Childhood Home of Laura Ingalls Wilder and Birthplace of Carrie Ingalls

Childhood Home of Laura Ingalls Wilder and Birthplace of Carrie Ingalls. Little House on the Prairie The Historic Home Site. , The Ingalls family arrived here in 1869, on the Osage Diminished Reserve, believing the land would soon be available for legal purchase. They had previously lived near present-day Rothville, in Yellow Creek Township, Chariton County Missouri, and after over a year in Kansas, they returned to their home in Pepin, Wisconsin. In September 1870, the Osage signed a treaty with the United States government, selling their remaining Kansas land, moving to a new reservation In Indian Territory (now Oklahoma). Although legal purchases were first recorded here in June 1871, Charles Ingalls never filed on this land, making identification of the exact location of their log cabin challenging., In 1972, this site was identified by researchers Margaret Gray Clement and Ellene Charbo as the setting of Little House on the Prairie, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. In her book, Charles and Caroline Ingalls with daughters Mary, Laura, and Baby Carrie live in "Indian Territory" for a year, leaving after hearing that soldiers were being sent to drive the white settlers off the land. The Ingalls Family Bible reveals that Caroline (Carrie) Celestia Ingalls was born in Rutland Township, Montgomery County, Kansas, on Wednesday, August 3, 1870. The Kansas State Historical Society located the Charles Ingalls family on the 1870 census In Rutland Township in Montgomery County, taken on August 12-13, 1870, by Asa Hairgrove. Working from these clues, Clement and Charbo searched land records for Rutland Township documents and comparing them with the names on the 1870 census, Clement and Charbo discovered that the families listed just prior to and after the Ingalls family were all located in the southeast corner of the township. Only two quarter sections in this corner were not filed on by individuals listed on the census. This location (SW ¼ of Section 36, Township 33, Range 14) was selected to most likely be the home site of the Ingalls family, with a hand dug well on the property. Most importantly, since this location was designated as a "school section", which would cost much more to purchase it, the Ingalls family had to once again move., In Little House on the Prairie, Laura tells the story of Pa and their neighbor Mr. Scott digging the well and Mr. Edwards helping build their log cabin home. Edmund Mason lived half a mile away, and is most likely written to be Mr. Edwards. He is buried one mile east of the site at the Harrisonville Cemetery on Tyro Road/County Road 2700. Dr. George Tann was the first African American physician in Kansas and Oklahoma, who treated the Ingalls family for malaria. He is buried at the Mount Hope Cemetery in Independence., In 1977, Little House on the Prairie, Inc. was formed by Brigadier General William (Bill) Albert Kurtis, Sr. and his wife Wilma Horton Kurtis. Local volunteers built a replica log cabin on the property, based on descriptions in Laura's book. Visitors can still see the well nearby, in the book, as the creek Mr. Edwards crossed to bring Christmas presents to the Ingalls girls. , Historical Marker Presented in 2018 by John A. Bass of Ingalls-Wilder-Lane Historic Alliance (Shreveport, Louisiana).