The Election

You Mush Vote for Mary; or

Will the Real Not-Joni Mitchell Please Stand Up?

(a recap by Will Kaiser)

Title: The Election

Airdate: March 21, 1977

Written by B.W. Sandefur

Directed by Victor French

SUMMARY IN A NUTSHELL: A developmentally delayed student gets caught in the crossfire when bullies try to stop Nellie from becoming Dictator-For-Life.

RECAP:

WILL: Boy, will I be glad when this season is done.

ROMAN: Why?

WILL: So we don’t have to listen to this lame-ass arrangement of the theme anymore.

WILL: Also, we’ve been on Season Three for over a year now.

OLIVE: Really?

WILL: Yeah. It’s what happens when you only do one episode a month.

ROMAN: How long till we’re done with the whole project?

WILL: Um . . . about fifteen more years. I’ll be retirement age.

[OLIVE and ROMAN laugh.]

WILL: Most of our readers will probably be dead!

[OLIVE and ROMAN laugh harder.]

WILL: And you’ll both be middle-aged!

[OLIVE and ROMAN stop laughing.]

Looking to the nearer term, I’m sorry to report that this month, our dear step-twins Alexander and Olive depart for college, so their participation in Walnut Groovy will become more intermittent. (Roman is stuck with us for another year, though.)

Don’t know about you all, but I’ll sure miss ’em.

Anyways. [sob!]

We open on a beautiful contrail-streaked sky, under which a boy of twelve or so is walking.

The boy has a “long bowl cut,” like Ringo Starr if you’re of a certain age, or Will Byers, if you’re of another.

Or like the young Will Kaiser, who wore his hair like that for nearly the entire 1980s. Not exactly by choice – it was the only boys’ style my dad’s barber could do.

The kid hears some peeping or cheeping in the grass before him – the time of year is uncertain – and he stoops to pick up a baby bird that’s fallen out of the nest.

The mother bird watches from the tree.

ROMAN: Is that the bird that laid eggs when Freddie died?

It might be. It does look like a finch of some sort, which I’m sure you recall was the species of that early-er bird. They can live to be twenty years old!

What am I saying, I suppose it could be a father bird, not a mother. Birds share parenting responsibilities pretty equally, I believe. It’s one of their only nice traits, as we’ll learn in a bit.

This episode was written by B.W. Sandefur. Our own Victor French directs.

Anyways, the boy tucks the baby inside his shirt and climbs the tree.

ROMAN: CRUNCH!

WILL [as LENNIE from Of Mice and Men]: “Can I pet the rabbits, George?”

(Actually, we’ll see there are some similarities to that story.)

There are a lot of superstitions about putting baby birds back in the nest. But according to the National Audubon Society, the kid probably makes the right call here, since the bird hasn’t got feathers yet and so is too young to survive on its own. The parents won’t reject it if it’s returned to the nest.

This chick is pretty big, though . . . suggesting it might be a horrible murderous cuckoo!

Actually, I’m no expert, but the hooked bill suggests a parrot, parakeet, or the like, to me, anyways.

Unlike Lennie from Of Mice and Men, this kid manages to get the bird back into the nest without killing it. And sure enough, the parent bird does actually sit on the baby immediately. Who bred and trained these birds, I wonder? No finch wrangler is listed in the credits.

Cut to the schoolyard, where some kids we’ve never seen before are racing around roughly.

OLIVE [meaningfully]: WHO is that GINGER??? And WHO is that OTHER ONE???

A good many of the usual gang are around too, including Nellie, Willie, Cloud City Princess Leia, Not-Joni Mitchell, Not-Albert, Pigtail Helen, Mona Lisa Helen, an Ambiguously Ethnic Kid, the Nonbinary Kid, the Smallest Nondescript Helen of Them All, Not-Carl Sanderson, and, in her first repeat appearance, the Sharp-Faced Paranoid-Looking Sister from “The Wisdom of Solomon.” (Not her brother, though.)

The two older guys seize the Non-Binary Kid, but are almost immediately distracted by the bird boy’s arrival.

The Ginger then produces an earthworm from his breast pocket.

They greet the bird boy, addressing him as “Elmer.” Why do some old-fashioned names come back into style and others not? Amelia and Olive’s names were considered “old lady names” when they were born, but they took off in popularity and our kids seem to know quite a lot of them now. 

The old-timey naming trend has continued for boys as well as girls; we even have a six-year-old named Walter (!) living across the street from us. We love to hear his parents calling him “Walt,” as for example in this recent exchange:

WALTER’S MOM [watering her tomatoes]: Are you not feeling entertained, Walt?

WALTER: No! I am NOT feeling entertained!

But I’ve never at any phase of my life met a young person named Elmer.

Anyways, the two other boys, who we could already tell are sickos, trick Elmer into nearly eating the worm.  

WILL: Now I understand what it must be like to be on Ozempic, because I think I might throw up.

Then the Ginger ducks down into a classic “table” yoga pose behind Elmer, and the dark-haired bully pushes him over.

