<P> In 1997, TV Guide ranked the two - part episode "I'll Be Waving As You Drive Away" at 97 on its 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time list . </P> <P> A film adaptation of the pilot movie is currently underway at Paramount Pictures, with Sean Durkin as the director, Scott Rudin as the producer, and Abi Morgan as the screenwriter . </P> <P> Based on the autobiographical "Little House" stories, episodes of Little House on the Prairie usually concern members of the Ingalls family, who live on a small farm near the village of Walnut Grove, Minnesota . Many episodes concern the maturation of the family's second daughter, Laura . However, episodes also focus on other family and community members, providing a depiction of life in a small agrarian community in late nineteenth - century America . The show's central characters are Charles Ingalls (farmer and mill worker), his wife Caroline, and their four daughters, Mary, Laura, Carrie, and Grace, though the family expands with the addition of adopted son Albert in season five and adopted siblings Cassandra and James at the end of season seven . </P> <P> Other essential characters include the Oleson family: Nels, proprietor of the town's general store, Oleson's Mercantile; his malicious, gossiping wife, Harriet, who runs the Mercantile with him; and their two children, Nellie and Willie, and later, their adopted daughter, Nancy; Isaiah Edwards, Grace Snider Edwards and their three adopted children; the Garvey family, Jonathan, Alice, and Andy; Rev. Robert Alden; Lars Hanson, the town's founder and proprietor of the town's mill; and Dr. Hiram Baker, the town's physician . Teacher - turned - lawyer Adam Kendall is introduced at the end of season four and later weds Mary Ingalls, and Almanzo Wilder is introduced in season six and later weds Laura Ingalls . </P>

When did little house on the prarie take place