[ SECRET POST #4104 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #4104 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



__________________________________________________



02.
(Vanessa Vanjie Mateo, RuPaul's Drag Race season 10)


__________________________________________________



03.


__________________________________________________



04.


__________________________________________________



05.


__________________________________________________


















06. [SPOILERS for Shadow Unit]



__________________________________________________



07. [SPOILERS for Pacific Rim: Uprising]



__________________________________________________



08. [WARNING for rape/non-con]
https://i.imgur.com/n0Letic.jpg
[linked for porn, Spartacus: Gods of the Arena]
















Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #587.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[tabaqui]

Eh. People criticize his and Almonzo's farming, but it was actually a pretty damn hard job, especially in that area. The weather was harsh, the land wasn't actually suited to farming, water was hard to find, and the railroads charged high prices for staples that people couldn't grow or make on their own.

This article even mention's Laura's family when it talks about how hard it was.

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/ushistory2os2xmaster/chapter/homesteading-dreams-and-realities/

[(Anonymous)]

Right, but it's not like either of them were born there and couldn't afford to leave. Both families left parts of the country where farming was much easier specifically to be third-rate dirt farmers in the Dakotas. Ingalls just went the extra irresponsible mile by dragging his wife and small children out of a comfortable living and into hell with him.

[tabaqui]

They were getting by back east, but the 'Big Woods' wasn't ideal farm land, the growing season was short, and the winters were harsh. Neither the Ingalls family or Ma's family had a lot of extra money, and buying land in the east was too expensive for a lot of people to consider.

Literally millions of people thought they could go west into vast, fertile prairies and make their fortune - why would they think any differently? They simply didn't know enough, were given incorrect or hyperbolic information, and didn't have the money to buy equipment and etc. needed to really successfully farm. Even in the book that is the 'real' story, you never get the sense that Ma Ingalls was unhappy or hated her life, or thought her husband was a loser, and Laura certainly enjoyed going west, exploring new places, and not being tied down.

So - to modern eyes, it seems bad, but it was simply the experience of millions of people back then.

[(Anonymous)]

It was a pretty consistent theme throughout the series that Caroline missed the conveniences of being back East and that she particularly didn't care for the interruption of the girls' education or the inferiority of Western schools. It was also heavily implied that Mary's blindness and Carrie's sickliness were compounded, in part, by being in the middle of nowhere away from good doctors.

Charles' half-assed attempt at homesteading may have been a national phenomenon, but that doesn't make it a good idea and it doesn't detract from the real consequences of dragging the family off to the middle of nowhere to live in shacks and fail at farming.

[tabaqui]

No? It wasn't? She wanted her girls to go to school, she never talked about the 'conveniences' of being in the East other than schools and society, which they had once they settled near Silver Lake. And the girls went to school at Plum Creek, as well, but even in the Big Woods, they weren't in school, and there was no mention of it.

It was not implied that the lack of a 'good doctor' had caused Mary's blindness. They had doctor bills from whomever was local, as is stated in Silver Lake. She was also taken to a specialist in Chicago who confirmed that nerve damage in her eyes was irreversible.

It's assumed Mary had meningoencephalitis, which is only diagnosed by blood and spinal fluid tests (not available in 1879), and the treatment was antibiotics, also not available.

Carrie was possibly in utero while Caroline had malaria, which could have effected her (a disease most homesteaders had no knowledge about), and later had rheumatic fever, which can damage the heart muscle (and wasn't treatable then). She also had lung (asthma-type) issues, which was not treatable in her childhood (or, indeed, for a long time after. Remember 'asthma cigarettes'?).

I'm not sure why you have such a hate-on for Charles Ingalls, and don't really care, but do your research first.

[(Anonymous)]

The part of Wisconsin they were living in is at a comparable latitude to where they were living in South Dakota.* I can't imagine the winters were less harsh in that part of the Plains, although maybe the soil wasn't so good or there were too many trees to clear. That part of Wisconsin is hilly, and that might have been an issue.

*Wisconsin isn't as far north as people tend to think it is, since the Great lakes push the Canadian border well south of the 49th parallel (e.g. Toronto is SOUTH of Minneapolis). See also: those episodes of That 70s Show where the kids drive to Canada to buy beer. That's a really damn long drive through either Minnesota or the UP because Wisconsin does not share a land border with Ontario (or even a border in the lake).

[tabaqui]

I'm slightly confused by your comment, heh. Where they lived in Wisconsin was the 'Big Woods' - basically, Mr. Ingalls spent hours and hours clearing trees and 'grubbing out' sprouts in order to have a field of worthwhile acreage to farm. So it was very difficult, back-breaking work, something he remarked upon often when they moved west and didn't have to clear any trees at all.

The issue re: winters is - while Wisconsin and North Dakota might not be all that different latitude-ally, there is practically nothing between huge, arctic storm masses in ND, while in Wisconsin, you have that...huge forest (or did) that made things not quite as bad. Blizzards that piled snow as high as the roof and made it impossible to see more than a few inches just didn't happen in Wisconsin, or at least - didn't happen for seven months straight as they did in Silver Lake.

And then - the plains are actually fairly dry, with not a lot of water on the surface. Some rainy years had made homesteaders think it would be fine, but they moved out there and planted crops that needed much more water than they would actually get, and didn't realize how dry it was regularly until they'd pretty much lost everything.

[(Anonymous)]

The issue re: winters is - while Wisconsin and North Dakota might not be all that different latitude-ally, there is practically nothing between huge, arctic storm masses in ND, while in Wisconsin, you have that...huge forest (or did) that made things not quite as bad.

Also, Wisconsin is closer to the Great Lakes, and large bodies of water have a significant moderating effect on temperature swings. The further inland you go, the more extreme temperatures you get (as a general rule).

[tabaqui]

Yup. All in all, living in ND at that time was hard as hell.

[(Anonymous)]

He was running from debtors early on, so going to the empty prairies probably seemed like a great idea!