WILL: That works. They did it once on Doctor Who. Tegan, Nyssa and Adric used it to get away from a Seventeenth-Century peasant.

ROMAN: I remember that.

Laura, who’s been watching from the steps, is outraged and rushes to help Elmer.

She tells Elmer he should beat the shit out of the bullies. (It worked for Mary, after all.) 

But Elmer is a peacenik who thinks violence “ain’t Christian-like.”

“Oh, I’d do unto ’em,” says Laura, mistaking the point of the Sermon on the Mount.

She’s hardly the first to do that, of course.

Elmer then protests that the bullies are mean to him because they actually like him. As we noted last week, that might really be true of Nellie and Laura; but already we can tell Elmer’s is no frenemy situation.

I never deceived myself that my bullies liked me, preferring to wriggle in my own bile after such incidents rather than kiss anyone’s ass. (That showed ’em all right.)

But I had friends who, like Elmer, did imagine some sort of fantasy acceptance. Down deep, I think they worshipped their bullies and wanted to be them.

Well, we all had our own coping strategies.

But you know, speaking of bullying, this year’s Minnesota State Fair is right around the corner. I wonder what might have happened if only I’d given those line-cutting, mustard-colored-trouser-mocking bullies the lunch-bucket treatment back in 2019! 

Like the guy in “The Tell-Tale Heart,” I had a whole internal plan worked out for doing so. First I was going to hit the “leader” bully as hard as I could in the mouth with my pinky-ring hand. (I was wearing my big one that day, too!)

Then, as his dumb ox of a sidekick gaped in astonishment, I would have shoved him in the chest, again as hard as I could. (There was nobody doing “table pose” behind him, but I bet he would’ve gone down anyway. The element of surprise was mine.)

The woman I would have left alone, obviously, though she was the nastiest piece of work of the three.

Then I would have run like hell! 

But Dagny and I know each other quite well, and her facial expressions that day told me she would disapprove of these actions. (We might have been ejected from the Fair, you see; and we had Brandi Carlile tickets that night.)

And, like Elmer, I’m really not a violent person. In retrospect, perhaps Dags was right in trying to defuse things rather than encourage a counterattack.

After all, today I literally never think of the incident. What’s past is past, I say.

Besides, I’m sure all three of them died in the pandemic, so why worry about it at this point? Water under the bridge.

Anyways, these two bullies continue to tease Elmer as the kids head in to school. 

Today, Miss Beadle calls for class president nominations.

ROMAN: Who would have been the actual President during these stories?

WILL: Well . . . I would guess Ulysses S. Grant or Rutherford B. Hayes.

The Ginger points out since women aren’t allowed to vote in real elections, the Grovester girls shouldn’t have a say in this one either. 

(I was raised in a conservative church where women were not allowed to vote. My parents still attend, though my mom does not like the voting thing. At all. This shouldn’t surprise you if you’re reading this, Dad.)

The Bead rather pointedly points out that Wyoming passed a law allowing women to vote, which will be their precedent here. 

Wyoming again! It’s true, they were really the first government in the world to fully allow women to participate in elections (in 1869), and you’ll recall last week I mentioned they were also the first state to allow women on juries. 

I wonder when they went wrong?

(Actually, the Wyoming Historical Society explains those promoting women’s suffrage in the state weren’t just interested in equality. What they hoped was that women would join them in punishing Republicans – then the socially liberal party in the United States – for allowing Black men to vote. Don’t tell the kids in Florida, though.)

[One correction: Reader srogouski writes that New Jersey actually allowed women to vote first, and he is right. They did it way back in 1790 – it was limited to certain counties at first, then expanded statewide in 1797. However, I guess a better way to put it would be Wyoming was the first to do it with no takebacks, since Jersey revoked voting rights for women in 1807. Thanks for the clarification – I do love our readers. – WK]

Before we get on with the story, there are a couple faces in the gallery we need to single out.

WILL: Those are Michael Landon’s kids. 

ROMAN: Legitimate ones, or ones he sired on-set?

Not funny. One of them is Leslie Landon, last seen as Dying-of-Typhus Leslie in “Plague,” all the way back in Season One. In this story, she’s credited as “Kate,” but we’ll assume it’s the same character. Very glad she survived that calamity.

(Speaking of typhus, it’s still around, and even less of a joke than poison ivy.)

The other offspring is Michael Landon, Jr., who’s credited as “Jim,” and who looks something like a cross between a young Charles and the Midsommar Kid.

Michael Landon, Jr., would go on to produce a number of heartwarming Hallmark Channel or Hallmark-Channel-type entertainments, notably When Calls the Heart and When Hope Calls.

I’ve never watched them, but my understanding is they’re both as Canadian as Champs delivering chicken hot, right to your door.

As for Leslie Landon, we’ll deal with her full bio at a later date.

Later, at recess (weren’t they just at recess?), the two bullies are scheming to rig the election against the girls – specifically Nellie, whose ambition is well-known to everyone, both watching this show and trapped inside it.

