Lindsay Greenbush

Little House on the Prairie is an American Western drama television series, starring Michael Landon, Melissa Gilbert, and Karen Grassle, about a family living on a farm in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, in the 1870s and 1880s. The show is an adaptation of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s best-selling series of Little House books. Television producer and NBC executive Ed Friendly became aware of the story in the early 1970s. He asked Michael Landon to direct the pilot movie, who agreed on the condition that he could also play Charles Ingalls.

The regular series was preceded by the two-hour pilot movie, which first aired on March 30, 1974. The series began on the NBC network on September 11, 1974, and ended on May 10, 1982. During the 1982–83 television season, with the departure of Michael Landon and Karen Grassle, the series was broadcast with the new title Little House: A New Beginning.

In 1997, TV Guide ranked the two-part episode “I’ll Be Waving As You Drive Away” #97 on its 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time.