By the Shores of Silver Lake

By the Shores of Silver Lake by Laura Ingalls Wilder

Pa is again restless.  They’ve been two more years by Plum Creek and the crops are weak and the animals are scarce.  Pa wants a place where the hunting is better.  They travel to the Dakota Territory, mostly by train (which travels at a whopping 20 mph!)

Pa has gone ahead to work for the railroad and the Ingalls women must travel out to meet him.  After the excitement of the journey, the next few chapters are a little slower, with lots of information on the railroad and western expansion.  My favorite parts of the book are once the railroad camps have broken up and the family is wintering at the surveyors house.  But in By the Shores of Silver Lake, they are never anywhere for very long.  They’ll live in two more houses before the end of the book.

This is the first book where you get a sense of how rough and dangerous things were in the early days of the west (I’m not counting the disputes with the Indians which is a whole different kettle of fish).  There’s a lot more violence in this book than in the ones prior.

Of note:  At the very end of the book Laura gets her first glimpse of Almanzo Wilder (and more importantly his beautiful horses).  It’s nothing more than a mention, but it’s there.

Racism Laura’s cousins “yell like Indians.” After Laura rides bareback Ma says she doesn’t know when she’s seen Laura look so much like a wild Indian.  A man is referred to as a half-breed. The half-breed is implicated in horse thievery.  Ma says you can’t trust a half-breed.  Pa says they would have been scalped on the Verdigris River if it hadn’t been for a full-breed.  Ma says they wouldn’t have had to worry about scalping if it weren’t for the “howling savages.”
Sex, Nudity, Dating – Baby Grace appears as if by magic.  No worries about TMI on that front. Laura and her cousin Lena sing a song about marrying a railroad man.  They also sing a song about a pretty maid and a man who refuses to marry her.  Some of Pa’s songs are about courting and marriage as well. A girl is married at age 13.  Lena and Laura discuss how they are just about the same age as that girl and how they’d rather not have that much responsibility yet.  You have to really read between the lines, but Ma subtly requests that Pa warn the girls about the railroad men.  I can’t imagine children would assume the warning belongs in this category at all, but an adult might realize that at least in part, it does. Mr. Boast met Mrs. Boast when he was 21 and she was 17.
Profanity – “darned,” the girls are warned that the railroad men use rough language. Laura overhears and recognizes rough language which includes swear and words she’s never heard before. “hell-divers” which seems to be a type of bird and not an intended profanity. “shut up,”
Death, Violence and Gore – Jack, the dog, dies of old age.  Riders carrying pistols follow the wagon.  People are planning on shooting Big Jerry on suspicion of stealing horses. Pa now has a rifle, a shotgun and a revolver.  Laura knows that Ma knows how to use them too, if she has to protect something.  A mob of men try to intimidate Pa.  A group of men string up the paymaster.  He is badly injured.  Pa describes the men lowering the noose. A man hits another man over the head and he doesn’t regain consciousness.  Many men carry guns, but not for hunting. Pa accidentally kills a swan.  Pa sings a song about a girl begging to be let in or else her child will die.  Some of his songs are about people who have died.  There’s an illustration of Pa with a gun holding a dead bunny.  There is a fair amount of fighting and brawling.  In one of the final chapters, there is a murder.  A claim jumper shoots a man.  Pa says that hanging is too good for the murderer.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – Railroad men drink behave badly when they are drunk.  A group of men sheltering at the Ingalls house brings a jug of whiskey, gets drunk and fights.
Frightening or Intense Things – Everyone has Scarlet Fever and Mary is now blind. This happens within the first two pages of the book, so it’s not a huge spoiler.  Mary also had to have her head shaved.  There’s a frequent threat of robbery in the railroad camps – men stealing horses, robbing each other, stealing from the paymaster.  There is a riot at another camp.  An old man has consumption.  Laura and Carrie end up close to a wolf outside, but run back to safety.