“Back to School,” Part One

Love is a Manly Splendored Thing; or

Flippin’ Awesome

(a recap by Will Kaiser)

Title: “Back to School” [sic], Part One

Airdate: September 17, 1979

Written and directed by Michael Landon

SUMMARY IN A NUTSHELL: Walnut Grove experiences an outbreak of immortal TV moments when a grown man named Almanzo Wilder comes to town.

RECAP: Welcome, friends, to September of 1979! Big story today with a lot to go over. . . . Let’s do it!

Our hero David Rose is back, and as he’s done for each season opener, he gives us a new arrangement of the theme.

This one isn’t super-new, though. It’s essentially Season Two’s version with Season Five’s ending tacked on. 

(When I reference Season Five’s version, I mean Season Five’s version that was introduced last season, then immediately abandoned in favor of the old one from Season Four again – a choice I know mystified many of us at the time.)

(Well, some of us. Yes, I do realize something would need to be really wrong with you to be familiar with all five previous versions and know what I’m talking about when I compare them. And if it is, well, welcome to the club.) 

The big takeaway this time is that the trumpet “yadda-dadda-da-dah” is BACK for the first time since “Going Home” in Season Two – sixty-two stories ago! (I know we have a lot of “yadda-dadda-da-dah” fans out there.)

The other notable change, and it’s probably my favoritest thing about any arrangement so far, is that David inserts a little comical “pew” sound on a guitar when Carrie falls.

Small edits, but they add up, I think, to what I think of as the definitive version of the Little House theme, or at least what I think I think of as the definitive version. (I think.)

We open with a nice simple shot of the Little House.

The weather looks nice compared to the last few episodes. (Even “The Odyssey,” ostensibly set in summertime, was full of bare trees and winter coats.)

There are some exciting new names in the opening credits, but we’ll deal with those a little later.

Katherine MacGregor and Alison Arngrim both get “guest star” credits on this one, so surely we’re in for a treat. (As if you didn’t already know that, you sophisticated Little House on the Prairie Fan, you!)

“’Back to School’” is of course a turning point, kicking off the fourth of the five unofficial “eras” we’ve discussed in the past. 

While it’s one of the most famous episodes – among the biggest of what we’ve styled “the Big Classics” – I’m going to approach it cold, as if I’ve never seen it.

Next we get an iconic image – Carrie exiting the Little House and heading to the privy. 

At this point, Little House had been in the Nielsen top fifteen for three years straight, and there’s a certain self-awareness that’s creeping in.

Assured its tropes are now recognizable as such to the audience, it’s hitting notes such as “Carrie Runs to the Privy” in a triumphant, give-the-public-what-it-wants kind of way.

What I mean is that here, we don’t just see Carrie running to the privy. We see Carrie running to the privy IN THAT CLASSIC WAY SHE ALWAYS DOES ON LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE. 

This was already happening to a certain extent in Season Five – you’ll remember “Mortal Mission” contained so many “classic” tropes it verged on self-parody.

Fortunately, there’s a lot of life in the old show yet, and while Landon is obviously proud of his creation, we’re not in for a season of mere box-ticking and on-its-laurels-resting.

No, we’re in for new elements that immediately turn the ship in a different direction, and Season Six contains some of the series’ most intense and emotional episodes.

Some of them are devastating; some of them are bizarre; and some of them are excruciating; but none of them are by-the-numbers filler. One has to admire that.

We move along with another familiar trope, one likely to make feminists groan. 

For Ma approaches Pa at the breakfast table and says (all together now), “More coffee?”

Pa’s hair today is large, a little limp, and freshly-dyed-looking. You know, I just read Dean Butler’s book, and in it he notes that Landon was superstitious about cutting his hair because of the story of Samson and Delilah.

Taking things in an unexpected direction, Pa asks why Carrie has diarrhea this morning.

I suppose if you got diarrhea in those days, chances were good you had dysentery or cholera, so I can see why he’s concerned.

Ma reassures him Carrie is just excited about the first day of school. (September of 1881-J, then?)

(If we’re picking up where Season Five left off, I’m surprised the property isn’t overgrown, given everyone but Ma and the two useless Ing-Gals spent half the summer in sunny California!)

Ma notes there will be a new teacher today. What happened to Alice? I’m pretty sure she hasn’t died yet. . . .

Ma calls for the kids, and Laura hilariously says she’s ready, but “Albert’s still primping.”

Albert comes down in a suit and tie. 

“What are you dressed for, a wedding or a funeral?” Pa says. (I like dressing nicely, and people at work ask me that too. It’s fucking annoying!)

Both Laura and Albert look a little older, but Albert’s hair looks quite different. 

It’s still long, but it’s a) brushed and b) lying flat instead of all bouffanted up like last season.

Laura says Albert already has a crush on the new teacher, despite never having seen her, and despite it blowing up in his face the last time that happened.

They start calling each other dumb, and Pa says cheesily, “All right, now let’s not argue about who’s the dumbest, why don’t we get ourselves to school and see who can be the smartest?”

(Landon then gives us the self-satisfied shit-eating smirk of the dad who has gotten off a good one.)

Laura (also smirking) says, “Come on, Little Lord Fauntleroy.”

Little Lord Fauntleroy  was written by Frances Hodgson Burnett, who also wrote The Secret Garden. (I’ve never read either of them, but I do remember the musical version of The Secret Garden with Mandy Patinkin.)

Little Lord Fauntleroy was a huge sensation at the time of its publication – literary scholars compare it to the Harry Potter phenomenon.

The book has already been obliquely referenced by this show. 

Nels’s young cousin, the millionaire Peter Lundstrom, wore a Little Lord Fauntleroy suit (but nobody mentioned the character by name.)

(The character Little Lord Fauntleroy, I mean. Peter Lundstrom was mentioned by name.)

As I said, I’ve never read Little Lord Fauntleroy; the plot sounds like a cross between Annie and King Ralph. (You could do worse than that.)

