 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:08.640 the middle of home in page two seventeen, almost near 0:07:08.720 --> 0:07:12.400 the bottom, and it says dsmet Sdak and it says 0:07:12.440 --> 0:07:15.600 thirty two D five. So page thirty two is a 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:18.200 double spread of what I now understand to be the 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:21.200 midwest of the United States of America. So my left 0:07:21.240 --> 0:07:22.880 finger would be on five, my right finger me on D, 0:07:22.960 --> 0:07:25.000 and then I'd pull them together to where they meet. 0:07:25.400 --> 0:07:31.760 The joy and excitement of seeing where she lived on 0:07:31.800 --> 0:07:37.280 an actual map was so gratifying to me and exciting 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:40.960 because she was a real person and this little tiny 0:07:41.160 --> 0:07:43.880 entry on a map just seemed like proof to me 0:07:44.000 --> 0:07:49.480 that it was possible to be an adventurous girl in 0:07:49.520 --> 0:07:55.640 the world. And then I would try and hold my 0:07:55.720 --> 0:08:00.200 finger here and then flip the pages back to the 0:08:00.240 --> 0:08:04.840 one that showed the whole map of the United States 0:08:05.120 --> 0:08:08.240 and find South Dakota. And then I'd look over because 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:11.960 on the big map the top of Canada shows and 0:08:12.000 --> 0:08:15.640 I could find Toronto, and then just to left it, it 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:18.080 was Kitchener, where I lived, and I just remember trying 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:20.080 to like measure it with my hands. My hands are 0:08:20.240 --> 0:08:21.960 much bigger nails, so it's like one hand with But 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:25.120 as a kid, it was like for me where I 0:08:25.200 --> 0:08:27.760 was to Laura Engles where she was was like two 0:08:28.000 --> 0:08:30.520 of my little seven year old hands, And that felt 0:08:30.960 --> 0:08:34.960 super important to me that I could measure the distance 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:37.560 between the two of us, like here's where I existed 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:39.480 and here's where she existed, and I can see them 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:42.360 both on the same map and they're not that far apart. 0:08:42.600 --> 0:08:44.280 This map was such a big deal to me, it 0:08:44.280 --> 0:08:48.880 makes me want to cry looking at it. So obviously 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:52.280 I have an intense relationship to Laura. But when I 0:08:52.320 --> 0:08:56.000 say Laura Ingles Wilder, what do you think of? What 0:08:56.040 --> 0:08:58.840 about when I say little House on the prairie. Do 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:01.960 you see the yellow box set of books, or maybe 0:09:02.080 --> 0:09:05.760 Melissa Gilbert with braids running down a grassy hill? Or 0:09:05.800 --> 0:09:08.560 do you think of nothing at all? Why don't we 0:09:08.600 --> 0:09:11.560 start with the basic facts. Laura Engleswilder was born in 0:09:11.600 --> 0:09:15.640 a log cabin in Wisconsin on February seventh, eighteen sixty seven, 0:09:16.160 --> 0:09:18.840 in the aftermath of the Civil War. She spent her 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:21.520 childhood on the American frontier, and by the time she 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:25.319 died in nineteen fifty seven at age ninety, she'd witnessed 0:09:25.320 --> 0:09:28.920 the violent transformation of the American West. Her lifetime saw 0:09:28.920 --> 0:09:33.760 the advent of electricity cars, two World Wars, television, and 0:09:33.840 --> 0:09:36.920 Elvis Presley. She'd made her first trips in a covered wagon, 0:09:37.080 --> 0:09:39.520 and three years before her death, she flew on a 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:42.560 jet plane. When I think about the arc of Laura's life, 0:09:42.760 --> 0:09:46.000 I'm reminded of that line in Madmen, when Bert Cooper's secretary, 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:49.880 former Hellcat Eyeda Blankenship dies. She was born in eighteen 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:53.200 ninety eight in the barn. She died on the thirty 0:09:53.280 --> 0:09:55.080 seventh floor of skyscraper. 