They’re right about her, of course. She and Willie have already formed a Super PAC and run home to get candy with which to buy votes. 

Through this scene, everybody’s sticking their hands into the candy jars rather than using a scoop. I’m not an overly hygienic person myself, but honestly. 

Nels comes down and says their expensive dentist in Mankato will be pleased to see the children’s rotten teeth.

Mrs. Oleson departs to check on a roast (see, she does cook), and Nels mutters that when the kids’ teeth fall out, she can lend them her false teeth.

“What was that, Nels?” says Harriet, bluntly.

Caught, Nels replies, “That roast . . . I just bet that’s a good piece of beef!”

The return of Rappin’ Nels! Not my favorite comedic device on this show, but a lot of people love it, and after all, what the hell do I know?

Elaborate pizzicato strings bring us back to school, where the Bead calls for nominations.

Not-Joni Mitchell looks particularly excited. Speaking of teeth, hers are rather good for the Nineteenth Century.

The Bead says, “We’re going to hold our election just like the national election – the one that gave us Rutherford B. Hayes as our new President!”

A number of noteworthy things about this.

First, I was right about Hayes probably being the officeholder at the time.

OLIVE: Way to go, Dad.

WILL: I only guessed that because he’s mentioned as being the President on Deadwood.

Second, I don’t know whether it proves that my insane system for dating these stories is any good, but it does prove it’s 1877, which is exactly where I projected we were in the timeline! Hayes was elected in November of 1876, and since we’ll see characters eat fresh sweet corn later in the episode, “The Election” has to be set in late summer/early fall the following year.

Third, I wondered if Miss Beadle actually would have called him “Rutherford B. Hayes” rather than just “Rutherford Hayes” at that time. But it seems he did use the “B,” on campaign posters, anyways. Maybe there were a lot of other Rutherford Hayeses who ran against him and he needed to distinguish himself.

Finally:

ROMAN: It’s funny she would hold this election up as one to emulate. We learned it was one of the most horrible in history.

And it’s true, the 1876 Presidential election had a lot of features which, while familiar to us today, aren’t examples of the American Experiment at its best. 

It featured a contest decided by the electoral college rather than the popular vote; accusations of fraud and suppression of Black voters; competing slates of contested electors; a decision made by a Congressional Commission along partisan lines; and an outcome never really accepted as legitimate by the losing side.

Say, we haven’t changed a bit, have we, cats?

The Bead whitewashes all this, though. And of course, it isn’t the first whitewashing to have occurred in her classroom.

The Ginger laughs, “I’m gonna vote Democrat!” 

(The 1876 election was a Republican-vs-Democratic contest, but as I mentioned above, the party platforms on many issues were quite different from what they are now. For instance, the Republicans were then the party of progressive social policy on race, while the Democrats opposed efforts to enfranchise Black people and became the dominant party in the post-Confederate South.) 

(In the hundred years or so following the Civil War, the parties’ sensibilities on these and many other issues completely reversed. Which is why anybody who tells you Lincoln being a Republican “proves Democrats are the real racists” is full of shit, not to put too fine a point on it. Truth is just truth, folks.) 

Anyways, Miss Beadle, addressing the Ginger as “Kenneth,” says they’re not going so far as to have political parties.

Kenneth is played by Dermott Downs, who was a child actor who appeared on The ABC Afterschool Special and in Escape to Witch Mountain and Freaky Friday.

Downs grew up to do camerawork for the third and fifth films in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Nightmare on Elm Street series, respectively, as well as for a number of soft-core adult films including a sex potboiler called Save Me, which I believe I have actually seen.

I remember the poster, anyways.

Downs went on to a quite successful career as a director, doing country music videos for Martina McBride and Dierks Bentley and episodes of Criminal Minds, Arrow, Supergirl, Chucky, etc., etc. Nothing I ever watched, but good for him.

Everyone starts talking at once, so the Bead brings down the hammer, hissing, “Class, you will speak only with permission or we’ll have no election!” (I kind of wish she ran our elections today, don’t you?)

Willie nominates Nellie, and Dying-of-Typhus Leslie seconds the motion. In a nice touch, Leslie and several other girls are chewing Nellie’s candy already.

A born legislator, Nellie immediately moves that the nominations be closed.

Prodded by the Ginger, Michael Landon, Jr., raises his hand and nominates Mary.

This surprise development brings whispers and shifting allegiances. 

WILL: It’s like the Skeksis picking an Emperor in The Dark Crystal.

ROMAN: Probably Jim Henson’s tribute to Little House on the Prairie.

Junior’s motion is seconded by the Non-Binary Kid, who today is addressed by the Bead as “Steve.” 

(According to the credits, the character is played by someone named “Wade Alberty,” even though the Non-Binary Kid isn’t all that Alberty-looking if you ask me, at least compared to, say, Matthew Labyorteaux.)

Then Kenny and his dark-haired pal, who has a fuzzy adolescent sleaze stash, nominate Elmer, and all the kids laugh their heads off. 

Except poor Elmer, who looks very uncomfortable.

