Melissa Gilbert is best known as portraying Laura Ingalls Wilder, the second oldest daughter of Charles Ingalls (played by Michael Landon) on the NBC series Little House on the Prairie (1974-1983). During the run of the series, she appeared in several television films including The Diary of Anne Frank and The Miracle Worker. In 2012, she was a contestant on season 14 of Dancing with the Stars.

Gilbert served as the president of the Screen Actors Guild from 2001 to 2005. In 2009, her autobiography, Prairie Tale: A Memoir, was released. In 2016, she ran for U.S. Congress as a Democrat in Michigan’s 8th congressional district, and she won the Democratic primary but later dropped out because of health issues. Actress Sara Gilbert is her half-sister and former actor Jonathan Gilbert (who played Willie Oleson in Little House on the Prairie) is her brother. She married actor and director Timothy Busfield in 2013.

On May 10, 2022, Gilbert returns with a new hilarious and heartfelt memoir, Back to the Prairie: A Home Remade, a Life Rediscovered, which chronicles her journey from Hollywood to a ramshackle house in the Catskills during the Covid-19 pandemic. When her husband introduces her to the wilds of rural Michigan, she begins to fall back in love with nature, and when work takes them to New York, they find a rustic cottage to call home. She named the house Cabbage (a conflation of cabin and cottage), and the book details all of the blood, sweat and tears that the two of them endured just to make it habitable.

In a brand new interview with Smashing Interviews Magazine, Gilbert describes how Little House on the Prairie inspired her to live her best life and find her dreams far from the glamorous lights of Tinseltown.

What follows is an excerpt from the interview:

Smashing Interviews Magazine: You said, “I had never stopped being Halfpint," which was a nickname Michael Landon gave you.

Melissa Gilbert: One hundred percent.

Smashing Interviews Magazine: How did Little House on the Prairie affect your aspirations for the future?

Melissa Gilbert: I hear from people a lot, especially young women, how they wish they’d had a childhood like Laura’s was portrayed on Little House on the Prairie. Even though I played her, I also wished for the same thing (laughs). It took a global pandemic for me to find the lifestyle, not that I was completely off the grid or entirely without any sort of modern comforts. But I’d always wanted to have land, to have chickens, to have a garden, to be somewhat independent in many different ways, to also contribute to the plan, to give back, to try to leave a smaller carbon footprint and just be a conscientious human. I think that being on the show inspired me to have this life that I have now, for sure. One hundred percent.

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About the authors:

Marc Parker is an American journalist, author, artist, a photographer and a computer scientist. He is the founder/publisher/editor-in-chief of Smashing Interviews Magazine. Marc Parker's social media: Twitter Facebook

Melissa Benefield Parker is an American journalist and author. She is the founder/publisher of Smashing Interviews Magazine. Melissa Benefield Parker's social media: Twitter Facebook