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:58.040 She's an astronaut. 0:09:58.480 --> 0:10:02.480 Laura's an astronaut, a time traveler, or at least a 0:10:02.520 --> 0:10:06.840 time traveling machine. For me, that time machine takes the 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:09.760 form of the Nine Little House Books, which roughly cover 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:12.840 her pioneer childhood during the years eighteen seventy through eighteen 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:15.839 eighty five, as she and her family traveled around the 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:20.360 American Midwest from Wisconsin to South Dakota. I didn't know 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:22.520 it when I was seven, but I wasn't just mapping 0:10:22.520 --> 0:10:25.680 out laws journeys on my parents atlas. I was, in 0:10:25.720 --> 0:10:29.040 some ways also mapping out my own future stories. I 0:10:29.040 --> 0:10:32.840 would write trips I would take, often dragging along with 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:34.160 me unsuspecting friends. 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:39.160 What I remember is like, Okay, the goal was to 0:10:39.200 --> 0:10:41.800 get from New York to San Francisco as quickly as possible, 0:10:42.000 --> 0:10:45.840 And suddenly you had re routed our journey to go 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:51.480 through southeastern South Dakota. And before I knew what was happening, 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:55.440 I was in a field in the middle of nowhere, 0:10:55.559 --> 0:10:58.760 at the tail end of a Laura Ingels Wilder live 0:10:58.880 --> 0:11:00.560 action role play pageant. 0:11:01.200 --> 0:11:05.000 This is Joe Piazza, writer, podcaster, and one of my 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:09.080 best friends and co producer of this podcast. In twenty fifteen, 0:11:09.160 --> 0:11:11.920 I dragged her four hours off our route hoping to 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:14.080 see a pageant, but we didn't get there in time. 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:15.720 She was very tolerant. 0:11:16.440 --> 0:11:17.959 I'm always tolerant, my friend. 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:24.439 Yes, that's true. But my question is, were you surprised 0:11:24.600 --> 0:11:27.000 when I did that. Did it feels like you discovered 0:11:27.040 --> 0:11:28.040 some new side of me? 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:31.960 Yeah? Actually it did. I mean, you're one of my 0:11:31.960 --> 0:11:34.200 best friends, but there were things I just didn't even 0:11:34.240 --> 0:11:38.000 know about you before I discovered. You're deep and intense 0:11:38.080 --> 0:11:40.840 and sometimes pathological. Love for Laura Engeles Wilder. 0:11:40.960 --> 0:11:43.199 Feel like opening a closet in the house of one 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:46.960 of your best friends and being like, hm, oh. 0:11:46.840 --> 0:11:48.760 What's going on in Why are there all these headless 0:11:48.760 --> 0:11:49.320 dolls in here? 0:11:49.600 --> 0:11:49.760 Yeah? 0:11:49.800 --> 0:11:51.120 I mean it kind of felt like that, but in 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:51.720 a nice way. 0:11:52.280 --> 0:11:55.280 I mean, from a very young age, it felt like 0:11:55.320 --> 0:11:57.160 I had like not a lot of examples of how 0:11:57.160 --> 0:12:00.400 to be in the world, and she was just sort 0:12:00.400 --> 0:12:03.200 of how I located myself in the world. And the 0:12:03.240 --> 0:12:05.000 fact she was a real life person. You know, I 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:06.640 was a big reader as a kid, and I think 0:12:06.720 --> 0:12:09.440 a lot of people who love Laura have the same 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:12.760 experiences like you loved Anne Shirley and you loved Nancy Drew, 0:12:13.160 --> 0:12:16.000 but of course their fictional characters, and Laura was real 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:19.560 and she was my age. When I read the books, 0:12:19.559 --> 0:12:21.920 I literally thought she'd written these books when she was 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:25.080 six years old, and she sort of wanted to have 0:12:25.080 --> 0:12:28.120 adventures and thought wolves were exciting, and she couldn't sit still, 0:12:28.160 --> 0:12:31.280 and she had a temper, and you know, she idolized. 