Caddie Woodlawn

There are different things I've read over the years about how the pioneers stored and cooked their food, amongst other things,  that I have read with great interest then promptly forgot.  After all, we have better and safer ways to do things now and those old ways are interesting but unnecessary.  As time goes on, we forget that these  methods ever existed.  We then try to come up with new ways to do the same old thing.  Often, we modern people must reinvent the wheel when, in fact, some of what worked back then will still work now...and just as well!

Two of my favourite books growing up were Caddie Woodlawn and the sequel, Caddie Woodlawn's Family.  Carol Ryrie Brink, Caddie's granddaughter, wrote the first book in 1939 and the second book in 1944, 4 years after Caddie's death in 1940, a matter of weeks before Caddie's 86th birthday.  How exciting it must have been for Carol to grow up listening to the wonderful stories told to her.  Carol was orphaned at age 8 and raised by her grandmother, so had many years to listen to Caddie.  How kind of her to share her grandmother's stories with us!  Without her, Laura and others like them, we would know little about those days.

The outside of the Woodlawn house.
http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/

  The inside of Caddie's house.
http://www.childrensliteraturenetwork.org/