Little House Wayside Sign, Pepin County, Wisconsin

"Once upon a time......a little girl lived in the Big Woods of Wisconsin in a little gray house made of logs." Writing about herself and her life here, Laura Ingalls Wilder thus began "Little House in the Big Woods," the first of her famous "Little House" books.

Laura was born here on February 7, 1867. Late in 1868 or in the spring of 1869, the Ingalls family left Wisconsin and traveled by covered wagon to Kansas. IN 1870, Charles Ingalls brought his family back to the little house near Pepin. In 1871 Mary and Laura enrolled in the Barry Corner School near here. They sold this farm in 1873 and moved to Minnesota.

Laura Ingalls Wilder is loved, both for her delightful writing style and for her good homespun philosophy. Reflecting on her rugged frontier youth, she said, "It has been many years since I beat eggs with a fork or cleaned a kerosene lamp. Many things have changed since then, but the truths we learned from our parents and the principles they taught us are always true. They can never change."

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