I don’t know if the book is read much these days, but the classic Fauntleroy suit is still recognized in some circles.

At any rate, the book wasn’t published until 1885, so it’s an anachronistic reference.

Pa tells Albert not to get the suit dirty, since Ma made it herself. (She probably hacked up one Charles bought when he thought they were rich in “The Inheritance.”)

The kids take off, and Pa starts making smalltalk; but Ma complains that his stupid observations would be better received if he’d help with the dishes whilst making them. (Paraphrase.)

Pa says that’s “not a man’s work,” but Ma notes that in the Bible God says, “And I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipeth a dish.” (Second Kings 21:13.)

It’s cute, in that way only Bible jokes on Little House on the Prairie can be.

I thought so, at least.

DAGNY: Blah blah. I always hated when they would do Bible jokes.

Ma doesn’t mention that in that Bible verse, God is speaking metaphorically to indicate He’s going to completely destroy the king and his people for worshipping other gods. 

Like Pa, I don’t doubt Ma’s knowledge of the text. Probably she pictures the mush crust on the plates as heathen hordes when she’s washing up, in fact. (Take that, Manasseh, King of Judah!)

Laura and Albert arrive in town, and holy shit, there’s a giant building across the road from school that wasn’t there before!

The building has some sort of scaffolding with giant sheets hiding the place from public view. 

As they approach the schoolhouse, Laura and Al tell us Nellie has gone to Mankato and taken a special exam so she can graduate from school early. (What? Why?)

The kids stop to say hi to Nels, who’s working on the new building in some capacity.

They say nobody in town knows what the mysterious place is about. (You’re telling me none of the little pukes at Groveland Elementary/Middle have peeked behind that sheet? It isn’t a forcefield!)

Nels starts to explain, but Mrs. Oleson suddenly shrieks at him from the Mercantile porch.

“I swear, she could hear a flea belch a mile away,” Nels says aside.

The Ingalls kids bare their monstrous teeth and laugh. (I agree, funny script so far, Landon.)

Mrs. O is dressed in the fancy heliotrope-or-is-it-lilac dress from Winoka, and she tells Nels to go get ready for Nellie’s graduation ceremony.

Then she screams instructions to the “common laborers” working behind the sheet (ha!).

The Non-Binary Kid rings the bell, and everyone goes inside.

A wagon passes carrying a weird mixture of characters.

The perspective of the shot is surreal, making Mrs. Oleson for a moment look like she’s been miniaturized.

Okay, we’ll save the new teacher the trouble of taking the roll.

Present today are Andrew Garvey, the Non-Blind AEK, Not-Linda Hunt, Quincy Fusspot, Not-Ellen, Gelfling Boy, the Misbehaving Little Girl, Miniature Art Garfunkel, and a dark-haired girl wearing an interesting stripey pinafore.

There’s also Not-Gelfling Boy and the Sharp-Faced Brother, both of whom seem to have lockjaw, or something.

An accordion plays Albert’s theme, and he smiles as he checks out the slender new teacher as she writes her name on the chalkboard.

In a painful moment, then, the teacher turns around – and the lower brasses give a rude blurt to indicate she’s hideous.

She isn’t really hideous, of course. But perhaps she would not be considered a great beauty, at least styled the way she is.

She grins and introduces herself as “Miss Wilder,” saying Mrs. Garvey gave her a good briefing on them all.

(She doesn’t say where Mrs. G has gone. Did the Walnut Grove School Board get wind of how she mocks the students and shitcan her?)

In the gallery, Laura and the Non-Binary Kid smile, but Albert just looks stunned.

Then Albert whispers, with a what-the-hell-was-I-thinking inflection, “It is kinda hot to wear a tie.”

Miss Wilder, who’s skinny as a stork and has red hair and spectacles, sits at the Bead’s desk with exaggerated daintiness.

Already, Lucy Lee Flippin is a scream. 

In 1975, Flippin played Helena, on-again off-again girlfriend of Richard Gere’s Demetrius, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream onstage.

She soon relocated to Hollywood, where she was told she was “too tall” and “not pretty enough” to be an actress.

Flippin showed ’em by becoming one anyway, and she had small parts in Slap Shot with Paul Newman, Annie Hall, Flashdance, and the 1980s crap comedies Private Resort, Summer School, and Police Academy 2.

On TV, she was a regular on Flo (she appeared on Alice too), and also acted on both Bob Newhart and Newhart. 

Plus she did The Ropers, Scarecrow and Mrs. King, Moonlighting, Santa Barbara, Full House, Mr. Belvedere, E.R. (on which she played “Woman With Roach in Ear,” gag, barf), and The Golden Girls

Finally, she had a recurring role on Small Wonder!

On the show, she played Cynthia Jennings, an executive’s refined wife whom Vicki the robot outs as a WWF-watching ex-cocktail waitress after having a conversation with Mrs. Jennings’s dog. (The eighties!)

Speaking in a fruity falsetto, Eliza Jane shares her pedagogical philosophy.

But she’s immediately interrupted by the arrival of Harriet Oleson and her children.

We also notice a small girl who’s clearly Not-Linda’s younger sister (same phenotype), but whom we’ve never seen before.

Mrs. Oleson says she’s brought Nellie so she can deliver her “commencement speech.”

(We’ve never seen this school put on a graduation ceremony for anyone before, much less on the first day of school.)

(This was true even during the decadent, devil-may-care reign of Miss Beadle.)

Mrs. O introduces Willie. Miss Wilder says she’s heard a lot about him.

“I was afraid of that,” Willie says.

Miss Wilder formally explains that Nellie “has taken the township board test” (whatever that is) and so doesn’t need to return to class this year.

As far as Nellie’s age goes, Alison Arngrim was seventeen in the fall of 1979.

Nellie’s birthday has been celebrated twice on this show: first in “Town Party Country Party” and then again in “‘Here Come the Brides.’” We know from the latter story that she was born on June 14th (Flag Day). 