After school, Nellie and Dying-of-Typhus Leslie walk together.

WILL: My God, is Leslie Landon a giantess?

Meanwhile, Mary thanks Michael Landon, Jr., for nominating her.

OLIVE: Whoa, did you see him check Mary out?

WILL: Like father like son!

But when Mary leaves, Junior joins a faction of boys comprising the Ginger, the Sleaze Stash, the Non-Binary Kid, and Not-Carl. 

It kind of breaks my heart Non-Binary’s of their number. But it does prove my point about how some weaker kids kiss up to their bullies.

Apparently this group wants to humiliate the girls by splitting them against each other and electing “a boy [who] don’t know nothin’.”

You’d think supporting a known idiot just to “own” your enemies would be an unlikely tactic to succeed.

That night, in the common room of the Little House, Laura is designing Mary’s campaign posters.

It’s a pretty good design for a beginner. I thought I’d try to recreate it with the more advanced tools I have at my disposal.

Unfortunately, there are some typos or I suppose “write-os,” which of course Mary the Schoolmarm’s Apprentice jumps on her for. (Typical client, freaking out about a first draft. Wait for the final deliverable, Mare!)

Pa comes home, and we see Ma’s been in the room the whole time without speaking. Honestly, they could just prop a dummy up to be Caroline in some of these stories, couldn’t they? Poor Grassle.

Laura wants Pa to guess what happened at school, but he’s already heard about it. (Ruining his daughter’s surprise gives him the giggles, of course.)

Honestly, I want Landon’s giggle as a notification sound on my phone.

Pa says he heard it from Nels at the store. Do you think all the Grovesters take a deep breath when they have to go shopping, because they don’t know if they’ll get Nels or Harriet when they go through the door? I bet they do. It would require some mental preparation.

Mary says she can’t compete with Nellie, but Laura says with herself as campaign manager, she can’t lose. How on earth does Laura know what a campaign manager is? It seems like the concept would be completely outside her sphere. This episode verges on the fantastical at times.

“I vote for Mary!” slurps Carrie suddenly, and Pa scoops her up, delighted. We haven’t had any good Pa/Carrie bonding scenes in a while.

Laura says Nellie’s bribing the schoolgirls with a party, and Ma, who finally recovers the power of speech, says they’re planning their own in response.

OLIVE: Party? They can’t afford a party. What are they gonna serve?

WILL: Mush. It’s all they can afford to feed to a large group.

ROMAN: “You MUSH Vote for Mary!”

No mush, but the menu apparently is corn-based: “roasting ears and popcorn.”

During this conversation, Laura has whipped up another design. This one depicts Nellie flying over the Mercantile and is captioned “Bossy Nellie Tweed.”

Oh my God, Sandefur, Boss Tweed? You think that’s a reference an eleven-year-old prairie girl would make?

For those of you who don’t know the story, “Boss” Tweed was a corrupt Nineteenth-Century zillionaire who controlled NYC’s government and institutions for decades through bribery and mafia-like tactics. 

By the time of this story, Tweed’s power was gone – he was in prison for embezzlement. 

Anticipating my objection, Sandefur has Laura explain she modeled her picture on a satirical cartoon in the newspaper. Whatever, B.W. 

It is true Tweed was a popular target for cartoonists, notably Thomas Nast; in fact, Nast’s caricature below was used to ID Tweed when he fled to Spain in 1876.

I’m not sure those cartoons were reprinted in the Mankato Clarion, though. And if they were, would Laura Ingalls give a shit?

But Charles just giggles these objections away.

Then we cut to Elmer, who’s out in a barn giving a chicken a bath.

OLIVE: So he’s obsessed with birds?

Elmer’s dad comes in, and they have a conversation about how this particular chicken has been the victim of vicious gang-pecking by the others.

OLIVE: Does that really happen? 

WILL: Yes. Birds are horrible. They say pheasants are the worst.

We see Elmer has also been tending to an injured squirrel.

OLIVE: Just like Bob Ross’s squirrel.

ROMAN: Yeah, Peapod!

Elmer’s dad is a quiet, rather intense-looking man. In fact, he does a lot of intense staring at his son throughout the episode.

Boy, was the actor, Charles Aidman, in a lot of stuff. Have Gun Will Travel, Wagon Train, Rawhide, The Wild Wild West, Gunsmoke, Ironside, The Virginian, Mannix, Medical Center, Quincy, Dallas, Knots Landing . . . and that’s leaving out, like, 90 percent of his resume.

He was on The Twilight Zone twice, too – both really weird ones.

The conversation to the election. Elmer’s dad gently asks who talked him into running. “Joel and Kenny,” Elmer says – Joel apparently being Sleaze Stash.

OLIVE: “Joel” and “Kenny” don’t seem like Nineteenth-Century names.

“I thought you was havin’ trouble with those two boys,” Mr. Dobkins says. 

He mentions some previous bullying incidents, but Elmer shakes his head and says, “They didn’t mean no harm.”

The dad thinks this over, then, not unkindly, tells Elmer he’d better hurry and come in to supper.

