“How the Hard Winter of 1880-81 Became 'The Long Winter' by Laura Ingalls Wilder,” September 15

Thursday, September 15, 6 p.m.

Presented by the Davenport Public Library

Presented on September 15 as part of the Davenport Public Library's 3rd Thursday at Hoover's Presidential Library & Museum series, the virtual program How the Hard Winter of 1880-81 Became The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder will deliver as insightful overview of the Hard Winter of 1880-81 as found in the newspaper record, followed by an exploration of some of Wilder’s struggles to convert her family’s experiences into her acclaimed novel.

An autobiographical children's novel published in 1940, The Long Winter is the sixth of nine books in Wilder's Little House series and is set in southeastern Dakota Territory during the severe winter of 1880–1881, when the author turned 14 years old. The book runs from fall 1880 to spring 1881, a season of such frequent blizzards that it went down in history as "The Snow Winter." Accurate details in the novel include the names of the townspeople (with only minor exceptions); the blizzards' severity and the deep cold; the Chicago and North Western Railway stopping trains until the spring thaw after the snow made the tracks impassable; the near-starvation of the townspeople; and the courage of Almanzo Wilder and Cap Garland, who ventured out on the open prairie in search of a cache of wheat that no one was even sure existed.

Wilder's fictionalized material includes the "Indian warning" in an early chapter and the duration and frequency of blizzards. While historical records indicate a larger than usual number of blizzards that winter, Wilder's description of storms lasting on average three days each, with only two to two-and-a-half days' separation, from late October until early April, would imply about 35 separate blizzards during that time frame. Local oral history and research by Wilder's biographers also indicate that the figures of Almanzo and Cap traveled about 12 miles south of De Smet to find the wheat, not 20 as she states in the novel. And Almanzo is portrayed as being roughly six years older than Wilder, when he was in fact 10 years older. Aside from these minor variations, however, The Long Winter is largely considered an accurate portrayal of that legendary winter in Dakota Territory, and the novel was a runner-up for the 1941 Newbery Medal, as were all of the fourth to eighth Little House books from 1938 to 1943.

Presenting the Davenport Public Library's illustrated talk, speaker Cindy Wilson is an author who describes herself as passionate about history and enchanted by the prairie landscape. Her award-winning book The Beautiful Snow: The Ingalls Family, the Railroads, and the Hard Winter of 1880-81 can be purchased through her Web site TheBeautifulSnow.com or at various online and museum retailers.

How the Hard Winter of 1880-81 Became The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder will be presented virtually on September 15, participation in the 6 p.m. Zoom event is free, and more information is available by visiting DavenportLibrary.com.