In “Here Come the Bs,” which took place in 1881-F, we posited that she was turning seventeen. 

As I mentioned, this story most likely is set in 1881-J, the show having time-jumped four times since “Bs.” (See Time Travel.)

I always let logic dictate my judgment on questions like this – well, I don’t have to tell you that, reader! 

So let’s assume Nellie is still seventeen in 1881-J. (Or seventeen again in it, or whatever.)

TV Nellie Oleson is of course based on “Nellie Oleson” from the Little House books, who, also of course, was a composite of three real-life schoolmates of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s: Nellie Owens, who would have been twelve in 1881, Genevieve Masters, who was fourteen, and Stella Gilbert, who was seventeen. 

(See, seventeen works great.)

“Fellow students, friends, and others,” Nellie says as she begins another of her hilarious class speeches, delivered with the elegant formality of Antony’s eulogy in Julius Caesar.

On the sidelines, Mrs. Oleson beams, and looks around to gauge the audience reaction. (As a proud parent myself, I’ll cut her some slack on that.)

Judging from the students’ faces, that reaction is “underwhelmed.”

Even Carrie’s expression is one of near-Groovian skepticism.

There’s another skeptical girl in the class I’m not sure we’ve seen before, whose expression is quite similar to one Dagny herself made for a school photo as a child.

Mrs. Oleson, then, demonstrating her privilege as a member of the Board, takes over from Eliza Jane, inviting the kids to come outside and see the unveiling of the new building – Nellie’s “graduation gift.”

Miss Wilder, making a face we often see when strangers first encounter Walnut Grove’s bonkers citizenry, reluctantly agrees.

To a sort of toy-soldierish march from David Rose, everybody heads out into the thoroughfare. Well, Willie stays behind.

Mrs. O makes a silly speech of her own, then pulls a rope to release the giant sheet – which of course falls on top of her, knocking her to the ground.

The kids scream with laughter. (It is pretty funny.)

Nels rushes out to help Harriet. (Interestingly, we see a crate that has Chinese lettering and “Made in Hong Kong” stamped on it.)

This is the point at which we realize Eliza Jane is okay, because she’s laughing too – even if she’s primly covering her mouth to hide it.

In all the chaos, we’ve barely seen the building, which of course has signage that declares it “Nellie’s Restaurant & Hotel.”

Miss Wilder shepherdesses the kids back into school, with Mrs. Oleson shrieking PR talking points about the restaurant after them. 

WILL: Why would she go into this forceful a pitch with the children?

Nels is embarrassed Harriet’s “shouting in the middle of the street.” 

WILL: I don’t know who he thinks would care, or be surprised, or probably even notice that Harriet’s screaming.

DAGNY: Yeah. I bet it’s like living near an airport, where you don’t even hear the plane engines after a while.

Nellie, on the other hand, also looks Groovianishly skeptical as she gazes at her “present.”

David Rose brings in that instrument or combination of instruments that sort of sounds like a bagpipe as Harriet pulls Nellie into the restaurant.

The interior looks quite similar to the Dakota in Winoka. We see that not only is the building constructed, it’s also fully furnished and decorated. 

Meanwhile, another caterpillar-eyebrowed man is polishing up the woodwork.

(He’s Sunshine Parker, who – often typecast as a hobo – acted on Bonanza  and AfterMASH and in the movies Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure and Road House as well as in the Charlotte Stewart vehicle Tremors.)

(He also has been on this show twice before! He played Captain Howdy, a wagon driver who was a friend and colleague to Mustache Man. I see no reason to assume this isn’t the same character, though he has had a shave.)

Well, the first thing Mrs. Oleson does is stick her hand right into wet paint on the window.

She screams at Captain Howdy, who sensibly says he didn’t warn her about the paint because “I didn’t want to interrupt you while you were talking.”

Howdy doesn’t seem mad, though . . . unlike the workman who once yelled at me when I stepped in cement he’d just spread. (I never found out precisely how angry he was, because I ran away, but from what I could tell, he was overreacting.)

Well, Harriet takes Nellie into the kitchen. She’s goggling over everything, including the cookstove, which she proudly notes is a Majestic. (The Edwards-Sandersons also had a Majestic, confirming our theory that Grace was left a fairly wealthy woman after her first husband died.)

Now, when I say she’s goggling over everything, I mean Mrs. Oleson is. 

Nellie, on the other hand, is not goggling. No, she’s transitioned from her baffled look to one approaching contempt.

DAGNY: Her dress is very seventies-country.

WILL: It’s pretty.

Then we get one of those immortal TV moments I mentioned above.

Nellie says, “Who’s going to do the cooking?”

She repeats the question, and Harriet cheerfully suggests that Nellie will be the one to do it.

“Mother,” Nellie says, “I don’t like to cook.”

Harriet says that while cooking for a family is dull, cooking for many families at once is much more enjoyable.

Nellie doesn’t believe that any more than you do, reader. 

“Mother,” she says, “I don’t like cooking, at home or here.”

Nels suddenly snaps and yells, “Well, you darn well better start liking it!”

DAGNY: Nels is kind of squeezed into that vest.

“Nels!” Harriet shrieks. “Don’t raise your voice!” (This is not a Subtle MacG episode.)

“You and your ideas!” Nels shouts back. “I told you to ask first!”

This is of course hard to believe on multiple levels. First, as reader Leslie pointed out recently, it’s unclear how the Olesons, who were in such dire straits in Season Five they had to sell all their inventory as well as their personal possessions, can now afford this “venture.”

(Little House Universal Time (LHUT) may help here, since by the sequence of events it’s been ten years since the Grovesters returned from Winoka.)

Second, as I mentioned, it’s hard to credit that this project was planned and executed without anybody finding out about it. Who built it? Laborers from out of town? Were the materials all shipped in from elsewhere too? (Hong Kong?) It seems insane to do that rather than buy locally from Hanson’s.

Finally, while this restaurant/hotel is kitted out to the point of having the tables set, we’ll see that no one thought to put together a business plan or evaluate the need for such an establishment in this tiny town.