Turning now to his rabbits (see? Steinbeck), Elmer picks up a little glass bottle from a crate.

ROMAN: Is he drinking booze? Maybe that explains why he’s “slow.”

It’s actually chicken moisturizer, and he isn’t drinking it, but it’s interesting that Elmer does seem “slow.” Because really, apart from literally moving and talking a little slowly, he doesn’t seem that different in his speech or manner from any other kids on this show. A little quieter, maybe; though of course, many of the other boys never speak at all.

Whatever it is, it’s a testament to the actor’s powers of suggestion, and I’ll say right now I think Eric Olson is pretty good in this one. You know, reader srogouski recently mentioned Landon’s ability to get great performances from child actors, and it’s certainly true. Do you think that man glowed in the dark?

Anyways, Eric Olson (no, he wasn’t from Minnesota) was also on Gunsmoke and Eight is Enough, and appeared in a TV movie from 1975, Sarah T. – Portrait of a Teenage Alcoholic.

Sarah T. also starred Linda Blair, Mark Hamill, Larry Hagman, Michael Lerner, and M. Emmet Walsh, as well as THREE other Little House alumni:

Miss Ames, the insane and mysterious Sunday school teacher in “The Gift” . . . 

. . . the Dwight Schrute lookalike kid from “Troublemaker” . . . 

. . . and our beloved Ebenezer Sprague, Ted Gehring! 

Plus, William Daniels is in it, and since he’s Mr. Bonnie Bartlett I’ll give him partial Little House credit.

Maybe I’ll look Sarah T up this weekend when I need a break from Little House. Either that, or Save Me.

[TIME LAPSE]

Okay, I watched Sarah T. last night. Seriously, it was so good! I’m recovering myself, so I’m probably biased, but I was blubbering by the end. If you’re the type of person who hangs out here for fun, I bet you’d love it too.

(Nota bene: Unless you can’t watch stories where bad things happen to horses. No judgment from me on that, just fair warning!)

Anyways, Mr. Dobkins goes inside, and he and Elmer’s smallish, darkish mother, Ellen, discuss the “great news” about Elmer’s presidential nomination. 

“It’s the Bagby and Turner boys that put him up to it,” Mr. Dobkins says. (Bagby is the Ginger and Turner the Sleaze Stash, according to the credits.)

Then Dobkins says:

MR. DOBKINS: You know, kids are like chickens. Somebody different, like Elmer, slow thinker, can’t keep up with the others, they set out to peck him to pieces.

OLIVE: All right, we got it the first time, you don’t have to explain the whole metaphor.

Mrs. Dobkins says Elmer knows this very well, he just doesn’t let it bother him.

“Well, it doesn’t bother him that he’s two years behind the other kids his age either,” says Mr. Dobkins.

OLIVE: What difference does that make? It’s just one-room school.

Mrs. Dobkins reminds her husband they actually made the decision as a family to keep Elmer out of school for a while.

“Yeah,” Dobkins says, “because of what the kids and that Springfield teacher did to him.” Apparently a previous educator tried to get Elmer to learn by publicly shaming him.

WILL [as MR. DOBKINS]: “. . . That guy was a real crab-apple.”

Taking a leaf from the Book of Baker Makay, Dobkins says, “Might have been a mistake to put him in school here, too.”

“He wants to go, Sam,” says Mrs. Dobkins, and Mr. Dobkins replies, “Yah . . . like that little chicken wants to run with the flock, and get pecked to death.”

Mrs. Dobkins comes and puts her arms around him.

OLIVE: Are we supposed to like this guy?

WILL: I think so.

OLIVE: Well, I don’t.

ROMAN: Like him, Olive! You’re supposed to! Conform!

Well, I like him. I think both the actors are good. This scene is really quiet, almost as if they’re talking around the real subject because it’s too difficult. You can tell they’ve discussed their son many times before, and can’t see any way forward that’s free of pain for him. Hard for any parent to accept.

Mitzi Hoag, the actor playing Mrs. Dobkins, was on That Girl, Hawaii Five-O, The Partridge Family, The Jeffersons, The Facts of Life, Gunsmoke and Bonanza, Father Murphy and Highway to Heaven, Knots Landing and Santa Barbara, and Love Boat.

After a break, Willie comes zipping around the porch of the Mercantile.

ROMAN: This music is great, David!

A second later, Nellie, skirts a-hoisted, chases after him.

She finds him in the storeroom.

Nellie says she’s got a present for him, but he says all the political pressure is too much for him.

But then she gives him a big cigar, and even lights it for him. Dashed civilized of her.

OLIVE: Oh my God!

ROMAN: Little House!

WILL: I wonder if this one was underwritten by Big Tobacco.

Willie takes a couple puffs, and says “Good!”, imbecilically.

Then Nellie says she’s going to blackmail him for smoking if he doesn’t vote for her.

OLIVE: They shouldn’t have this Evil Nellie story right after the last one. It doesn’t compare. I also doubt Laura would be recovered emotionally from that incident.