0:12:30.760 --> 0:12:32.679 Her father and you idolized your father. 0:12:33.240 --> 0:12:35.120 Yeah, definitely when I was that age. You know, that 0:12:35.240 --> 0:12:39.120 sort of magnetic, larger than life character that you. 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:42.280 Don't see as a real human being until you're a 0:12:42.320 --> 0:12:44.800 grown up and have been to lots and lots of therapy. 0:12:45.520 --> 0:12:48.800 Exactly until you unpack that. But I think too, it's 0:12:48.840 --> 0:12:51.800 been interesting realizing that she captured a lot of like 0:12:51.960 --> 0:12:56.480 really complicated family dynamics before that was the norm for ya. 0:12:56.640 --> 0:13:00.880 And she talks a lot about resentment to Ma, jealousy 0:13:00.920 --> 0:13:04.240 over her older sister, and how Mary was prettier and smarter, 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:08.440 And I was like, oh, this is also my family dynamic, 0:13:08.480 --> 0:13:11.400 and these are all the things I'm experiencing. And it 0:13:11.520 --> 0:13:14.640 was the fact that I recognize those experiences and she 0:13:14.720 --> 0:13:17.280 wrote them down and then people wanted to read about them. 0:13:17.360 --> 0:13:21.640 It was like, oh, these things you're living are worthwhile. 0:13:22.080 --> 0:13:25.120 The things you're experiencing, even as little kid, are interesting 0:13:25.160 --> 0:13:27.280 to other people. And that to me was such a 0:13:27.280 --> 0:13:27.720 big deal. 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:30.800 The story of a young girl is interesting like that. 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:34.160 That's a gut punch, right, like, oh my gosh, I'm 0:13:34.920 --> 0:13:37.920 I'm a child. The world kind of tells me I'm insignificant. 0:13:38.200 --> 0:13:43.559 But her stories were worthy, and therefore I feel. 0:13:43.240 --> 0:13:47.440 Worthy exactly, And they were worthy in like the smallest ways. 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:50.079 The first book in the series is Little House in 0:13:50.080 --> 0:13:52.320 the Big Woods, and it's like of all the books, 0:13:52.320 --> 0:13:53.959 that's like a fairy tale. And they're in a little 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:57.679 cabin in big woods and at the very very end, 0:13:58.679 --> 0:14:01.000 Laura and Mary are in bed and playing the fiddle 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:03.920 by the fire, and the last line of that book 0:14:04.000 --> 0:14:05.320 is I'm just gonna pull it out and read it 0:14:05.320 --> 0:14:08.440 to you. She was glad that the cozy house and 0:14:08.559 --> 0:14:11.160 paw Ma in the firelight and the music were now. 0:14:11.840 --> 0:14:15.920 They could not be forgotten, she thought, because now is now. 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:22.200 It can never be a long time ago. Like even 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:24.680 me reading that to you right now, I get the chills. 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:28.800 I kind of have the chills, so philosophical. It's way 0:14:28.840 --> 0:14:33.080 more philosophical than what I read in most children's books 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:35.120 Sweet Valley High. 0:14:34.560 --> 0:14:37.440 Right, It's like imagine like feeding that to a six 0:14:37.560 --> 0:14:39.280 year old because of course, part of the obsession of 0:14:39.360 --> 0:14:42.080 Laura's she lived in the olden days, like she got 0:14:42.120 --> 0:14:44.200 to travel by a horse and buggy and like put 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:47.880 her hair and braids and whatever. But like in that moment, 0:14:48.080 --> 0:14:51.440 I really was like in my bedroom, in my bed thinking, 0:14:51.520 --> 0:14:55.360 oh my god, is my now gonna be someone else's 