Geekerati has a number of mottos, but my favorite motto is that “Geekerati is the place where we geek out about anything.” As editor of this site, my personal geek tastes are wide ranging and I love to share new fandoms when I get the chance. A few weeks ago, Luke asked if I would be interested in an article discussing a Little House on the Prairie convention and I leapt at the opportunity. Little House has a vibrant fan base and Luke gives us a glimpse.
— Christian Lindke, Editor
Like me, Little House on the Prairie, the TV show based on Laura Ingalls Wilder's frontier memoirs for kids, turns 50 this year (People Magazine, Hustler, and Saturday Night Live too...what a year 1974 was for pop culture). And I can honestly say that had I never married, the Michael Landon-produced show would probably have barely registered in my life at all.
Since that isn't what happened, I found myself on the penultimate weekend of March at a Little House on the Prairie convention, deep in a throng of fans who call themselves “bonnet-heads” (and dress accordingly). I've been to many similar events in my time, as a regular fixture of San Diego Comic-Con, and periodic attendee of sci-fi, horror, and even Masters of the Universe conventions. Never before, however, have I been to a convention held primarily outside. And run by BIG GUBMINT! (a.k.a. The Simi Valley Chamber of Commerce.)
It's an irony befitting a Cold War-era hit – Reagan came to power with mantras that government was the problem, yet stayed popular with his base by using all of said government's power to further conservative causes domestically, and interventionist, hawkish foreign policy internationally. Little House, in some ways the ultimate conservative show for Americana, self-reliance, and belief in the Christian God (as made by a Jewish man), gets an anniversary celebration from the town best-known as the home of the Reagan Library and the Rodney King verdict. Of course, for today's more vehemently anti-government Trumpists, the show is now “too woke” in some quarters because of its generally progressive depiction of race relations for the time. It probably doesn't help matters that equally angry Leftists are mad at the books for featuring more of-their-era, cowboys-and-Indians style prejudices.
The show itself, meanwhile, embodies an ethic of neighbors helping neighbors, which seems to this atheist to be the one commandment Jesus exalted above all others. The show's villains could be governmental, but were equally as likely to be greedy businessmen; meanwhile, small-time con men and small-minded bigots without wealthy backing were more likely to see the error of their ways in the face of Charles Ingalls' noble behavior, as modeled, of course, by Landon himself (who in actuality was such a heavy smoker and drinker that he either exacerbated or gave himself terminal cancer).
The books center on Laura as the narrator; the show inevitably made Landon the real star. He became the perfect American dad, worthy of following Ward Cleaver, and serving as a positive contrast to the likes of Archie Bunker and George Jefferson. Harriet Oleson, the most negative regular character in the show, proved over the long haul to be as much a victim of her own anxieties as she was any kind of villain, with her nasty daughter Nellie a product of her environment (and beneficiary of perhaps the biggest TV babyface turn of all time when she finally grew past it).
I only know any of this due to absorbing episodes by osmosis. The wife likes to rewatch familiar shows as comfort-viewing, and like many shows of the era, Little House was designed to be fully understood even for people who might watch the show out of order in syndication. On that score, it's easier to get a handle on than her other favorite out-of-continuity comfort watch, Downton Abbey. I never saw the Little House when I was a kid, and probably would have ruled it out as a girl show. I did harbor vague curiosity about Highway to Heaven, the show Landon later did about a do-gooder angel, but was barred from watching that by my mother, who ruled it “sickly sweet.” It didn't fall into her American TV category of “good rubbish,” which included Murder, She Wrote, Quincy, Matlock, and basically any show about an older person solving crimes in mostly non-violent ways.
Barred from watching “violent” shows like The Equalizer and Miami Vice, I imagined them as horror-level bloodbaths in my headcanon.
My wife was home-schooled, and apparently Little House was THE show for kids like her. Indeed, she would refer to the events of the weekend as “Comic-Con for homeschoolers.” It's a good line, but it turns out there's a huge difference between an indoor convention that's become a well-oiled nonprofit machine, and an outdoor show run by local government volunteers. With that said, at least the latter were always friendly, even when they were clearly in way over their heads. While buying tickets online, I had checked the box asking for disabled assistance; in person, it turned out there was no such thing. We were able to use our handicapped parking pass for two of the three days, at the train station that became the de facto primary lot (Heaven help anyone who actually needed to take the train that day). Day 2, Saturday, required getting $20 from a gas station ATM in order to park in a large pay lot behind a grocery store.
The folks operating the official convention merchandise stand were volunteers from the local library, using a tablet without a card scanner or tap terminal, slowly punching in 16-digit credit-card numbers with aged fingers. To buy a bottle of water with a card took a family of four behind their food stand to figure out the pay program. Everyone was generally nice, but so unprepared that they'd have found life on the actual prairie quite the challenge. It's easier to be patient with folks who were obviously trying, though according to the local police, not everyone thought so – one alluded to us the fact that many guests were rather upset with them about where they could and could not park. (The $20 lot always had space aplenty, for the record.)