I agree, though it’s probably been at least seven months since the events of “The Music Box” in Little House Universal Time (LHUT).

Willie suddenly rises and races outside to be sick in the privy. From two puffs on a cigar? That’s a little much.

Meanwhile, Laura and Mary approach the store, breaking the barrier of the Pagan Stone Circle as they do.

Mr. Nelson the Gray-Haired Dude and a man I believe is the Dungareed Hick from “Little Girl Lost” pass in a wagon.

Dying-of-Typhus Leslie and Not-Joni Mitchell approach and start going on about Nellie’s party. Not-Joni’s all dolled up in her green party dress.

Wait a second . . . that isn’t Not-Joni Mitchell! It’s Pigtail Helen!

She’s wearing Not-Joni’s party dress. She’s got her hair and makeup done Not-Jonily, too. It’s even the same hair ribbon!

Attentive readers will remember how in recent stories this season, Pigtail Helen has not been doing her hair in her trademark pigtails.

But I had no idea she was building up to full-fledged identity theft. My God, it’s Single White Female! The question now is, what’s become of the real Not-Joni Mitchell?

Anyways, Mary just snubs them, whilst Laura makes sarcastic comments before doing the same.

It’s clear Leslie and Helen had no idea the Ing-Gals weren’t invited, and so can’t really be blamed. (I’m in a generous mood today.)

Anyways, inside the store, Nels also talks to Mary about the party, and Laura points out Nellie didn’t invite them.

OLIVE: Just like Isaac not inviting me to Amelia’s birthday brunch.

Good old Nels says they certainly are invited.

The girls decline, saying they have chores. “On Saturday?” says Nels. 

Yes, Nels, you city slicker you, why not? You think you can just hit the off switch on a cow when Hanson blows the whistle Friday afternoon?

It must be noted, for all Mary’s involvement here, she doesn’t really have much of a part in this one. She’s just a cog in the wheels of B.W. Sandefur’s plot.

The Ing-Gals leave, just as Carl the Flunky is arriving. (The whole gang’s in this one, it seems.)

They see Elmer resting on a bench, and stop to chat with him.

Incredibly, Laura makes another Boss Tweed joke, which Mary has to explain to Elmer.

“Oh, I guess I don’t know about him,” says Elmer. NEITHER DOES ANYONE ELSE, B.W. SANDEFUR!

Elmer tells Mary he hopes she wins the election. Didn’t Corky run for class president on Life Goes On? I wonder if that was a Little House tribute too.

Mary says Elmer may win himself; but (as his parents knew) Elmer is aware his nomination was a joke at his expense.

“You could vote for yourself!” says Laura, sort of embarrassingly.

But like Paul Metzler in Election (one of the great fin de siècle political films), Elmer views voting for yourself as somehow unethical.

The Ing-Gals depart, and there goes the Dungareed Hick in the background again, this time accompanied by Ben Slick, it seems. 

All we need is Mustache Man and Mrs. Foster for the full pantheon of Grovesters to be realized, I think.

Back at the Dobkins place, Elmer’s mom says “Elmer’s pretty sure his squirrel’s gonna have younguns.” (He’s not breeding them, is he? That’s a disquieting thought.)

Mr. Dobkins, who’s doing the bills, says, “Figures. Price of seed’s goin’ up again.” Good Lord, Grandpa Kaiser, how much can a squirrel eat? It’s not like Elmer got a classmate pregnant or something.

Mrs. Dobkins makes the same observation, more or less.

Soon they’re both worrying about the fallout from the election again. 

We learn Elmer asked his ma to tailor one of his dad’s shirts for him to wear on Election Day, but she decided to make him a brand-new one instead. Mr. D. smiles. I do like these two.

Back at the Little House, Ma pours the coffee. (Sigh.)

Charles, who we’ve seen has some bullyish instincts himself, comes up with the same analysis as Joel and Kenny; viz., that dividing the female vote will hand the election to Elmer.

Out in the soddy, which frankly could use a little maintenance, Mary and Laura load up on sweet corn for their campaign cookout.

Of course, it looks better than the Ingallses’ real-life sod house in Walnut Grove does these days.

Elmer is the first to arrive. He’s brought some corn for the grill himself.

OLIVE: They should get sick from eating too much corn.

WILL: Yeah, they all get pellagra and die.

Elmer glumly informs the Ing-Gals that in town, Nellie is diverting girls away from Mary’s event with more free candy.

To her credit, Mary says who cares, they can have fun just the three of them.

That night in the barn, Pa blah-blahs about how politicians are all a bunch of crooks. As for him, he’s a typical independent voter. (“Independent voters,” as you may know, are notable mostly for handing elections to the worst possible people for the shallowest possible reasons.)

But that’s neither here nor there. Pa gives a little background on the 1876 election, during which Rutherford B. Hayes’s rival was a Samuel Tilden. (Actually Samuel J. Tilden, but nobody ever says that, do they?)

Laura says Mary could win the race by adding extra recesses to the schoolday. But Pa, who you’ll recall is a member or alumnus of the Walnut Grove school board himself, says the board couldn’t approve that.

