Those interested in the faith of Laura Ingalls Wilder would be forgiven if they assumed that this blog had gone dormant. Indeed, it did go dormant during the spring semester here at Trinity Christian College. My work as an Academic Dean at Trinity meant that I was involved intimately with the work of developing a new structure for the Foundations (core) curriculum at the College and getting it approved by the faculty. The Foundations committee met nine times during the fall semester. It met eighteen times during the spring semester. I was involved in dozens of other meetings with key faculty members across campus. The proposed new Foundations curriculum was approved by the faculty this month. Between Foundations work, teaching, and my other duties as an Academic Dean, I spent no time at all with Laura Ingalls Wilder materials between December and May 15.
As a result, it has been a blessing to jump back into work on the project during the last several weeks. After a little bit of a slow start, I was able to pick up where I had left off early last fall on Chapter 4 of the book. I finished a draft of Chapter four last week. I’m hoping to write drafts of at least two more chapters this summer. I’m also presenting a paper, along with Bill Anderson and John Miller, at the Midwestern Historical Conference at the end of this week. I pulled my paper proposal from consideration for LauraPalooza to make the summer less hectic; I may be helping my parents move.
Last week I was also able to read Little Lodges on the Prairie: Freemasonry and Laura Ingalls Wilder by Teresa Lynn. I met Teresa at LauraPalooza in 2017. Her research on Laura’s family, the Freemasons, and the Order of the Eastern Star touches many of the same sources and themes that mine does. Full disclosure: Teresa then sent me a free copy of her book last year. I had been looking forward to having the time to read it. It’s a delightful book.
About the first third of the book describes the history of the Freemasons and the Eastern Star and explains how the Lodge and the Order are organized. This was incredibly helpful. I grew up in a conservative Presbyterian church in Western Pennsylvania, and in my church when “secret societies” like the Freemasons were talked about, the normal assumption was that membership in one of those organizations was incompatible with Christianity. I wasn’t taught that Freemasonry involved the worship of Satan, although I have subsequently known Christians who did believe that. I think it was that the leaders of our church suspected an organization where people never revealed to others what went on in meetings. The idea was also that our first allegiance should be to God and to the church, and Freemasonry interfered with that. At any rate, it was intriguing to learn about how local chapters and Grand Chapters (state organizations) work, about the various offices in both the Masonic Lodge and the Order of the Eastern Star, and about the values that undergird the work of both organizations. This section of the book filled in many blanks in my understanding, first and foremost that only men can become Freemasons, while both women and men can be members of the Eastern Star, although some offices in the Eastern Star are reserved for women.
After giving an introduction to Freemasonry and the Eastern Star, the book narrates Laura Ingalls Wilder’s life, paying particular attention to the Lodges and chapters of the Eastern Star that touched it: in De Smet, South Dakota, in Keystone, South Dakota (where her sister Carrie lived much of her adult life), and in Mansfield, Missouri. Laura’s father, Charles Ingalls, petitioned to become a Mason in De Smet in 1885, several months after Laura’s marriage to Almanzo Wilder. In 1891, Laura’s mother and younger sister Carrie were charter members of the Eastern Star chapter in De Smet. Charles and Laura became members of the Eastern Star in 1893.
Laura and Almanzo moved to Mansfield in 1894, so it is there that most of their participation in the Lodge and Order occurred. Laura became a member of the Eastern Star chapter in Mansfield in 1897; Almanzo joined the Lodge in 1898 and the Eastern Star chapter in 1902. Between 1897 and 1931, when they demitted their membership (possibly to save money as the Depression deepened), Laura served as an officer over twenty-five times. She was Worthy Matron—essentially the President of the Chapter—three different times, attended Grand Chapter of Missouri meetings in Sedalia, Kansas City, and St. Louis, and even served as a district officer that visited other chapters and reported on their health to the Grand Chapter.
It is clear that Lynn has done her homework. She has read all of the chapter minutes for the De Smet, Keystone, and Mansfield Lodges and Eastern Star chapters for the years under study. She has also read the local newspapers—the De Smet News and the Mansfield Mirror—to supplement her chronology. The book reproduces sections of Lodge or Eastern Star Chapter minutes, newspaper articles, and pictures of the people being described. The narrative of Laura’s life follows that established by other biographers like Bill Anderson and John Miller. The book argues that the values of the Freemasons and Eastern Star—“family, faith, education, charity, courage, independence, patriotism, fortitude, and self-improvement” (272)—basically were Laura Ingalls Wilder’s values. It’s hard to disagree with this.
Teresa told me when we spoke in 2017 about a Watch Meeting that Laura had called on December 31, 1909. Here is how it is described in the book:
Watch meetings, also called watch night services, were first held by John Wesley, founder of the Methodist church. (The Wilders were attending the Methodist Church in Mansfield. Many other Chapter members were also Methodists.) The meetings generally included singing hymns, prayer, scripture reading, uplifting conversation, and reflection on the old year and resolutions for the new. The purpose of these meetings was to provide an alternative to the drunken parties often held on New Year’s Eve. (236)
This is fascinating, and I wouldn’t have known about it apart from Lynn’s research. It appears that there are a number of things about Laura’s life in Mansfield that we wouldn’t know apart from this book.
As I think about my project, I’m trying to understand Wilder’s formal membership in the Freemasons, the Eastern Star, and at least four other women’s clubs in Mansfield and Hartville, when she never officially became a member of any church. Previous biographers have noted that Laura and Almanzo never became a member of the Methodist Church in Mansfield. The more I study, the more indications I find that Laura never became a member of any church. For someone who went to church regularly her entire life, knew the Bible well, and prayed every night, I’m not exactly sure how to explain her refusal to formally join the body of Christ. I continue to think about what that might mean.
Thanks for reading.
(Quotes are from Teresa Lynn, Little Lodges on the Prairie: Freemasonry and Laura Ingalls Wilder (Austin, TX: Tranquility Press, 2014).
Links:
The Faith of Laura Ingalls Wilder 