Farmer Boy
Eight year old Almanzo Wilder lives on a
prosperous farm with his family in northern New
York State. The Wilders are busy all year long from sunup to sunset - cutting ice, planting,
shearing sheep, harvesting, threshing, and hauling
wood. They make time for fun, too: cosy evenings
of popcorn and apple cider by the fire, fishing,
berrying, Fourth-of-July celebrations, and
attending the County Fair.
Almanzo's relationship with his brother and sisters is often humorously told - there's big brother Royal, who wants to leave the farm and be a storekeeper, bossy Eliza Jane, who even tries to correct Mother, and sweet yet often tom-boyish Alice, who is Almanzo's playmate. Mother Wilder is always bustling; even when she sits to rest at the end of the day, her knitting needles are flashing. Father is stern yet quiet; he is a man respected by all, a shrewd businessman in the town of Malone and a successful stock raiser and planter.
Almanzo wants to be a farmer, and what he loves most of all is horses. Almanzo dreams of the day when he will be big enough to help Father train the young colts. In order to hurry his growing up, Almanzo eats. Oh, how Almanzo eats: ham, chicken, spareribs, potatoes and gravy, bread and butter and doughnuts and pie! And as the seasons pass, Almanzo learns that eating isn't the only way to grow up.
There is one surviving manuscript of Farmer
Boy. It includes stories not found in the
published book, including a description of the
starch factory in Burke, picking hops for a
neighbor, and the Wilder family's decision to move
west to Spring Valley, Minnesota. The manuscript
includes drawings of the layout of the Wilder
farm, including house plans of both barns and farmhouse.