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:58.960 olden days? And like my six year old head explodes, 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:02.200 and I immediately pull out a little diary that someone 0:15:02.240 --> 0:15:03.920 had gave me in was like, well, I'm also going 0:15:04.000 --> 0:15:06.680 to write my life down because obviously I have to 0:15:06.720 --> 0:15:09.600 get this on paper lickety split. And I have that 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:12.480 diary still, and the first line of it is I 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:14.880 want to be a writer. I don't know what kind 0:15:14.960 --> 0:15:17.240 of writer I want to be. Mom, And I went 0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:21.240 to boggaining today. To boggaining is Canadian for sledding, and 0:15:21.440 --> 0:15:24.040 that was like me thinking, like, maybe this is going 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:27.400 to be the olden days sometime too. I better start writing. 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:31.320 Little Glenness in the Suburbs. So from everything that you're 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:34.840 telling me, it actually does feel like Laura Ingles Wilder 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:39.760 and the things that she wrote remain endlessly relevant today 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:42.040 in lots of different ways. 0:15:42.440 --> 0:15:45.680 It certainly seems that way, and I think one of 0:15:45.680 --> 0:15:47.520 the things we're trying to unpack when we do this 0:15:47.600 --> 0:15:51.200 podcast is what it is about her that keeps her 0:15:51.560 --> 0:15:54.600 relevant still because you know, the TV show is still on, 0:15:54.640 --> 0:15:57.160 the books are still being read, people are still traveling 0:15:57.200 --> 0:16:00.400 to see her, and like, what is it about those 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:04.480 descriptions and those revelations that make her life so visceral 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:07.960 we can still relate to it having gone back, you know, 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:12.280 for another reread for this podcast. What's so incredible is that, like, 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:14.960 the America that she's writing about in the late nineteenth 0:16:14.960 --> 0:16:18.360 century also speaks to the America that we're in right now, 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:22.600 and in some ways it sort of speaks to where 0:16:23.040 --> 0:16:23.800 we're all going. 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:25.640 So let's get going. 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:29.360 The thing is, while Laura and goes Welder may be 0:16:29.520 --> 0:16:31.880 my on the road, she's not actually on the way 0:16:31.920 --> 0:16:35.280 to anywhere. Her houses are literally in the middle of nowhere. 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:38.040 They are a pilgrimage and the truest sense of the word, 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:40.760 you have to want to go there, You have to 0:16:40.960 --> 0:16:47.160 really want to go there to Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, 0:16:47.400 --> 0:16:51.200 and South Dakota. And that's what we're doing. We're going 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:53.880 on the Great Laura road Trip to figure out what 0:16:54.000 --> 0:16:57.160 this hold is that Laura has on her readers and 0:16:57.200 --> 0:16:59.920 on America and what we're supposed to do with it. 0:17:01.440 --> 0:17:04.440 So let's set the scene. Like any good road trip, 0:17:04.680 --> 0:17:09.440 there's a cast of characters. Me obsessive Joe, who knows 0:17:09.520 --> 0:17:12.320 very little about lor Engeles Wilder, and our producer Emily, 0:17:12.560 --> 0:17:15.560 a millennial who loved the TV show which she watched 0:17:15.560 --> 0:17:20.560 on DVD. We started in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, the side 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:22.679 of the book on the banks of Plum Creek and 0:17:22.720 --> 0:17:26.080 even more famously the setting of the TV show. Well, 0:17:26.119 --> 0:17:28.440 actually we started on the way to Walnut Grove. You're 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:31.280 based off towards Walnut Grove because we realized the pageant 0:17:31.359 --> 0:17:33.960 was tonight and not tomorrow, as we had organized our 0:17:34.040 --> 0:17:35.200 entire triporeal But. 0:17:35.240 --> 0:17:37.440 You know what, you texted me in a panic, and 0:17:37.560 --> 0:17:39.360 I really urgot that shit you did. 