This is the last in a series of blogs dealing with adoption in the popular, still-airing-in-reruns show Little House on the Prairie.
In season nine’s two-part opener, “Times are Changing”, Almanzo’s brother dies. Their niece Jenny will now live with them. They are perplexed at how to help her deal with her grief and with the changes in her life.
Also in season 9 is “The Wild Boy”. A deaf boy has been kept in a circus show and drugged to act as “the Wild Boy”. Jenny Wilder, Dr. Baker and Mr. Edwards discover his true nature. Although the judge has previously ordered that the boy be sent to an asylum rather than returned to the abusive showman, the judge later tells Mr. Edwards that it would be okay to take the boy to the asylum “in twenty or thirty years”. The boy remains with Mr. Edwards. In a later episode, conflict is created when Matthew’s biological father finds him there.
A made for TV-movie called “God Bless the Child” was made after the series ended. It is Christmastime, and Laura and Almanzo are traveling with their toddler Rose. Rose is kidnapped from a train station by a woman who has just been told by a doctor that she’ll never have children. She tells her husband that the child was abandoned at the hospital and the nurses encouraged her to take her.
Meanwhile Laura and her husband have been searching for her with the aid of a boy who has run away from an orphanage. When they find Rose, the woman who took her confesses that Rose is Laura’s daughter.
The most incredible part here is the happy ending: the kidnapper and her husband take the boy as their son so that Laura and Almanzo don’t have to bring him back to the orphanage. Everyone is thrilled. So, even a troubled woman who kidnaps a toddler during a psychotic episode can adopt a kid! Great message, huh?
Some of these situations are unfortunately true to history. The term “put up for adoption” referred to the practice of sending children from the streets of New York City on “Orphan Trains” where they were stood up on a platform for people to adopt. Many were used for farm work. Many orphanages probably were short on funds and would pretty much give the kids to anyone who would feed them.
One minor subplot involves the Oleson’s adopted daughter Nancy. Mrs. Oleson (who pressured her husband into adopting Nancy) is in a mental hospital and Mr. Oleson asks his daughter to help. But her lies cause a big accident. When they are revealed (and the Christmas tree falls on Mr. Oleson), Nancy again shouts, “You hate me, don’t you?” Nels is at the end of his rope and shouts, “Yes!”
Things adults whose children watch the shows should make clear:
• The child’s own adoption story, to dispel any fears that kidnapping was involved.
• The fact that many people at child welfare agencies here and abroad care very much about the children in their care should be pointed out, while acknowledging that a few don’t.
• These people take a lot of time in connecting the would-be adoptive parents with a child. These workers check to see if the prospective parents have done anything criminal or have any severe or untreated mental illness, and whether they take proper care of any children already in the home.
• Share with your child why you wanted to be a parent.
• All children and adult family members must do chores to contribute to a household, but manual labor a century ago was much more arduous than now. There is no financial benefit to adopting a child.
• Not only are the children lucky, but the parents feel lucky to have been united with these children.
In future blogs, we will talk about adoption themes in media and popular culture.
Please see these related blogs:
Helping Your Child to Deal with the Loss of a Parent
Book Review: The Orphan Train Children Series, Part One
Book Review: Orphan Train Children: David’s Search
The Story of the Orphan Trains