– General George Armstrong Custer leads a military expedition into the Black Hills of Dakota Territory, a region that had been granted to the Sioux in 1868. Charles Ingalls then builds the family a house on this farm.

This continued through 1877.įebruary 1874 – The Ingalls family settles near Walnut Grove, Minnesota, and spends their first year there living in a dugout as described in On the Banks of Plum Creek. – Caroline Celestia (“Carrie”) Ingalls is born in Montgomery County, Kansas.ġ871 – The family leaves the Indian Territory in the spring and returns to their home in the Big Woods.ġ873 – The Ingalls family, along with hundreds of other farmers, loses its wheat crop year after year. September 1869 – Pa, Ma, Mary, and Laura move to the Osage Diminished Reserve (Indian Territory) in Kansas. Transcontinental Railroad is completed as the famous “Last Spike” is driven at Promontory Summit, Utah. It is considered to be the first American young adult novel. – Laura Elizabeth Ingalls is born in the “Little House in the Big Woods” outside of Pepin, Wisconsin.ġ868 – Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott, is published in 1868. – The Thirteenth Amendment to Constitution abolishing slavery in the United States is ratified. The president dies early the next morning. – Actor and Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth shoots President Abraham Lincoln at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., on April 14. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia. – Mary Amelia Ingalls is born in the “Little House in the Big Woods” outside of Pepin, Wisconsin. Laura refers to this conflict in Pioneer Girl.ġ863 – English author Charles Kingsley publishes the classic children’s book, The Water Babies.ġ863 – Charles and Caroline settle on a farm in Pepin County, Wisconsin.ġ865 – English author Lewis Carroll publishes the children’s classic, Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland.

As punishment, on December 26, 1863, 38 American Indian men are hanged, the largest public execution in American history.

– Four Santee Dakota men kill five settlers in Minnesota and trigger a six-week conflict that claims the lives of 400-600 white settlers and soldiers. – Confederate forces bombarded Fort Sumter in South Carolina, launching the American Civil War. – Charles Ingalls marries Caroline Quiner in Concord, Wisconsin. – Almanzo James Wilder is born to James and Angeline Day Wilder on a farm near Malone, New York. – Caroline Lake Quiner is born to Henry Newton Quiner and Charlotte Quiner in Brookfield Township, Wisconsin. – Charles Phillip Ingalls is born to Lansford Whiting Ingalls and Laura Louise Ingalls in Cuba, New York.ġ838 – Samuel Morse invents Morse code which is still in use today.

Little house on the prairie books