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:42.320 And honestly this was thrilling for me. Becaus the TV 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:45.520 fan representative, He's like, oh my god, I've really strained 0:17:45.520 --> 0:17:46.320 to Walnut Grove. 0:17:47.080 --> 0:17:52.600 Guys, what we need to pay attention what we're in 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:53.240 Walnut Grove. 0:17:54.160 --> 0:18:00.720 Walnut Grove. Walnut Grove was the first place we ran 0:18:00.760 --> 0:18:03.600 into the reality that Laura's past really is our Now 0:18:04.640 --> 0:18:06.600 we'll get to it after the break. Also, we need 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:07.600 to figure out with the pageants. 0:18:07.720 --> 0:18:27.639 Well, great, let's take a picture. Okay, describe what you're seeing. 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:32.200 I mean, there's so First off, there's so many cars here. 0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:34.720 Yeah, you would think you were a county fair. 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:38.080 And now it looks like there's a whole little house 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:40.320 on that Curry TV set. 0:18:40.480 --> 0:18:43.639 It does look like that. So, after racing across empty 0:18:43.640 --> 0:18:47.679 farmland into the setting sun, we finally arrived in Walnut 0:18:47.720 --> 0:18:51.000 Grove to discover the pageant parking lot was already almost full. 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:54.360 Are sing Oh wait, I'm sorry, but look Charles. 0:18:54.760 --> 0:18:58.959 The parking lanes are named after character. 0:18:59.280 --> 0:19:01.840 We quickly realized that every detail of the pageant had 0:19:01.840 --> 0:19:05.000 little house branding on it. Nothing had been left untouched. 0:19:05.240 --> 0:19:08.400 We're parked in Mary, are we? Yeah? I think we're 0:19:08.400 --> 0:19:12.000 parked in Caroline. Past the gates. The concession looks like 0:19:12.040 --> 0:19:14.960 a professional kitchen. The water bottles are branded with little 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:18.800 house logos. There are Mom Pop bathrooms, and then just 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:20.760 beyond there is a huge stage. 0:19:21.240 --> 0:19:25.359 This is Walnut Grove, a busy growing village on the 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:26.320 edge of. 0:19:26.160 --> 0:19:28.000 It looks like the set for a TV show. 0:19:29.440 --> 0:19:30.080 And supplies. 0:19:30.320 --> 0:19:32.680 Tonight's pageant is based on the banks of Plum Creek. 0:19:33.280 --> 0:19:36.120 The fourth book in the Little House series, it takes 0:19:36.119 --> 0:19:38.399 place in Walnut Grove, although the town is not actually 0:19:38.440 --> 0:19:41.600 mentioned in the books. Because Walnut Grove is also where 0:19:41.600 --> 0:19:44.640 the TV show is set, it makes sense that their 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:47.639 pageant is the most Hollywood, the flashiest. 0:19:48.720 --> 0:19:51.200 This is better send. Some off Broadways did. 0:19:53.200 --> 0:19:56.320 Sets roll out on hydraulics. Their effects are not what 0:19:56.400 --> 0:19:58.439 you'd expect in a tiny town in the corner of 0:19:58.480 --> 0:20:04.240 seemingly empty farmland. Real fire. There was so much energy. 0:20:04.640 --> 0:20:07.080 It was clear. The crowd was dazzled and so were we. 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:13.840 Really really exceeded my expectations. 0:20:13.920 --> 0:20:17.920 Yeah, it was spectacular. It was spectacular rock. The whole 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:23.200 day actually has been fairly spectacular. And we came back 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:25.240 to town the next morning and we got to see it 0:20:25.240 --> 0:20:28.399 in daylight. It looked a little different. 