LITTLE HOUSE’s Almanzo Details Life on the PRAIRIE and Beyond

Published: June 26, 2024

LITTLE HOUSE’s Almanzo Details Life on the PRAIRIE and Beyond

By Movieguide® Contributor

Dean Butler, who played Almanzo in LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE, released a memoir recently about his time on the show called “Prairie Man: My Little House Life and Beyond.”

In the book, he tries to share his point of view while on the show, leaving out petty secrets or disappointments related to events or cast members.

“I wanted to be honest about what my life was, and particularly where LITTLE HOUSE was concerned, because so much has been said about it, so much has been written about it,” he recently told PEOPLE. “It’s an iconic program. LITTLE HOUSE is a part of people’s lives, and it has been for a long time.”

“Even when something may not feel great in the moment, or the initial memory of it isn’t perhaps great in the moment, in the context of things, I feel like there’s mostly good,” he says. “I feel very fortunate. There are things that maybe weren’t what they could have been or what we’d hoped they’d be, and I’ve tried to share those moments with a balance.”

Butler found his love for theater when he was a high school sophomore.

“You become part of something that’s bigger than you in that moment, and you’re all contributing to it,” he recalled. “That really lit me up and started me down this path.”

His role as Laura Ingalls’ love interest brought him a lot of fame and female attention.

“I think what’s really beautiful is so many of these women walk up to me with their husbands and children in tow and will tell me that I’m their first crush, and their husband is standing there just like, ‘Okay,’” he laughed, “I always say to husbands. ‘Thank you for being such a good sport.’”

“I want them to feel like they’re dealing with the real thing that they liked, admired, fell in love with, enjoyed, laughed with, you know, whatever I brought to them [back then], I want them to feel like they’re getting something that’s authentic,” Butler said.

When it came time to do his first screen kiss with his co-star, Melissa Gilbert, he took it seriously. He was in his 20s, and Gilbert, 15, had never kissed anyone in her life. He had some nervousness about how to approach it.

“I think that there was anxiety on both sides of that kiss and how is this going to go? But we stepped up to it,” he said in another interview.

“It was an important moment for the show. It was a big moment in her life as a young actress. It was a big moment for me, as someone who is going to be now cemented into this,” Butler explained to PEOPLE. “This had to be a very pure, equal kiss. You watch the kiss and it’s a very chaste, sweet, simple little kiss.”

“When I look at the kiss now, I think, ‘Oh, God, you were so geeky in this,’ ” he laughs. “It’s like, ‘What are you doing?’ This is the most uncool thing in the world, but what it is it may not be cool, but it’s very sweet.”

The actor feels blessed to have been a part of the show and is proud of its positive impact on its viewers.

“If I’ve been able to be a part of that idyllic moment, that’s something that honors me forever,” he says. “I am blown away by that. I’m touched by it. I am humbled by it. It’s special for me to feel like so many people have been positively impacted by a piece of work that I did. It is very important to me to do it well.”

Though his other performances have left their mark on his life, LITTLE HOUSE takes the cake.

He wrote in his book, “I’m honored to support the LITTLE HOUSE legacy. I’m honored to affirm the timeless appeal of the series, the genius of Michael Landon, my immediate and extended LITTLE HOUSE family, and, of course, the brilliance of Laura Ingalls Wilder. There has been other work of which I’m proud, but LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE is my place in television.”

Movieguide® reported on the show’s 50th anniversary in March:

“When we did the show, we went, ‘Yeah, this is a really good show, Oh, it seems to be a hit, that’s nice.’ But the idea that 50 years later, people would still be excited about it, it’s absolutely mind-blowing,” Arngrim, who played Nellie Oleson, shared.

Grassle (who played Laura’s mother, Caroline) added, “People are finding values, comfort and a message that they long for, and I think, you know, it’s just simple human decency.”

Gilbert, who starred as Laura, called the anniversary “overwhelming,” as “so much of my childhood and so many wonderful experiences and emotional experiences attached to all of these people.”