| Caroline Lake Quiner Ingalls | |
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Caroline Ingalls with her husband Charles |
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| Born | December 12, 1839 Brookfield, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Died | April 20, 1924 (aged 84) De Smet, South Dakota, U.S. |
| Spouse | Charles Ingalls (m. 1860–1902) (his death) |
Caroline Ingalls, born Caroline Lake Quiner (December 12, 1839 – April 20, 1924) was the mother of Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the Little House books.
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She was born 15 miles west of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in the town of Brookfield, in the county of Waukesha, the fifth of seven children of Henry Quiner and Charlotte (Tucker) Quiner. Her brothers were Joseph, Henry, and Thomas, and her sisters were Martha Jane and Eliza (the Quiners' first child, Martha Morse Quiner, died in 1836).[1]
When Caroline was five, her father died in an accident, reportedly on Lake Michigan near the Straits of Mackinac. In 1849, her mother married Frederick Holbrook, a farmer who lived nearby.[2] They had one child together, Charlotte "Lottie" Holbrook. Caroline evidently loved and respected her stepfather, and would later honor his memory by naming her son after him.
At the age of sixteen and a half, Caroline started working as a teacher. On February 1, 1860 she married Charles Ingalls. They had five children: Mary, Laura, Caroline ("Carrie"), Charles Frederick ("Freddie"), and Grace.
| Charles Frederick Ingalls Jr. | |
|---|---|
| Born | November 1, 1875 Walnut Grove, Minnesota, U.S. |
| Died | August 27, 1876 (aged 0) South Troy, Minnesota, U.S. |
Freddie died at the age of 9 months. He was born November 1, 1875 in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, and died August 27, 1876 in South Troy, Minnesota, of undetermined causes. In her unpublished autobiography Pioneer Girl,[3] Laura remembers that "Little Brother was not well" and that "one terrible day, he straightened out his little body and was dead". Wilder scholar William Anderson noted, "Nearly forty years after Freddie’s death, Ma mourned him, telling relatives how different everything would be 'if Freddie had lived'."[4] Laura Ingalls Wilder never mentioned him in her books, but he appears in Old Town in the Green Groves, a Laura's Lost Years novel by Cynthia Rylant. The history of Freddie is also mentioned in The Lord Is My Shepherd, Part 1 episode of the Little House on the Prairie series. Certain circumstances and consequences of his death (appearing in the part 2 of the episode) were, however, fictionalized, including his death when he was only a few weeks old.
Laura Ingalls Wilder's only son also died. It is not known exactly how old he was, but he was supposedly a few weeks old, sick, and was never even named. He died of unspecified causes and Laura did not have any more children after his death. He is not buried with his parents Laura and Almanzo in Mansfield, Missouri. Instead "baby son of A.J. Wilder" is buried with his maternal grandparents and aunts in the De Smet, South Dakota cemetery.
Laura's only surviving child, daughter Rose Wilder Lane, like her mother and grandmother, also had a son who died shortly after birth or who was still born around 1910. Like her mother Laura, Rose never had any more children after his tragic death. Supposedly, the end of the pregnancy required Rose to have an operation which left her unable to have children. She eventually divorced her husband, Gillette Lane around 1915 or 1916 and does not appear to have dated men after her divorce. Although she was a prolific writer, Rose never wrote about what exactly happened to her son or when he was born. The death was so painful, as was Freddie Ingalls' and Baby Son Wilder's deaths, that Rose did not want to speak about the loss. Decades later she would only write a friend and say that she never forgot it.
The Ingalls family traveled by covered wagon from Wisconsin, Kansas (Indian Territory), Burr Oak, Iowa and Minnesota. In 1879 they settled on a homestead near De Smet. When Charles and Caroline Ingalls decided to sell their farm because of the persistent pattern of dry years of weather, combined with Charles Ingalls advancing age and inability to take care of his large acreage, he built the family a home on Third Street in the town of De Smet in Dakota Territory.[5] He made his living primarily as a carpenter from that time onward until his death of heart disease at age 66 - a normal lifespan for an adult male at that time.
After her husband Charles died in 1902 of heart disease, Caroline rented rooms out in her house for income. De Smet residents remember Caroline sometimes sitting outside with her blind daughter Mary. Although they attended church, Caroline was a very private person who very rarely left home. She was deeply religious and Mary's blindness was an extreme blow to Caroline's hopes for her bright daughter.
Caroline died at the age of 84, and was buried at De Smet Cemetery along with her husband and daughters Mary, Carrie, and Grace along with her deceased, un-named baby grandson (son of Laura Ingalls Wilder).
The series The Caroline Years, an extension of the Little House series, by Maria D. Wilkes and Celia Wilkins, follows Caroline Quiner from her fifth year to her late teens, up to her engagement to Charles. The names, dates and people mentioned in the books are true, but much of the content of the books is, by necessity, fictionalized. The first title in the series is Little House in Brookfield.[6]
Additionally, Caroline was portrayed in the television adaptation of Little House on the Prairie by :
In I Remember, I Remember, fourth season episode of the Little House on the Prairie series, Katy Kurtzman portrays young version of Caroline.