0:20:28.760 --> 0:20:33.520 There's a lot of empty store friends, American Legion Insurance 0:20:33.560 --> 0:20:34.200 and real estate. 0:20:34.880 --> 0:20:38.320 It was a lot quieter. I don't mean just small 0:20:38.359 --> 0:20:41.600 town quiet. I mean it was a bit too quiet. 0:20:41.640 --> 0:20:44.399 This town looks like a zombie apocalypse hit. 0:20:44.400 --> 0:20:49.880 It does. So I'm curious what struck you the most 0:20:49.920 --> 0:20:52.680 about Walnut Grove when we first got there for the pageant. 0:20:52.880 --> 0:20:56.000 I mean, honestly that it was a total ghost town. 0:20:56.359 --> 0:21:00.080 Most of the businesses were closed and they looked like 0:21:00.119 --> 0:21:03.440 they had been for a really long time. We saw 0:21:03.480 --> 0:21:08.320 no people, There was no real commerce, just a couple 0:21:08.560 --> 0:21:11.359 couple of shops that were open, and we had to 0:21:11.400 --> 0:21:14.479 stay at a hotel that was thirty minutes away because 0:21:14.880 --> 0:21:16.640 Walnut Grove didn't have one. 0:21:17.320 --> 0:21:19.720 Like we know, the town is only seven hundred and 0:21:19.760 --> 0:21:23.040 fifty people, but like the pageant, felt like it was 0:21:23.119 --> 0:21:26.480 such a huge community effort. When we drove in the 0:21:26.560 --> 0:21:28.879 next thing and it was like completely empty, it was 0:21:28.960 --> 0:21:29.760 just so striking. 0:21:30.280 --> 0:21:32.719 But we did eventually find some people and they were 0:21:32.760 --> 0:21:33.720 all in the gift shop. 0:21:33.960 --> 0:21:35.800 They were all in the gift shop for the Lower 0:21:35.800 --> 0:21:38.840 Angles Wilder Museum. I mean all of them, Like we 0:21:38.880 --> 0:21:41.439 met the entire town in the gift shop. I have 0:21:41.760 --> 0:21:43.840 family that has lived here for a really long time, 0:21:43.880 --> 0:21:47.440 like great grandparents and my grandmo who used to work 0:21:47.440 --> 0:21:51.040 here on my mom's side, there's a farm, and I 0:21:51.080 --> 0:21:55.040 think it's a century farm this year, mister Lson, Ye, yeah, 0:21:55.240 --> 0:21:56.040 were fantastic. 0:21:57.040 --> 0:21:58.960 I never thought you were a twenty one year old. 0:22:01.160 --> 0:22:03.159 We meant have been surprised. But the gift shop is 0:22:03.240 --> 0:22:05.120 used to a crowd over the whole year. 0:22:05.280 --> 0:22:08.600 We can get up between ten thousand to probably twelve 0:22:08.640 --> 0:22:12.160 thousand a year. We've had twenty thousand in one year. 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:15.040 In addition to all the locals, there's also fans just 0:22:15.119 --> 0:22:17.879 passing through, like a pair of motorcycle ladies we met 0:22:17.920 --> 0:22:22.359 who were driving across the country days. I read all 0:22:22.400 --> 0:22:25.479 the books when I was little so and then there 0:22:25.520 --> 0:22:30.000 were the people you might describe as professional fans. And 0:22:30.160 --> 0:22:32.680 one of the things I'm really interested in is Laura's 0:22:32.760 --> 0:22:36.199 life as a farm woman later on, and that's actually 0:22:36.200 --> 0:22:37.639 what my program was about. 0:22:37.760 --> 0:22:39.280 It was in the kitchen with Laura. 0:22:39.600 --> 0:22:41.160 The truth is we could have stayed in the gift 0:22:41.160 --> 0:22:43.520 shop all day, and we had to leave after an 0:22:43.560 --> 0:22:46.120 hour because we had an important appointment with Bill Richards, 0:22:46.119 --> 0:22:50.040 the director of the pageant. On our way to meet him, 0:22:50.480 --> 0:22:53.800 we noticed something we hadn't seen before. It's what is 0:22:53.840 --> 0:22:57.920 this mural? What's Boo Baye Foods? 0:22:57.960 --> 0:22:58.160 Oh. 0:22:58.880 --> 0:23:01.040 On the side of Boobay food it's the only grocery 0:23:01.080 --> 0:23:04.159 store in town, was a mural. It was a fifteen 0:23:04.160 --> 0:23:07.080 foot high painting of a pioneer woman linking arms with 0:23:07.119 --> 0:23:10.480 someone wearing what appeared to be a traditional Southeast Asian outfit. 0:23:11.280 --> 0:23:13.919 Was a pioneer woman, Laura, who was the person she 0:23:13.960 --> 0:23:14.840 was linking arms with. 0:23:15.520 --> 0:23:17.760 The little grocery store d early kind of price. 0:23:17.880 --> 0:23:20.280