"Little Libertarians on the prairie; Was Laura Ingalls Wilder’s beloved children’s series written as an anti-New Deal fable? The Wilder family papers suggest yes" by Christine Woodside | August 09, 2013
From the publication of the first book in 1932, the series was immediately popular. And, at a time when President Franklin D. Roosevelt was introducing the major federal initiatives of the New Deal and Social Security as a way out of the Depression, the Little House books lulled children to sleep with the opposite message. The books placed self-reliance at the heart of the American myth: If the pioneers wanted a farm, they found one; if they needed food, they killed it or grew it; if they needed shelter, they built it....
Of course, for anyone who has ever studied AmeriKan history or read about it in the past, it is government that has always saved us, government that has always looked out for the good, government that is the hero of our story.
I'm sorry, but the AmeriKan newspaper is the last institution that should be pointing fingers regarding myth promotion.
A close examination of the Wilder family papers suggests that Wilder’s daughter did far more than transcribe her mother’s pioneer tales: She shaped them and turned them from recollections into American fables, changing details where necessary to suit her version of the story.
Oh, like governments and mouthpiece media?
And if those fables sound like a perfect expression of Libertarian ideas—maximum personal freedom and limited need for the government—that’s no accident. Lane, and to an extent her mother, were affronted by taxes, the New Deal, and what they saw as Americans’ growing reliance on Washington. Eventually, as Lane became increasingly antigovernment, she would pursue her politics more openly, writing a strident political treatise and playing an important if little-known role inspiring the movement that eventually coalesced into the Libertarian Party.
Which explains its appearance on television just as the Reagan revolution was starting. What a coincidence.
Today, as Libertarian values move back into the mainstream of American politics, few citizens think to link them to a series of beloved childhood books. But....
The Globe will make the connection -- even if there really isn't one there after times have changed so much in 80 years.
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I'm sorry, folks, but I've got chores to do and am sick of the agenda-pushing log roll from my paper.