Then he bids them goodnight, quite sweetly.

The following week, the Ginger and Sleaze Stash are observing poor Elmer on the playground.

The two drag Elmer onto the seesaw stump (get it???), and, with Michael Landon, Jr., feeding him terrible ideas, Sleaze Stash tells the kids for every vote Elmer receives, he’ll eat a worm for their entertainment. 

You know, the tormenting of Elmer as a “worm-eater” has an evil logic, since remember, he’s obsessed with birds.

(The Sleaze Stash actor, with the unfortunate name of John Herbsleb, wasn’t in much else.)

WILL: I’m sorry, his stache is horrible.

WILL: Speaking of staches, Mary should try to get Mustache Man to endorse her campaign. Mustache, Mush, Mary!

ROMAN [as MUSTACHE MAN]: “I must-ashk you to vote for Mary.”

Unhappily, Elmer’s dad has pulled his wagon over in the thoroughfare to watch this dreadful spectacle.

My mom once came to school to spy on me when I was a little kid. She got to see me sticking my tongue out at a teacher behind her back, ha ha ha! Be careful what you wish for, parents.

All the evil schoolgirls laugh at the “worm” gag, but Mr. Dobkins ain’t laughin’.

Neither is the Bead, who materializes out of nowhere – she has a knack for that, doesn’t she? – and shrieks, “That will be quite enough!”

Then she cancels recess for everyone – a common teacher’s tactic after such disruptions in my day too.

Elmer’s dad, unhappy but surely pleased the Bead defends his son better than that Springfield guy, drives away.

Miss Beadle stares after her wretched, wretched students.

ROMAN: Does she have a big birthmark on her neck?

OLIVE: No, it’s just the shadow of her giant earring.

After another commercial, we see Elmer’s house at night.

WILL: Are those lights real? They look funny.

ROMAN: They tweaked the colors on Microsoft Paint.

OLIVE: It would be great in those days, because you could go burn down somebody’s house in the middle of the night, and everyone would think, “Oh, they kicked over a lantern, what a tragedy.”

WILL: Yeah. Just like that Jason Aldean song says!

Mrs. Dobkins is a-ironin’ the new shirt she made for Elmer.

WILL: I had a shirt kind of like that in the nineties. Mine was rayon, though.

Mr. Dobkins comes home, makes some cryptic remarks, and then leaves again.

Out in the barn, Elmer is trying to practice his campaign speech, but he can’t get very far into it.

Elmer’s pa appears, and they discuss what he witnessed on the playground today. 

OLIVE: Does the dad kill all his pets to teach him a lesson?

ROMAN: Yeah, that’s the twist ending.

Mr. Dobkins starts talking about the peckin’ chickens again.

OLIVE: He’s like Ernie, telling a joke four times even though no one thinks it’s funny.

[NOTE: Ernie is Olive’s little brother at her mom’s house.]

Elmer begs him not to go to Kenny and Joel’s parents.

OLIVE: These tropes always make me sad.

WILL: Yeah, Landon has such sympathy for picked-on and downtrodden kids. He really gets it.

Mr. Dobkins says okay, but he wants Elmer to drop out of the race, to spare him further humiliation.

Crying, Elmer agrees, and his dad hugs him. They both look agonized.

Well, Election Day arrives, but Mrs. Dobkins hasn’t been brought into the loop on Elmer dropping out, so she gives him the new shirt anyway.

Elmer walks to school.

WILL: David! This is some moody introspective music.

Meanwhile, the Ginger and Sleaze Stash are also coming through the woods, the Ginger trying to kill birds along the way.

When they spot Elmer, David gives us some tense Pyscho-type music – not the shower part, the opening credits.

They approach their victim once again.

OLIVE [as mean kids]: “Hey, bird-lover!”

Actually, the thread about caring for animals versus hurting them for fun is quite nicely done in this story. Plus it makes the broader theme easy to understand for the little kids in the audience.

Elmer tells them he has to quit the race . . . so they punish him by pushing him face-first into a nearby pigpen.

I don’t have to tell you, this is most likely Hobson’s pig farm, from “The Gift.”

After a break, we see Mary making her speech at school.

OLIVE: So boring old Mary’s gonna win it, huh?

Mary’s speech is very weak, but everybody claps anyways.

Nellie gets up and starts her spiel. She’s actually quite a lively speaker – not that the Bead appreciates it.

Nellie notes her mother is on the school board and will host a huge party for everyone if she wins.

Then Elmer arrives, covered in pigshit. Almost everyone laughs. I wonder which circle of Hell is reserved for the schoolchildren of Walnut Grove, Minnesota, circa 1874-1880?

The Bead is horrified, but Elmer says it’s all right, since he’s quitting the race. Then he turns to the class and says:

ELMER: Go ahead and laugh. I know I’m not smart like you. I don’t even know what a class president’s supposed to do. But I know what’s right and wrong. And it ain’t right for big kids to be pickin’ on little kids, just cuz they think it’s fun to hurt somebody. And it ain’t right to give someone something to make ’em vote for you, just because some folks got more money than others. It ain’t right to make fun of people –

ROMAN: Well, that’s us out.

