"TROUBLEMAKER"

The school board of Walnut Grove hires a new school teacher when Ms. Beadle is unable to control some of her students. The new teacher, Hannibal Applewood, has a bad temper. Mr. Applewood dislikes Laura from the start and punishes her unfairly. When Charles finds out how Mr. Applewood was behaving, a school board meeting was called. They decided to let Ms. Beadle teach again. The children worked together to make sure that the "Troublemaker" didn't misbehave anymore.



I like this episode. Poor Laura… she really got it bad with that teacher. I really really liked Charles grabbing him by the coat at the end and breaking his stick! :idance: lol

One thing that bugged me about the big guys in this episode is that they would say they were on Laura’s side but when it came for Mr. Applewood to punish someone, they didn’t say anything to defend her or stop him from punishing her! Good grief, they were bigger than Laura and I’m sure they could handle being hit with a ruler more than Laura.

Rhonda wrote:

Carol, is this the one with the cow that had the birthday??? :Hahaha:

Why yes... it is. lol :happybday:



I gotta say, the reason I thought he really had said that was because I thought he was being a smart alec with the teacher. So, I focused on his attitude and heard: "The reason why I was late, was because it was one of our cow's birthday"

But then after laughter exploded from my comment, I realized my mistake. LOL

THAT was one of the very best board moments, EVER, though, Carol! And you started it all.

Yes, after all the other comments, that thread was 'the thread of the day'

Another thing that cracks me up is the scene at the beginning (see pic number 1 above) where the kids are talking about who's fault it is that Ms. Beadle is leaving. Well Nellie says it was Laura's fault and the conversation goes like this:

Mary: "You say that one more time and I'll slap your face"

Nellie: "You try it and I'll pull your hair out by the roots"

They are so serious when they say those things and look so ticked off it is funny!

One of the LHOTP's characters I dislike the more , is Hannibal Applewood. He is so bad tempered ! I'm not a so "modern" teacher, but this one drives me nuts, really! Poor Laura! I was more than happy when Charles brokes his punishment's stick.

Hannibal Applewood is showed more as a lunatic than as a disciplinary...In my modest way of analyze things he was almost a crazy man. In any case, he was NOT normal...

Vanesa.

I agree with you, Vanesa! I was SO glad when Charles broke that stick. Applewood was just against Laura from the beginning, all because of that Nellie Olson, too! To me a teacher should get to the bottom of what ever is going on, then punish the child who did it. Even though I think 'switches' have there place, I think the parents need to do it, not some irate teacher, who the parents havn't even met.

That boy actually says "The reason I was late is because one of our cows was birthing"

Not having a birthday LOL

RoseRed wrote:

That boy actually says "The reason I was late is because one of our cows was birthing"

Not having a birthday LOL

LOL! Yeah, Carol figured that out after listening to it again. But thanks to Carol's wonderful sense of humor, it gave us all a huge laugh.

Thank god i never had a teacher like that in school....well i never had one but in my middle school i went to there was this one teacher everybody thought he ws mean cuz he would yell a lot.. or mybe it was cuz kids were not behaving at all....


but wow that teacher was soo mean! I mean it must of been hard back then teaching all grades together with no help at all..

poor Laura, ot wasn't fair he blamed her for everything!!

I SO wanted Charles to punch Mr Applewood when he grabbed him outside the school door! Or at the very least break the stick over Applewood's head! I'm not a violent person! Honest! But if I ever thought MY kids had a teacher like that you'd have to hold me down! Poor Laura. I felt so sorry for her in this episode.

I remember Applewood goes a little crazy at the end... sorta like the badguy in a criminal intent episode.

I felt bad that the new teacher took the immediate disliking towards Laura. I hate when teachers do that. i was really glad to see Miss Beadle come back at the end

oh my what a hard one to watch ....Poor Laura thats so abusive .....watching Mrs Olsen bad mouthing her at her dinner for Applewood was hateful ....Charles face while Mr applewood lost it in meeting with school council was brilliant ...the look of wow we got a nutter here ...
Applewood was lucky Ma knew Pa's temper it save him wearing that stick i think

Interesting that one of the troublemakers comes back to actually get engaged to the teacher of that schoolhouse many years later. (Same actor, different character.)

David, which characters are you referring to?

The guy who would play the part of Etta Plum's fiancee years later.
Wasn't he in "Troublemaker"?

I think you're right, David.

Ho Hum I don't like this one. Poor Laura, getting singled out and much of it because of Mrs Oleson!

Teresa wrote:

I think you're right, David.

