When the Ingalls family returned from Indian Territory, they visited for a number of months in Wisconsin, and then moved to the Walnut Grove, Minnesota, area.  This is the present-day town of Walnut Grove.  It's a small community, with farms surrounding it.  It is only a few miles southwest of Minneapolis and St. Paul, and has grown quite a bit since this photo was taken.

In the town, on the way to the Plum Creek site, is a small, but very wonderful, museum.  There is a small gift shop where items specifically tied to the Walnut Grove stories are sold.  It's a great place!  Visit this town and book site if you ever get the chance!

Here is the local church, which is quite new.  But look closer in the bell tower.  The bell found there is well over 100 years old, and is the one that Pa Ingalls helped to buy by donating the money he had saved to buy new boots.  Of course, you won't know about this story unless you have read On the Banks of Plum Creek!  This was the story that made me a Laura Ingalls Wilder fan from third grade until this very day.

As we drove the 3-4 miles toward Plum Creek, we wondered how we would know when we had arrived.  Suddenly I saw a sign on a large tree stating, "Ingalls Homestead 1876"!  We stopped to take a photograph by the driveway and we saw the mailbox below.

There was no doubt now.  Laura Ingalls Wilder's name was on the mailbox, as well as "Banks of Plum Creek".  The residents of the new house, Mr. & Mrs. Harold Gordon, were also named.  Being a rather shy person, I was nervous going up to the farmhouse door.  But once I met the Gordons, I felt right at home.  They were some of the friendliest people I ever met.  They have now passed, but because of their son, you can still visit the site!

Mr. Gordon had built this footbridge where he believed Pa had built his.  This would have been the bridge where Laura nearly drowned when she heard the water beckoning her to feel its power during a flood.  The day we took the photo, it was a warm Minnesota summer day, and it was just a nice place to sit and cool off over the water as it slid past under my feet.

I couldn't find the willow Laura talked about when she took all her party girls wading.  That would have been the place Nellie Oleson would have stood when Laura warned her of the angry crayfish, and how he could bite her toe right off!  Of course, if you've read the books, you know what happened to Nellie, and the same thing happened to me.  I did not, however, kick and scream, but calmly brought out the salt from our picnic basket, gave the creatures a sprinkle, and they let go quickly!  Too bad Nellie didn't know!

After I cleaned off my feet and legs we walked to the other end of the bridge, and up a slight hill.  There was a rather large dip in the side of the creek bank, as you can see.  The Gordons said this was the dugout in which the Ingalls lived (5 of them!) for nearly a year!  The original dugout was deeper, wider and longer than it looks here, but it was still much like living in a cave!  One window, dirt and thatch roof, and creatures that crawled and scratched at any time of day or night behind the paper which covered the walls!  

Believe it or not, the rock on which I am standing was the rock on which Laura and Mary would wait for the neighbor boy to bring their cow home from grazing.  Since the creek floods almost every year, mud has settled all around it, and it is probably much closer to the creek now than it was then.  You see, the creek also changes course every few years, and this was probably quite a safe distance from the water, and from the hooves of the cows as they came walking home.