Westward

Jan 29, 2013 12:19

I have been re-reading the Little House series. It started as a comfort read of These Happy Golden Years and turned into something else. I find myself truly admiring the storytelling and have gotten hooked on all the details of pioneer/farming life in the books. (I remember liking these parts as a wee one, but there was also a hunger for plot points, which I don't care as much for anymore.) As a record of social history, the series truly is unparalleled, which is no doubt a reason for its lasting success.

But that's not the point of this post. I've finished all the LH books proper and have been trying to find some other writings of Laura Ingalls Wilder to get a sense of who she really was. Apparently, there is a treasure trove of first-hand documents at the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library (long story) that I would love to comb over.

Some of Laura's personal journals and letters were also published as On the Way Home (documenting the Wilder family's move to Missouri) and West from Home. I'm reading the latter, which is a remarkably preserved set of correspondence from Laura to Almanzo in 1915. Laura had gone to San Francisco to visit daughter Rose, while Almanzo stayed in Missouri to mind the farm. San Francisco was at this time celebrating the Panama-Pacific International Exhibition, a World's Fair-like pageant held in honor of the opening of the Panama Canal. (Rose and Laura timed her visit expressly for this reason.)

Rose was a journalist of some renown and popularity. (As a contemporary writer, she was far more famous than Laura.) She wrote a number of human-interest pieces for the San Francisco Bulletin which were nationally syndicated. During the months of Laura's visit, Rose had interviews with (and wrote pieces on) Charlie Chaplin and Henry Ford, to name names. She brought her mother with her on a few of these ventures.

Rose was also asked to write a piece on an Austrian violinist who was in town for the exhibition. She and Laura had opportunity to visit with him, and attended a concert that Laura described as "so beautiful that when [the] violin began to sing it made one's throat ache." The violinist? Fritz Kreisler.

Yes, Laura listened to Fritz Kreisler in concert. MY MIND IS BLOWN.

Also, I can only imagine what that experience must have been like for Laura. The impact of music on her, as reflected in the LH books, really can't be overstated, as is the fact that Pa gifted her with his fiddle when she moved to Missouri.

Lines cross again.

books

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