Yes, he is. The actor is named Cooper Huckabee and plays the true "troublemaker" in this episode. His name in it was Herman Stone. Later, he played Etta Plum's fiancée. I don't remember his name there, if he had one...

Vanesa.

^ According to IMDb he was in "Look Back to Yesterday" and was Vance Reed. I don't recall him, but I think I've only seen that movie twice.


My mother and I always like to figure out what Michael Landon's message was in each episode.
I had to pause this episode partway through and I asked my mother what she thought Michael was trying to teach. The only thing we could think of was that he was against teachers being able to punish their students.

Later I finished watching the episode and Charles mentions that the parents and teacher need to work together. "Hey! That's the lesson!"


I was amused by Herman's smirking when Mr. Applewood was punishing him.

did not care for this one too much.

Poor girl...That teacher was just too mean. how dare he act like that. I want him to smack him too. Glad he got fired.

One thing I do not like about this one is that the students really were making a lot of trouble, and especially how they all joined in laughing, for example, when Mr. Applewood stuck his hand in the ink. Laura was laughing hard like all the students. I know he had it coming, but honestly I did not feel like the students gave him a chance at the start any more than he gave them a chance. But he was extremely unfair to Laura. At least Laura was not laughing after Willie knocked over the bag. But I do feel she would have been laughing along with the rest of them if it weren't for the fact that she probably figured she would be blamed for it.

I think Mr. Applewood was mentally unstable, and in a way, I feel sorry for him. Not probably a popular opinion on here, but I feel like there was really something kind of wrong with him. I think he picked on Laura because he was jealous that she had been a favorite with Ms. Beadle. Perhaps he realized that he was not the kind of teacher that could instill such love into his students. And then I think he continued to pick on her because he was actually afraid of the bigger boys, although he would not admit it.

But I think I would have been happier to be expelled than to have to have that man as my teacher, whether or not I feel sorry for him.

I think I would have liked this episode better if Mr. Applewood and/or Herman really had a turning point and really "repented" of their behavior. Even though Herman apologized to Ms. Beadle, I don't know that he really was sorry for his behavior. He just changed out of peer pressure. Maybe that is a good enough motivation for real change?

amyk wrote:

One thing I do not like about this one is that the students really were making a lot of trouble, and especially how they all joined in laughing, for example, when Mr. Applewood stuck his hand in the ink. Laura was laughing hard like all the students. I know he had it coming, but honestly I did not feel like the students gave him a chance at the start any more than he gave them a chance. But he was extremely unfair to Laura. At least Laura was not laughing after Willie knocked over the bag. But I do feel she would have been laughing along with the rest of them if it weren't for the fact that she probably figured she would be blamed for it.

I think Mr. Applewood was mentally unstable, and in a way, I feel sorry for him. Not probably a popular opinion on here, but I feel like there was really something kind of wrong with him. I think he picked on Laura because he was jealous that she had been a favorite with Ms. Beadle. Perhaps he realized that he was not the kind of teacher that could instill such love into his students. And then I think he continued to pick on her because he was actually afraid of the bigger boys, although he would not admit it.

But I think I would have been happier to be expelled than to have to have that man as my teacher, whether or not I feel sorry for him.

I think I would have liked this episode better if Mr. Applewood and/or Herman really had a turning point and really "repented" of their behavior. Even though Herman apologized to Ms. Beadle, I don't know that he really was sorry for his behavior. He just changed out of peer pressure. Maybe that is a good enough motivation for real change?

Well, Amyk. We tend to share opinions! I think exactly the same.

Mr. Applewod WAS nuts and had some major mental issue, but it is also real that big boys, and specially Hermann, WERE misbehaving. As for Laura, Mr. Applewod REALLY believed she was wicked and false. Mrs. Oleson said that she was Miss Beadle's pet and the man was convinced of it. Plus, the big boy seemed to like Laura too much, and he could have thought that they were scheming something together against him.

The Laura-Applewood thing was a giant misunderstanding.

As for punishing pupils, most of people doesn't know that it was common back then that when big boys would return to school after harvest season, they used to cause trouble at school. Some of them even boasted of "running the teacher away". Their parents supported them in that. Big boys were bot fun, and sometimes they gave very violent trashings to teachers when they were thinner and weakest than them. If you read "Farmer Boys", you'll know the story of a teacher who was KILLED by his big pupils. They gave a so big trashing to him that he died some days later because he had s much injures. It was a sad situation. That's why some teachers would be s rude with their big pupils.

Vanesa.