LITTLE HOUSE, OH SO DREARY

LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRARIE
1974-1983 NBC

LITTLE HOUSE, OH SO DREARY
MAD #197, March 1978
w: Dick DeBartolo
a: Angelo Torres

Based on the series of autobiographical books by Laura Ingalls Wilder about a family that settles on a farm in Walnut Grove, Minnesota in the 1870s. The translation to television was inspired by the slew of television shows and movies in the seventies about “simple folk” such as The Waltons and Apple's Way.

The Ingalls family were the father Charles (Michael Landon, who was also the producer and sometimes director), wife Caroline (Karren Grassle), and their three daughters Mary (Melissa Sue Anderson), Laura (Melissa Gilbert), and Carrie (Lindsay and Sydney Greenbush. By law, actors under six are only allowed to work a certain number of hours, so often they're played by twins). The Olesens were another family that lived there, Other townsfolk are caricatured, but not named, so I can't match them with particular actors. As with most humor articles of the late seventies, there's always a joke about singer turned anti-gay activist Anita Bryant.

It's unlikely anyone would have been named “Kahn” in the old west of that era.

From More TV Moments Well Never See in Bananas #61, c.1982