# Little Irritating Things About Little House on the Prairie **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 6, 2005, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289 "2005-09-06T03:21:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/21 "2005-09-06T15:14:20Z")
When I read “clown rape”, I thought- “No, that’s Chicago with Gacy. Wisconsin is known for its cannibal/necrophile/ghoul killers.” THEN the explanation came- I do not remember the rapist having a clown suit- now, wasn’t he & the girl both killed in a fall when he came back to do it again? Btw, I thought sure the rapist would turn out to be her uptight over-protective Dad. Kinda relieved that at least the show didn’t go in that direction. ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/22 "2005-09-06T16:42:36Z")
My Dad watches at least an hour of LHotP a day. The show makes me gag. Stoic endurance, courage, self-sacrifice? No, no, that’s boring. Let’s do melodrama and sappy emotion! And really bad 70’s dresses! And dress Pa worse than a bum! There was a _rape_? in the series? Oh, God. And _morphine addiction_? I have vague memories that while Laura did marry Manly, she almost didn’t because of family opposition. Which is ridiculous, because his family were mostly the hell over in New York State, and he wouldn’t have listened, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/23 "2005-09-06T16:50:37Z")
For me, it was the episode where a son was born, and Laura got jealous. The baby died, and she ran away, thinking she had killed the baby because she didn’t pray for him during his sickness. She ends up on a mountain and Charles is so happy when he finally finds her. For me, I would have whipped her butt for being so selfish and putting the family through that just after they lost a child. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/24 "2005-09-06T17:27:42Z")
It really chapped my ass when Charles and Caroline adopted TWO MORE kids. :rolleyes: Jason Bateman played the boy and I have no idea who the girl was. Their parents had been killed when their wagon crashed. It was already shark jumpin’ before that. ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/25 "2005-09-06T17:31:57Z")
Didn’t they have a huge continuity error with the morphine addiction? Albert got hooked, got cleaned up and then in a VO at the end, Laura talked about how he went on to become a doctor when he grew up. But in a later episode, didn’t he die of (?) scarlet fever? ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/26 "2005-09-06T17:32:46Z")
I was channel surfing last night and just saw the wagon crash. What timing, eh? ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/27 "2005-09-06T17:36:40Z")
In Farmer Boy, Almanzo baths every Saturday night in prepartion for Sunday church. He was living on a prospeous farm, with heating stoves in every room. I doubt that the Ingalls, living through Minnesota winters with only a fireplace for warmth, placed any value on bathing on a regular basis. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/28 "2005-09-06T17:51:10Z")
[All about the Clown Rape episode.](http://www.angelfire.com/ultra/misc/lhotp_sylvia.htm#1) I used to watch it when I was a kid, and I’ll occassionally watch reruns (it’s fun to spot some of the guest stars, and let’s face it-Alison Arngram kicks serious prairie ass). What I found amusing was that the kid who played Albert used to play “young Pa” in flashback episodes before he became Albert. Plus, didn’t the real Charles Ingles have a beard? And Mary wasn’t a tomboy like Laura, she was more of a girly-girl, starched dresses, perfect curls, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/29 "2005-09-06T17:52:48Z")
Charles INGALLS. Dammit. ---
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/30 "2005-09-06T18:16:12Z")
Well, somehow when I was growing up, Mary losing her eyesight while reading by the light of an oil lamp had a profound impact on my mother. As a result, we kids were no longer allowed to read books at night to ourselves before bedtime, in fear of acquiring “Ingalls Nighlite Blindness Syndrome ™”. It wasn’t until late high-school that our mother reluctantly embraced her TV-induced idiocy and allowed us to read at night again. I call that annoying 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/31 "2005-09-06T18:19:18Z")
> [@BiblioCat](#): > > Didn’t they have a huge continuity error with the morphine addiction? Albert got hooked, got cleaned up and then in a VO at the end, Laura talked about how he went on to become a doctor when he grew up. But in a later episode, didn’t he die of (?) scarlet fever? Yeah, I thought he died too. Leukemia or something. Remember, he kept getting those nose bleeds? ---
**Author:** ![Greywolf73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d9b06d/32.png) [@Greywolf73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greywolf73)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/32 "2005-09-06T18:20:45Z")
> [@BiblioCat](#): > > Didn’t they have a huge continuity error with the morphine addiction? Albert got hooked, got cleaned up and then in a VO at the end, Laura talked about how he went on to become a doctor when he grew up. But in a later episode, didn’t he die of (?) scarlet fever? Yep, I believe you’re right. Didn’t Charles take Albert to the ocean because he’d never been before and it was his dying wish? Or was that another poor ailing child? My personal favorite annoyance is the episode in which the School for the Blind caught fire and Alice Garvey used a baby as a battering ram to shatter a window (she had it in her arm and used the outside of her arm to hit the window, but still–babies are not blunt objects!). I thought for years that I’d imagined that scene but I ran across several references to it on sites like Television Without Pity and Jump the Shark that proved I wasn’t the only one who’d noticed that. There’s another episode that messed with my head too. I remember a young girl who decided to drown herself and walked into the creek until the water was over her head. I think she was pulled to safety though. Or maybe not. When Laura’s horse Bunny had to be shot because he got tangled in barbed wire was quite traumatizing too. I cried for hours after watching that episode when I was a kid. Come to think of it, a lot of Little House traumatized me… ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/33 "2005-09-06T18:35:46Z")
