Sallie Ketcham: "Whatever Happened to Baby Lane?"

The question has puzzled researchers for years: what happened with the baby Rose Wilder Lane lost early in her marriage to Gillette Lane?

We first heard from Laura Ingalls Wilder biographer Sallie Ketcham back on episode 23 talking about Rose Wilder Lane’s ghostwriting. But she's also the researcher who couldn't stop wondering what exactly happened with the pregnancy Rose had mentioned obliquely over the course of her life. When was Rose pregnant? When did she lose the baby? And where?

Sallie uncovered what no one else could. She's on Land of Laura now to talk about what she learned about this part of Rose's life, as well as the research process that led to it.

In a bonus episode available on the Land of Laura Patreon, Sallie shares the heavy influence of fairy tales on the writing of Little House in the Big Woods, and the elements of fairy tales that both Laura and Rose relied on to create that book.

patreon.com/landoflaura

https://www.routledge.com/Laura-Ingalls-Wilder-American-Writer-on-the-Prairie/Ketcham/p/book/9780415820202

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/laura-ingalls-wilder-and-the-wolves/

https://kellykferguson.substack.com

https://naasr.org/products/children-of-ararat

https://www.sdhspress.com/journal/south-dakota-history-50-2/it-was-in-armenia-that-i-learned-fear-rose-wilder-lane-and-the-armenian-genocide/sdh-5002-01.pdf