Anyways, at this point, Harriet’s manner completely changes, and she says in a hard voice, “Nels – kindly leave us.”

Nels scuttles away, and Harriet, with quiet superiority, tells Nellie owning a business will help her attract suitors. 

She says as a young woman she herself owned a mercantile, which was part of what made her seem a suitable prospect for Nels.

(This differs from what she told Nellie in “The Talking Machine,” which is that Nels was attracted by the valuable horses that were her dowry. I suppose both could be true. See Oleson Family History.)

Harriet dryly notes that, while you’d think attracting suitors would be easy for Nellie, the young men of the region must be “shy,” because she has none.

She suggests men might be intimidated by Nellie’s wealthy upbringing. Going into business, she implies, would add a cash incentive to courting her, and make her self-sufficient even if she can’t attract a man.

(We haven’t had an anti-feminist moment like this in a while: equating female independence with manipulation and guile by having the show’s villain praise it. See Pa-triarchy and Sexism.)

Looking satisfied, Harriet says, “Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, Mother,” Nellie says, smiling.

“Now, do you like your gift?”

“Yes, Mother.”

“Good,” Harriet says. “Now, are there any more questions?”

“Yes,” Nellie says.

“Who’s going to do the cooking?”

Well, we then cut to a Help Wanted, Cook sign nailed to the storefront.

In front of the school, a wagon passes by. I can’t tell who it’s carrying, though the driver might be the Dungareed Hick.

The schoolhouse spews out the kids.

Walking home, Albert says to Andrew Garvey he senses Miss Wilder will be stricter than Andy’s mom was.

Andy agrees, but says he doesn’t care, because he was sick of his mom breathing down his neck at school. Quite understandable.

Andy says he hated being thought of as “teacher’s pet” – though it seems that expression wasn’t used until a little later.

(And yeah, that’s pretty much Andy’s whole part in this one.)

Laura says she likes the new teacher, then they laugh about Willie already getting punished on the first day of school. (For fake-vomiting – ha!)

The three decide to go fishing, but they’re stopped by a stranger who pulls up in a not-yellow-wheeled buckboard.

He is a handsome blondish longhaired man of I would say approximately twenty-five years old.

Seeming quite friendly, the man asks if they know where Miss Wilder is.

As the stranger drives off, Albert and Andy head out; but Laura stands staring after him with goo-goo eyes, as David brings back the bagpipes on the soundtrack. 

DAGNY: I’m not sure that’s supposed to sound like bagpipes. Not everything that has a drone sounds like bagpipes. 

WILL: Um, it sort of does! 

DAGNY: Besides, why would they use bagpipes when she’s falling in love?

WILL: The Scottish Highland bagpipe is the international symbol of romance.

Back at school, Willie is plea-bargaining with Eliza Jane.

Miss Wilder rather fussily walks over to the blond man’s vehicle. (Lucy Lee Flippin’s performance is full of these camp, almost puppet-like movements. She kind of seems like she wandered in from some other type of project.)

Laura is still lurking nearby, and Eliza Jane says, “Oh, Laura . . . this is my brother Almanzo.”

“Pleased to meet you, Laura,” Almanzo Wilder says. “My friends call me Manny.”

Laura exposes the gopher fangs. 

(Drum roll, please.)

“Pleasure to meet you,” Laura says, “. . . Manly.”

The bagpipe fires up again as Almanzo and Eliza Jane giggle their heads off – just like all of us watching at home.

“Well, you must admit,” Almanzo laughs pleasantly, “it’s got a virile ring to it!” (Tasteless remark.)

As brother and sister drive off, David unplugs the pipes and shifts to some loungey jazz on (I think) the flugelhorn.

Suddenly appalled, Laura says to herself, “. . . ‘Manly’? Why did I call him Manly?”

Well, as you all knew already, this is Almanzo Wilder, who both in real and TV life would become Laura Ingalls’s husband.

It’s been a long time since we’ve had call to discuss Laura Ingalls’s real life. I’m sure people who thought this blog was going to be about the overlap between show and books abandoned us long ago, due to lack of such overlap. (I admire the book people, but understand why they wouldn’t like Walnut Groovy.)

But Almanzo Wilder was real. He was probably born in 1859 in New York State. In 1870, he moved with his family to Spring Valley, Minnesota, about 200 miles east of Walnut Grove and 100 south of the Big Woods of Wisconsin.

He stayed there about ten years, then spent some time farming in Marshall, Minnesota, a mere thirty miles from the Grove. (Marshall is where we stayed when we attended the Fiftieth Anniversary celebration last summer.)

Laura was in Walnut Grove for some of that time, but they never met until 1879, when both of them moved (separately) to De Smet, Dakota Territory. (Some argue Winoka was conceived as a stand-in for De Smet.) 

I’ve never been to De Smet, but I have heard it’s among the finest historical sites if you’re interested in the real Ingallses.

The reason I say Almanzo was probably born in 1859 is because he himself sometimes gave his birth year as 1857. However, it’s also thought he lied about his age so he could claim land in Dakota even though he hadn’t yet turned 21.

We’ll leave it there for now, but I will mention that Almanzo’s older sister Eliza Jane was also real. In Little Town on the Prairie, Laura Ingalls Wilder writes that Eliza Jane was in fact her teacher for a time; but official records don’t line up with this, so it’s thought to be an embellishment.

[UPDATE: Big apologies for my misstatement that Eliza Jane never taught Laura Ingalls in real life – she did, for a single term in 1882 in De Smet, Dakota Territory. Her relationship with Laura (and Carrie) is depicted in Little Town as being almost entirely antagonistic, though apparently they became friendlier when Laura married Almanzo. I sincerely regret the error! – WK]

Oh, and one other thing: As Melissa Gilbert noted when we spoke with her, Almanzo pronounced the man in his name to rhyme with can or fan. (Or man.) 