I noticed Entertainment Earth as a banner sponsor, and figured that was probably just because they're a Simi Valley-based business, realizing it would be good for their local rep. They certainly don't sell Little House merchandise, because not much exists any more. Melissa Gilbert runs a prairie-themed business in dresses and housewares, and there are some boutique high-end dolls and wooden-house facades made by small businesses, but most of the show-themed T-shirts worn by attendees – advertising Oleson's store or advocating behavior more like Laura than Nellie – are Etsy-made bootlegs. There's an underserved market here; I'm not saying they'd do Star Trek numbers, but Super7 Reaction figures based on the show, or even just licensed T-shirts, would likely turn a profit. Bus tours of the reconstructed set at the original location sold out long before I could snag any, but fortunately Simi Valley realizes the profit potential, and will soon be starting them up again for another six months.
Much of the convention was open field, with a large tent full of folding chairs for panels, and an open-air stage, also with folding chairs, on the other side. One aisle of vendors took a “ren faire” approach, with in-character vendors demonstrating prairie-time skills. Others sold the usual overpriced food. Indoors at the civic center, for which there were long lines to enter, felt more like a typical convention, with set reconstructions for photo ops (these were quite elaborate wnd well-made), higher-end vendors, and autograph tables for cast members who could make it. Star Melissa Gilbert had a separate entrance line from the rest.
Many of Little House's original stars were middle-aged men, and now deceased, in most cases simply from old age. The wives skewed younger, so some are still around; the actors who played children and babies are now late middle-aged, and most were there. Notable in his attendance was Melissa Gilbert's brother Jonathan, who played rival Nellie Oleson's brother on the show; he hadn't been heard from in thirty years, even by his sister, so his return – rail thin, grayish bearded and sporting a man-bun – was a huge deal for fans, many of whom wanted to know if he was single. He alluded to a journey of self-discovery, a career on Wall Street, and health challenges, ultimately declaring that after the show he wanted to know what real life was like, but he finally realized it was never more real than on the show.
Michael Landon is often quoted as having said, “Remember me with smiles and laughter, for that's the way I'll remember you all. If you can only remember me with tears then don't remember me at all.” (In actuality, it's a line he wrote for the character of Julia Sanderson on the show.) If we're being honest, a lot of the cast failed that test, bursting into tears, or recounting bursting into tears, as they re-encountered one another. Alison Arngrim (Nellie) and Dean Butler (Almanzo) were the MVPs, as cohosts of a podcast leading up to the event – Arngrim, who also has a comedy career, hammed it up with a presence big enough for the entire open field. I like to think her mention of her AIDS activism and gay following gave some people pause for self-reflection, like the man in the cowboy hat from Arizona who confided that he'd met a lot of Californians here, but “none of them look like they vote a certain way.” This audience had more important debates on their mind than Trump/Biden, like whether it's pronounced Al-MAN-zo or Al-MAHN-zo (Answer: the former when referring to the real guy in Wilder's books, and the latter when discussing the TV character loosely based on him).
Faith played as big a part in the festival as it did the series, with 89 year-old Ketty Lester singing a cappella gospel at a Sunday service presided over by Wendi Lou Lee, a.k.a. Baby Grace, whose Christianity was of the inclusive, Charles Ingalls-style “be a good example” variety. Lester was among many with autobiographies to sell, most appearing self-published and using the show as a hook, no matter how small their part. We should all be so lucky as to have such a hook, though I confess to some disappointment that Charlotte Stewart, who played schoolteacher Miss Beadle, didn't bring any photos of her David Lynch projects to sign. (Side note: anyone up for a Lynch-con?). Lester's panel was a highlight, as she steamrolled over the moderator and just told the stories she wanted to tell, occasionally misremembering – she called Hattie McDaniel “Aunt Jemima,” sincerely seeming to believe it was her real name – but clearly had the energy to go even longer. Having recently seen William Shatner, aged 90, do an hour of onstage riffing, I have to say there's something about the folks in that showbiz generation who've survived.
When we met Ms. Lester later in the autograph room, my wife asked her to tell me I need Jesus. She held my hand and proclaimed that he was her guide, which was, again, following the show ethos of leading by example rather than insistence.
We brought a walker for days two and three, to make our own disabled seating, and ducked out before rainstorms hit on the third day. Sadly for some of the folks on the bus tours, the rain forced several cancellations. It's a fine idea to have the celebration outdoors, and the tents allowed for people to stand outside and still hear panels, unlike convention halls. But it made everything more subjects to acts of God, and He proved as mercurial with the weather as he sometimes was on the series. It was nice that there was a lobster food truck to eat at, though perhaps out of character for the event. Then again, Star Trek conventions don't exactly serve live worms either.
The theme tune remained omnipresent throughout the weekend, with a fair share of local musicians and bluegrass artists all paying tribute. Occasionally I began to sing along, with my own lyrics:
“Little housie...on the prairie
Little housie...on prairie!
The littlest house...the littlest housie-house
That's on...the prai-ai-ai-airie
The housie! On the prai-air-airie!
Housie, little housie...that's o-o-o-o-o-n...THE PRAIRIE!”
My wife originally wanted to hit me with a rolling pin for that one, I suspect, but she's come around. Must be my model example of selflessness, just like Pa Ingalls.
And my wife's take? “It was really disorganized, but damn, did I have a blast!”