> [@Greywolf73](#): > > Come to think of it, a lot of Little House traumatized me… Me too. The ep that sticks out in my mind the most, well certain parts of it anyway, was the one with Patricia Neal titled “Remember Me” She plays a dying mother trying to find someone to take care of her kids after she goes. The opening scene was horrible. A man trying to get rid of unwanted puppies shoves them into a sack with rocks then tosses them into the water. I don’t remember who grabbed them out, Laura or maybe one of Patricia Neal’s kids but I think only a few pups survived. The whole episode, what with a mother dying and leaving young children behind and the bit with the puppies sent me over the edge. I cried uncontrollably during that episode. Christ. It’s no wonder I ended up in therapy later in life. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/34 "2005-09-06T18:43:42Z")
> [@The Chao Goes Mu](#): > > The opening scene was horrible. A man trying to get rid of unwanted puppies shoves them into a sack with rocks then tosses them into the water. I don’t remember who grabbed them out, Laura or maybe one of Patricia Neal’s kids but I think only a few pups survived. I remember that one! Laura waded in and got the sack out and Mary pulled the puppies out one by one- then there was just one left and it was not moving. She reached in and pulled it out, and it was the rock. You’re right, it was very traumatizing. Why do I still remember that after all these years? I need help… :eek: IIRC, all the puppies lived and they found homes for all of them. Same for the kids, (they found homes for all of them), but they didn’t want to break them up, so Mr. French and whats-her-name got married so the kids could stay together. _: cue sappy music :_ Awwww! ---
**Author:** ![photopat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e95f7d/32.png) [@photopat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/photopat)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/35 "2005-09-06T18:51:30Z")
I was always bothered by the episode where the Ingalls’ get a phone. Anachronistic or not, it bugged me. I was also bothered that we never got a “Witness-esque” washtub bathing scene with Caroline, but that’s just me. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/36 "2005-09-06T18:53:31Z")
The series has probably given Laura Ingalls Wilder lots of exercise. I’m sure she rotates rapidly in her grave every time it plays. ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/37 "2005-09-06T18:54:46Z")
_A **phone** _? It was the frigging 1880’s! In a prairie settlement! Gahh! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/38 "2005-09-06T18:59:24Z")
> [@BiblioCat](#): > > I remember that one! Laura waded in and got the sack out and Mary pulled the puppies out one by one- then there was just one left and it was not moving. She reached in and pulled it out, and it was the rock. You’re right, it was very traumatizing. Why do I still remember that after all these years? I need help… :eek: > > IIRC, all the puppies lived and they found homes for all of them. Same for the kids, (they found homes for all of them), but they didn’t want to break them up, so Mr. French and whats-her-name got married so the kids could stay together. > _: cue sappy music :_ > Awwww! And I’d bet my right breast that as Mr. French and Company were walking off into the sunset of familial bliss, Pa Ingalls had tears streaming down his face. (Must be a Michael Landon thing, he used to do it on Highway to Heaven, which I did _not_, BTW, watch, my mom liked it.) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/39 "2005-09-06T19:00:30Z")
> [@photopat](#): > > I was always bothered by the episode where the Ingalls’ get a phone. > > Anachronistic or not, it bugged me. > > I was also bothered that we never got a “Witness-esque” washtub bathing scene with Caroline, but that’s just me. 😃 Nope. Not just you. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2005, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289/40 "2005-09-06T19:12:09Z")
> [@JohnGalt](#): > > As a native prarie-area Minnesotan, you’d think the most awful thing about LHotP is the mountains on the background, but no, my mother (who was born in 1925) said the most inaccurate thing is the number of trees. She said even when she was growing up there were practically NO trees, just some along rivers (oops, creeks) and a few scraggly ones homesteaders planted around their farms. In that part of the country you could see the grass (and later, farm fields) for miles. Yeah, that bugged me to. I didn’t realize there were so many mountains in South Dakota until Television Taught Me Otherwise. And now, because I can, a MST3K quote: “Ah, the Eastern Europe region of Southern California.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/little-irritating-things-about-little-house-on-the-prairie/320289.md?page=3)