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and heartbeat of Little House, died in 1991 of pancreatic cancer at
age 54. Karen Grassle. who played Charles' loving wife, Caroline,
has toured the country performing in various theater productions
and now lives in Pacific Palisades, Calif., with her adopted
daughter, Lily.
Melissa Gilbert, the youngest actor ever to receive
a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, played feisty HI
Laura “Half-Pint” Ingalls, whose character is based on the
woman who went on to author the enduring Little House
books. Gilbert, now 42, is a mother and working actor.
starred in the 2005 TV movie Thicker Thun Water and recent
ly served two terms as president of Hollywood's Screen Actors
Guild. Melissa Sue Anderson, who played Laura's big sister, Mary,
is now 44 and a mother of two living in Topanga Canyon, Calif.
Little sister Carrie Ingalls actually was played by twins Sidney
and Lindsay Greenbush. Sidney is writing an autobiography, while
Lindsay is busy with Ltttle House cast-reunion activities. "Were
all closer now than when we were doing the show,” Lindsay says.
“It's more like a family than ever.” In 2005, several cast members
convened in Tombstone, Ariz., at a Western film symposium, and
again at the Homestead Days festival in Beatrice, Neb.
Nellie Oleson, Walnut Grove’s favorite bad girl, was played
by Allison Arngrim and was one of the
show's most colorful characters. Since
leaving Little House in 1981, Arngrim
has done stand-up comedy (recent show
title: Older! Uglier! Meaner!) and is a
social activist on behalf of the National
Association to Protect Children and
the Ambassador Council of AIDS Proj
ect in Los Angeles. “The show's con
tinuing popularity blows my mind,”
Arngrim says
Katherine McGregor, who played
Nellie’s hissably wicked on-screen
mom, Harriet, was—contrary to her
character—one of the set’s best-loved
personalities. Today, she is an advocate
of meditation and spiritual healing
and a follower of Vedanta, an Eastern
religion. Richard Bull, who played her
husband, Nels, boasts a long line of TV
and film credits before and after his
work on Little House. The young actor
who played Willie Oleson, Jonathan
Gilbert (the real-life brother to his
co-starring sister, Melissa, and another
sister, actress Sara Gilbert, who went
on to fame on TVs Roseanne ), lives in
New York and works as a stockbroker.
Matthew Laborteaux, who played Albert Ingalls, is an actor spe
cializing in video-game voiceovers.
Kevin Hagen, who portrayed Doc Baker, died of cancer last
year; Victor French, who played Isaiah Edwards, died in 1989
shortly after completing work on the final season of another series.
Highway to Heaven-, and Steve Tracy, who played Percival Dalton,
Nellie Oleson ’s husband, died of an AIDS-related illness in 1986.
“The show is like a gift that keeps on giving," Arngrim says. “I'm
embarrassed to admit it. but were still all heinously attached to each
other, which tells you the kind of amazing experience we had.”
Boh Gullet is a writer in Wakefield. R.I.
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Allison Arngrim played
"bad girl" Nellie Oleson.
Page 7
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From left: Melissa Sue Anderson, Lindsay Greenbush and Melissa Gilbert played Little House siblings.
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