By Lori Ferraro Do you have certain television theme songs that you never tire of? That you truly love? That fill you with a uniquely nostalgic warm fuzzy that’s hard to come by? This TV theme song doesn’t even have words . . . but if I’m flipping around and hear it, you bet I’m stopping on it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKVvZhTQl0k That wagon pulling up. The shot of Ma and Pa. The running down the hill. The falling of Carrie. I was (ok, I still am) a Little House on the Prairie junkie. Little House premiered in the mid-70s and ran through 1983. The show focused around the Ingalls family living in Walnut Grove, Minnesota during the mid-1800s. The series was based on the bestselling book series written by Laura Ingalls Wilder about her family’s experiences on the prairie.
- Laura having a crush on a boy named Johnny, which wasn’t reciprocated and made way worse when he shows interest in her older sister, Mary.
- Any episode where town bully Nellie Oleson is plotting and planning revenge on the other children. Or adults.
- The one where Mary’s pet raccoon bites Laura and she fears she may have rabies.
- The stress and drama of Mary waking up one morning to find that she has gone completely blind!
Little House on the Prairie really was and still is a great show. Besides being a dramatic tear-jerker and often funny, it also provided a great history lesson about life in the American west at that time. Lucky for us, it seems to be running on a loop on the Hallmark Channel. Ma, Pa, Laura, Mary, Carrie and the rest of Walnut Grove aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. In fact, I gotta go. The covered wagon just pulled up, and the girls are running down that hill as we speak.