But the show went with the more Italianate pronunciation of Al-MAHN-zo. [UPDATE: Lucy Lee Flippin noted that she was the first character to speak Almanzo’s name, and nobody corrected her.]

In Little Town, Almanzo explains he was named after “an Arab or somebody” called “El Manzoor,” because this person saved the life of an ancestor of a Wilder during the Crusades. Supposedly members of the Wilder family carried the name ever since.

Some have speculated this is a reference to al-Manṣūr or “Almanzor,” a ruler of the Iberian peninsula (modern-day Spain and Portugal) under a “Moorish” (Muslim) government in the Tenth Century. 

To my knowledge no one has verified Almanzo’s story, either about the lifesaving or the name being a family tradition. (I doubt many Midwestern homesteaders could trace their lineage back more than eight centuries. . . .)

Well, we cut to Plum Creek, where lonely Albert fishes to a gently swingin’ arrangement of his theme.

He yells into the woods for Laura to hurry up, but she’s busy carving LI and AW into the bark of a tree.

DAGNY: So, Laura’s had a few boyfriends by this time, right? What happened to them?

WILL: They all died in the pandemics.

It is one possibility. The mountain fever outbreak of 1881-C could have killed Henry Henderson and Jason R. The Scientist.

Jimmy Hill and Jason Brooks, on the other hand, could have made it as far the anthrax epidemic we reviewed recently.

Unexpectedly, then, we get a Special Guest Appearance by Voiceover Laura, who says “If I had a remembrance book” and spoils the story by confirming she and Almanzo do get married eventually.

WILL: So how old do you think Laura and Manly are in this one?

DAGNY: Hm . . . Almanzo twenty-five, Laura fifteen.

WILL: That’s pretty good! Gilbert was fifteen, Butler was twenty-three. It’s the same ages Laura and Manly were when they met in real life, I guess.

DAGNY: It seems pretty weird today. . . .

In fact, practically everyone you ask says there was an ick factor in 1979 as well. Both Melissa Gilbert and Dean Butler wrote in their books how difficult this scenario was for Gilbert – an issue that lasted for a couple years.

WILL: But what did you think of this at the time, as a kid?

DAGNY: Oh, I thought it was great! It was like every girl’s dream romance.

Butler mentions the show bent over backwards trying to handle the storyline sensitively (mainly by having Laura chase after Almanzo – a choice not without its own problems, but never mind).

It’s hard to imagine how they would handle the May/September aspect of the relationship today. But I guess we’ll find out with the new Neflix series, won’t we!

That night, the Ingallses larf it up at dinner about Mrs. Oleson’s humiliation that morning.  

Laura’s mind is elsewhere, and she says she’s going to turn in early.

The others then dissect her strange mood. Ma theorizes she wishes she had a restaurant of her own, then, shifting into the goofy chucklehead voice she used a couple times last season, says, “Anyway, there’s no danger of our spoiling our children with lavish gifts!”

Annoyed by this, Pa says, “Well, we’re not exactly poor, you know.”

They bicker a little, Pa saying the Mill is making some new improvements that will greatly improve business.

Ma defuses things by giving a wry smile and saying, “Can I get another cup of coffee for the mill tycoon?” Pa laughs.

The next day, the platoon of Grovester kids is marching back to school again. (Everybody seems to be taking the long way today, which I find hard to believe.)

Laura, Albert and Andrew Garvey are playing tag – but Laura stops short when she sees Almanzo dropping Eliza Jane off for work.

To rollicking Wild West music, Laura abandons the game, saying she forgot something at home. (Since the Little House is a forty-minute walk from town, that would be a time-consuming mistake.)

But in fact, she’s lying . In reality, she’s laying a trap for Almanzo, who stops and offers her a ride home. (We’ll deal with where the Wilders live next time.)

The orchestra swells to a Burt-Bacharach-type love theme.

DAGNY: David always brings it in the season openers. I think he puts in a little extra effort.

Laura apologizes for calling him “Manly,” but Almanzo says he likes it.

Almanzo asks if Laura has a nickname. She tells him Pa calls her Half-Pint, but downplays it as a little-kid name she’s outgrown.

Not realizing how his words will be received, Almanzo says, “Well, I certainly can’t call a lovely young woman like you ‘Half-Pint.’”

He asks for her full name, and given Laura’s middle name is Elizabeth, he says he’ll call her “Beth” from now on.

In real life, Almanzo Wilder nicknamed Laura “Bess,” noting he had another sister named Laura and didn’t like the name for that reason. 

Laura wrote about this in Pioneer Girl, her “grown-up” manuscript that wasn’t published during her lifetime. 

Research must have led Landon & Co. to this factoid, but I’m not sure how they settled on “Beth” rather than “Bess” for the show.

Laura did call Almanzo “Manly” in real life, but it seems that was in response to him giving her a nickname, not the other way round.

Almanzo drops her off, but rather than go inside, Laura just starts running back to town.

ABOUT FORTY MINUTES LATER, she arrives there.

At the livery, we see a mustached smithy we’ve never seen before. He kind of looks like an adult Matthew Labyorteaux with a mustache, actually.

Meanwhile, on the shortcut path leading past the Mill, Charles, Jonathan Garvey, the Unknown Grovester, and Bret Harper’s Underling Rod are looking at some new millstones on the back of Carl’s wagon.

The men have rigged up some kind of idiotic system where they’re rolling the gigantic stone wheels down a plank and straight into the mill, with only two men controlling the operation.

Charles’s job is simply to hold the mill doors open.

As for the Unknown Grovester, he just stands back doing nothing.

Underling Rod says, “Lord-a-mercy, what’s this thing weigh!”

Garvey says it’s nearly half a ton.

Well, I’m sure you can guess what happens. Something goes wrong, Garvey and Rod drop the stone, and it rolls down the plank and hits Charles.

It’s a fun stunt, though you can see Charles actually makes it out of the way before the wheel hits him.

In a very rare blooper of this type, you can see some crew members in modern dress down the hill.