ELMER: – or push ’em in the mud to make ’em look silly. My mother made me this shirt, because she loves me.

Not-Joni’s lip trembles at this.

ELMER: You probably all think that’s dumb. But that’s what’s wrong around here. People don’t pay no mind to other people’s carings. I hope whoever gets to be class president sees to it that the little kids aren’t picked on or hurt, because it’s not right. It’s just not right.

As a speech, it’s quite Corky-worthy, and we see tears are pouring down Mary’s face.

OLIVE: Oh my God, Mary!

ROMAN: She clearly isn’t presidential material.

WILL: No, but at least she’s really crying, not just shaking her shoulders or using glue.

Mary raises her hand, but the Bead, with surprising irritation, tells her to put it back down. I suppose she’s annoyed another of her brilliant ideas resulted in catastrophe.

Actually, it’s worth noting the Bead actually has her hand on Elmer’s shoulder – a strong statement of support considering he’s covered in pigshit.

But Mary insists on being heard, saying she’s dropping out of the race and throwing her support to Elmer.

Blah blah, Elmer’s such a decent guy, blah blah president, says Mary.

Even the Ginger and Sleaze Stash look chastened.

Rather improbably, Miss Beadle pushes Elmer to stay in the race, even though he specifically said at the beginning of his speech his father isn’t permitting it.

Equally improbably, Elmer agrees, and everyone claps.

After a little time lapse, we see Laura and the Bead counting the votes in front of the whole class. Miss Beadle announces a tie, with twelve votes for Nellie and twelve for Elmer. (I make it twenty children total in this episode, so I don’t know where those extra four votes came from.)

ROMAN: Would that many people really vote for Nellie?

WILL: Sure. She’s like a Kardashian to those girls.

Sounding quite Canadian again, Nellie says Willie’s in the outhouse and hasn’t voted yet.

Willie comes back in. Hilariously, everyone stares at him and David gives us a sinister drone from the basses.

WILLIE: This is so gripping. It’s like All the President’s Men.

Willie votes for Elmer, screaming it’s revenge for Nellie being mean to him all the time.

Nellie screams back and runs out of the room.

Everyone else cheers for Elmer, to his embarrassed happiness.

OLIVE: Aw, even the mean boy gave Willie a pat on the head.

ROMAN: NOW can Mary beat them up?

The school vomits everybody out, and Mary and Laura rush over to the mill, where Charles is selling something to Mr. Dobkins.

The Gals give the pas the happy news. Dobkins can’t believe it, but then he looks over and sees Elmer being congratulated by Michael Landon, Jr., and Not-Carl Sanderson.

Elmer’s clothes have magically become clean.

OLIVE: How did that happen?

WILL: Mary probably ran to Mrs. Whipple and had her make him a whole new outfit.

ROMAN: Yeah. She whipped one up.

Mr. Dobkins jumps out of his wagon and walks toward his son.

WILL: Where’d he get that Chonky? Look at its face!

OLIVE: It’s like a ghost Chonky.

We see Elmer’s clothes are really just “clean-ish.”

ROMAN: Just a guess, but we never see this kid again, right?

Mr. Dobkins breaks into a smile as he congratulates Elmer.

As Pa and the girls watch, we notice Mary is carrying Laura’s dictionary. Aha! So she DID really covet it after all! She must just have been playing it cool last week.

Bum-Bum-Ba-Dum!

STYLE WATCH: Charles appears to go commando again. And where the hell is Pinky?

THE VERDICT: This one suffers a bit from its proximity to the similarly-themed “Music Box” the previous week. But it’s still a very good story with plenty of strengths. Eric Olson plays Elmer with sympathy and dignity, and Charles Aidman and Mitzi Hoag give understated performances as his loving, suffering parents.

UP NEXT: Gold Country, Part One

POST SCRIPTUM: By the way, if anyone’s interested, here’s my thinking on how the twenty children in class voted. It still does break down pretty evenly along gender lines, with a couple notable line-crossers.

Plus, you can tell by their faces.

For Elmer

AEK, Cloud City Princess Leia, Sleaze Stash, the Ginger, Laura, Mary, Michael Landon, Jr., Mona Lisa Helen, Non-Binary Kid, Not-Albert, Not-Carl Sanderson, Willie

For Nellie

Dying-of-Typhus Leslie, Elmer (remember, he said he wouldn’t vote for himself), Nellie, Not-Joni, Pigtail Helen, the Sharp-Faced Girl, the Smallest Nondescript Helen of Them All, and an unnamed little girl I think we’ve never seen before.

It is possible some students voted absentee, which would account for the discrepency in the numbers.

Not-Joni might have been a vote-switcher too. She looks unhappy at the outcome, but she may have secretly voted Elmer, since she was moved by his speech and since we saw in the past she rolls her eyes behind Nellie’s back.

Thanks for reading! See ya next time.