Well, Charles is knocked out, and the next thing we see is Caroline running through town. (Why would she have to run? Wouldn’t whoever came to tell her about the accident bring her back to town?)

WILL: Boobilicious running.

DAGNY: Yeah. That’s how you can tell her underwear isn’t period-appropriate. She doesn’t have to hold her boobs while she runs.

Jonathan Garvey greets her in Doc’s lobby, saying Charles has some broken bones but is going to be fine.

Caroline hugs Jonathan with relief. (Would that have flown in the period?)

Doc comes through the curtain and says he’s given Charles some strong pain drugs. 

DAGNY: Doc looks great here! Moist lips, short hair. You can tell it’s early in the season.

Caroline goes into the surgery to see Charles. 

WILL: What is it about this top that makes it fit her . . . just so?

DAGNY: Well, she’s got a good bra on, but see how the blouse is gathered at the top and has ruching above the boobs? It draws your eye. It’s kind of an optical illusion.

WILL: It’s a good one.

Speaking of boobs, Charles has his shirt off altogether.

DAGNY: Charles was always breaking his ribs, wasn’t he? Do you think it was because Landon wanted to take his shirt off all the time?

WILL: No question.

Behind them is a diagram of a human skeleton by A.J. Nystrom & Co., but that company wasn’t founded till 1903.

Charles is a little stoned, but in good spirits.

WILL: I thought Doc didn’t like to give his patients narcotics. He wouldn’t give Granville Whipple anything stronger than aspirin.

Doc tells Garvey Charles will need to take the autumn off from work.

That night, after getting Pa settled into bed, Ma is touched when Laura offers to bring her some coffee.

Ma then sits down to talk about how to make ends meet until Pa recovers.

Albert gallantly volunteers to take over Pa’s position at the Mill, but Ma gently shoots that idea down.

Ma muses that she might inquire about the cook position at Nellie’s.

Laura says Pa would be upset at the thought of her working for Harriet Oleson.

“Well, sometimes what we like and what we have to do are two different things,” Ma says sensibly.

Albert asks if they should tell Pa, and Ma says, “Let’s not get the cart before the horse.” (A saying dating back to the Renaissance.)

After a commercial break, we see black smoke billowing from the chimney at Nellie’s.

Mr. Penguin Man and Mustache Man (I think) drive by in the YWB, and Not-Richard Libertini, who’s dressed like Tevye the dairyman, climbs the porch steps.

Smoke is also billowing from the Majestic stove in Nellie’s kitchen, where Mrs. Oleson is cooking.

DAGNY: What could possibly be making all that smoke? I’m having a hard time imagining a scenario like that.

WILL: Maybe that’s where Alice is, in the oven.

[UPDATE: Reader Maryann suggests they’re electing a new Pope. Ha!]

As we’ve noted in the past, the show is inconsistent about whether Mrs. O is a good or bad cook.

Going by what we’ve actually seen, her successes outnumber her failures.

Many times we’ve seen a hearty ham or chicken dinner on her table, and we’ve never had indication they’re unsatisfactory. (We know Nellie didn’t cook them.)

Not to mention, twice Harriet’s culinary creations have been of high enough degree to enter in competitions.

On Founder’s Day of 1877-A2, she was a finalist in the pie bake-off, and that was against such heavyweights as Caroline and Mrs. Grandy.

Harriet’s canning skills must also be strong, since she entered pickles in the Redwood County Fair in 1880-F.

In fact, the only time we’ve seen her struggle was when she tried cooking fish over an open campfire – to be fair, a different challenge than cooking in a kitchen.

Nellie comes in with another order. I can’t imagine she’s thrilled about waiting tables, but she seems to be doing all right temperamentally-wise-speaking.

Mrs. Oleson tries giving Nellie a plate of burned pancakes, and when Nellie refuses them, Harriet says it would be a lot easier if she would help in the kitchen, for Heaven’s sake!

“We’ve been through all that!” Nellie says hilariously. (Arngrim is in wonderful form this season.)

Mrs. O then literally prays to God for a suitor to come take Nellie away. (It’s a bit much, but it works. And of course, God does send one!)

Harriet takes the pancakes out, and the customer, we see, is Dan McBride, famous among fans for his repeat appearances as, well, “The Customer.”

We have met McBride before once – he played the Goofy Bellringer when Laura and Pa were pursuing the unwed mother who abandoned her baby in the forest (this show). 

I suppose this could be the same character.

McBride was also on Highway to Heaven and Flo. A lot of Flo alums recently.

Anyways, “The Customer” looks at the pancakes and asks if they have a fireplace poker to serve them with.

Mrs. Oleson laughs and says ridiculously, “Oh, well, it’s an old family recipe: crisp pancakes!”

“Was yer family all blacksmiths?” the Customer asks politely.

Mrs. O screams at him and he leaves in a huff. These days he’d become a minor internet sensation by sharing video of the incident, but this is of course the 1880s.

There are a number of people we’ve never seen before in the restaurant, including a John Ritter lookalike and a man in a striped jacket who looks at the camera.

It’s a bit weird there are all these strangers here. Where the hell did they come from? Nellie’s doesn’t seem like what you’d call a destination restaurant.

Caroline and Baby Grace appear. (Grace also looks at the camera.)

“Good morning, Mrs. Oleson,” Caroline says pleasantly, then adds, “You wait right here, Grace,” and leaves the kid alone in the dining room!

Caroline follows Harriet into the kitchen, where she observes her immediately cutting her finger with a butcher knife. (Doesn’t appear to be the same one Ma almost cut her leg off with.)

Caroline uses a slice of bread as a bandage (gag, barf), then offers to take over.

DAGNY: That’s a new top too. It’s like they had Laura Ashley redo all the costumes.

Caroline reminds Harriet that she ran the Dakota’s restaurant in Winoka.

Mrs. Oleson says she forgot that fact, which seems unlikely. (It’s also weird that Harriet’s so steamrolled here, since she’s a service industry vet herself, and it was implied in “There’s No Place Like Home” that she did an excellent job. It’s the Smart Harriet/Stupid Harriet discrepancy again.)

Caroline quickly negotiates a salary of $2 ($63) per day, with Sundays off.

Harriet gratefully agrees.

Back at home, Laura was right, Shirtless Pa is very upset at this development.

Unlike some others I could name, one of whom is introduced in this very episode, Charles doesn’t have a general objection to Caroline taking a paid job again. 

Rather, he is concerned that Harriet Oleson will be a terrible boss; and indeed, Caroline’s well-documented frenemy relationship with her notwithstanding, there are some red flags here.

But Caroline points out Nellie will technically be her boss.

“Aside from a few pounds, what’s the difference!” Charles says nastily. (Fat Joke #33.)

Caroline, who’s spoon-feeding Charles some of her Famous Mush, says there’s no difference from the jobs they both worked in Winoka.

Charles shifts his argument, then, and says he doesn’t like that she’d be serving people they already know. (How’s that different from you selling lumber to people you already know, Chuck?)

Caroline quotes Charles to his own face as saying, “There’s no reason to be ashamed of any job as long as you do your best.”

Charles, whose chest color in this scene is less like a roast chicken and more like a boiled lobster, relents, chuckling, “Caroline Ingalls, how could I get along without you?”

“You’re not without me,” Caroline says. “And you couldn’t!”

DAGNY: That has the ring of truth. It’s like Shauna on Yellowjackets saying Jeff and Callie would have no clue how to contact the phone company.

Charles can’t go into his full insane giggle because of his broken ribs, and Caroline continues feeding him.

DAGNY: There’s absolutely no reason for her to be feeding him! He’s left-handed!

The next morning, we see the chickens gossiping about Laura being in love with a middle-aged stranger.

Inside, Laura Ashley Ingalls is brushing her hair.

She asks how she looks, and Albert says, “Like a young girl with old hair.”

At school, some creepster is watching the kids play in the schoolyard from the front porch of Nellie’s.

Almanzo and Eliza Jane drive up.

Laura bounces up to chat with Almanzo, who says he’s doing “real fine!”

Almanzo says he “just got a job over at Miller’s Feed and Seed!”

WILL: What’s with his affect? It’s a little “Eric Shea.”

DAGNY: It’s partly that he’s just a dippy character, but I also think Dean Butler is doing a more “old-timey” acting style. 

WILL: It’s a different approach than Linwood Boomer’s for sure.

DAGNY: A better question might be, why is he so “aw shucks” while Eliza Jane is so prim and proper? They don’t really seem like siblings.

WILL: Yeah. Their coloring’s different too.

Unlike the Mill, which operated stably under the supervision of Mr. Hanson and is still going strong without him, the Feed & Seed has a history of bad management.

First, it was run by the dishonest Irish stereotype Liam “Shifty O’Crafty” O’Neil, who was well known for stabbing his contractors in the back in the fine print.

After O’Neil was run out of town, the F&S was run by a corn-chandler named Peterson, who presumably died of typhus when his stores were overrun by rats and fleas. (Seems he skimped on pest control tools like cats.)

By the time of “The Creeper of Walnut Grove,” the owner was a Mr. Tyler, a proprietor allegedly so careless that he left the doors unlocked at night with large amounts of money inside.

But I have more confidence in Mr. Miller. While we’ve never seen him, he’s a power player in Hero Township, known for making backroom deals and hosting lavish “corn-shuckings” complete with expensive fireworks.

Laura tells Almanzo she wants to be a teacher like Eliza Jane.

Almanzo says he likes the cut of her jib (paraphrase), but says she wouldn’t work too hard, because “all work and no play,” etc. (Seventeenth Century.)

Almanzo notices and compliments her new hairstyle, which she likes. 

But then he warns her against growing up too fast, saying “There’s nothing cuter than a little girl in pigtails!” Which she doesn’t like.

Well, before we get into the legendary final act of this episode, we might as well do Dean Butler’s background.

Born in Canada but raised in California, Butler got his first big break with Little House, but he had plenty of other fun TV appearances while the show was still on, and beyond.

He did CHiPs, The Kid with the 200 I.Q. (with Gary Coleman), Who’s the Boss?, Hotel, The ABC Afterschool Special, Murder, She Wrote, Diagnosis Murder, and (the Patrick Labyorteaux vehicle) JAG.

He was on Fantasy Island twice, and Love Boat three times. 

The Love Boat story of his I remember best, “Familiar Faces,” is a corker. 

Dean plays a young man of bright prospects, with a bride who’s pretty and nice and an acceptance letter to law school.

But all that is jeopardized when he’s recognized by an old man as the drunken miscreant who robbed and assaulted him years before!

The old man says he’s going to have him arrested and sent to prison, and Dean falls off the wagon after many years sober. 

But eventually they decide to forgive and forget (spoilers).

It’s not perhaps as memorable as the eye-transplant episode, or the one where Melissa Sue Anderson tries to seduce Doc Bricker, or the one where Captain Stubing lectures a Black woman about her own culture, but it is a good one.

Dean Butler also played Moondoggie in the eighties revival of Gidget (my sister Peggy liked that).

He memorably portrayed Buffy’s imperfect father Hank Summers on Buffy the Vampire Slayer (a favorite of Dagny’s).

Finally, he was on something called Here’s Boomer, which I hoped would turn out to be a short-lived sitcom starring himself and Linwood Boomer. But it didn’t.

In fact, Here’s Boomer was a ripoff of Canada’s The Littlest Hobo. (I won’t mention this to Dags, since she loves The Littlest Hobo and would be bummed out that it got ripped off.)

But speaking of such extra-Little House connections, Butler was briefly engaged to Entertainment Tonight‘s Mary Hart in the 1980s. (If you lived through that period, you understand the significance of this.)

But he married Katherine Cannon, whom he met while she was the female lead of on Father Murphy. (They didn’t marry till many years later, though.)

There’s still together today.

Oh, and one more thing. Dean Butler is also a talented singer and stage actor. In fact, he sang the role of Rapunzel’s Prince in the first Broadway production of Into the Woods – one of the smartest, deepest musicals ever written and a family favorite. (Well, Dagny doesn’t love it.)

Anyways, in the thoroughfare, the Groveland boys are playing Keep Away or Pickle in the Middle (a first on this show?).

Mrs. Oleson comes out and yells at Willie not to be put in the corner again at school.

Turning to Laura, she asks who the handsome stranger was.

Convinced he would be a good match for Nellie, Mrs. O runs off to an echo of The Ride of the Valkyries.

After a commercial break, we return to the classroom, where the camera slowly pans through the room to reveal Willie is in the corner.

Noting it’s Friday, Miss Wilder closes her Thompson’s American History and dismisses the kids with a fussy little clap.

As the schoolhouse vomits again, Laura notes with concern that Mrs. Oleson and Nellie have Almanzo surrounded.

Blowing off Carrie’s request for homework help (nice), Laura stares at them.

The Oleson ladies are in the process of inviting Almanzo to have dinner at the restaurant on Sunday – alone with Nellie.

In another immortal moment, then, Mrs. Oleson says, “What is your favorite dish, Mr. Wilder?”, then interrupts herself to says, “Oh, that’s so formal – may I call you Zaldamo?”

Zaldamo appears to be a name without precedent in the real universe. 

Almanzo corrects Mrs. O, who tries to pronounce his real name, but quickly dismisses it.

Anyways, Almanzo tells her his favorite dish is “cinnamon chicken.”

Cinnamon is not a spice commonly used with chicken in this country, so it seems an unlikely choice. 

However, the combo is apparently not that unusual in Morocco – which, being a majority-Muslim country just across the Strait of Gibraltar from the Iberian Peninsula, is probably where Almanzo’s family got the recipe from during the Crusades.

Delighted, Mrs. Oleson announces cinnamon chicken is Nellie’s “specialty.” We know that’s not true, but perhaps they sell an Eight Hundred Years of Moorish Cooking book in the Mercantile and she figures she can just pull a recipe from that.

Mrs. O declares that it’s a date, and spirits Nellie away crying, “See you in church, Zaldamo!”

Then we cut to Mrs. Oleson begging Caroline to break her rule and work on a Sunday to cook the dinner for Nellie and Zaldamo’s date.

She should know better, though.

Standing in the background, Laura giggles and volunteers to cook the dinner herself.

Ma objects, but says it’s okay as long as she doesn’t get paid for it. (That’s pretty liberal for her.)

As for Mrs. O, she says “What a wonderful little girl!”

We skip ahead to Sunday, then, where at the Little House, Charles is up and out of bed.

Laura goes to Ma’s spice cabinet and takes not the cinnamon, but the cayenne pepper, the label of which she discards in the driveway. (The brand is Hoffarth, which is not a real one.)

Now, you’ll remember that in “‘I’ll Be Waving as You Drive Away,’” one of Adam’s students at the Burton School for the Blind accidentally mixed up these two seasonings, ruining the dinner.

Laura wasn’t in Iowa at the time, of course, but no doubt Mary and Adam tell this story from time to time, and I think it’s safe to say that’s where Laura got the idea.

That night, we see Laura in the restaurant kitchen, preparing dinner. (It’s dark outside, which would be unusual for early September in Minnesota.)

Almanzo arrives, and Nellie hides Laura in the pantry.

DAGNY: I love how massive Nellie’s bow is. No need for a bonnet.

Out in the dining room, Nellie welcomes Almanzo and they have an awkward little conversation. (“You look fine.” “Do you really think so?” “Yes.”)

Heading back into the kitchen to get the food, Nellie burns her hand on the stove and screams.

Almanzo is alarmed, but Nellie pretends she’s just singing, and launches into some ghastly coloratura runs.

Then she brings out the plates, which feature sides of sweet corn. (An authentic September touch.)

Nellie says a predictably self-serving blessing, then they tuck in to the chicken – which is of course inedibly hot.

Now, I can tell you from personal experience that she needn’t have bothered with the cayenne. My friend Leslie once cooked a dinner in which she used so much cinnamon in a pasta sauce that it burned the mouth and was impossible to eat. It actually doesn’t take all that much.

Cinnamon is funny stuff. You’ll remember the trend of some years ago where people were daring each other to eat spoonfuls of it and winding up in the hospital. (Our dipshit world.)

Nellie and Almanzo rush into the kitchen to guzzle water from the pump.

DAGNY: This is kinda romantic, actually. This feels more like a Little Women or Anne of Green Gables story than Little House.

Croaking and squawking for Laura, Nellie reveals all to Almanzo.

But Laura is gone.

Almanzo flees, bumping into Nels and Ladies’ Cut Pinky Harriet as he goes.

We then hear terrifying screaming and crashing from the kitchen. It really sounds an awful lot like the scene in The Exorcist where Ellen Burstyn runs in and finds all of Regan’s records and stuff flying around in the bedroom.

Harriet rushes in just in time to get hit in the face with a handful of frosting and cake, or some such. (MacG really takes it!)

Nellie is roaring and screaming with rage, and smashing everything in sight.

Nels excuses himself to go to bed.

And the last thing we see is ol’ Gopher Fangs, laughing her head off on the porch.

BUM-BUM-BA-DUM!

STYLE WATCH:

Nearly everybody’s got new costume components today. In addition to the ones we’ve already mentioned, Laura wears her iconic red and white outfit for the first time.

Caroline wears her classic Boo Berry bonnet, but it looks brand-new. I think they probably made her a new one.

Baby Grace also has a bonnet to match.

Charles has a new shirt, in a tasteful light gray check.

He also appears to go commando again.

NOTE: For the first time, Mary makes no appearance in the season premiere.

THE VERDICT: Reserved till next week. (But it was flippin’ awesome, wasn’t it?)

UP NEXT: “‘Back to School,'” Part Two