"EBENEZER SPRAGUE"

“EBENEZER SPRAGUE”


Charles and Hansen build a bank in Walnut Grove. The banker is Mr. Sprague, a cold and heartless man. Laura becomes friends with Mr. Sprague without knowing who he really was. Mr. Sprague believes that Charles sent Laura to him to try to persuade Mr. Sprague to give a loan to Mr. Ingalls. After Mr. Sprague accuses Laura of this, Charles pays him a visit. In the end, a box of books was donated to the school by Mr. Sprague.

One of my favorites.

I love the ending when Mr. Sprague shows Laura all the fish he's caught and says "Thanks to you" and than Laura shows him the book and says "Thanks to you". :CoolSign:

It's always been one of my favorites.

Mine too, for Laura's happiness and love for life, made Ebeneezer Sprague to change and to realize how wrong certains of his ideas were. For him, interest was all in this earth, and he even believed that Laura was faking friendship to him to have some advantages for Charles, who was wanting to have some kind of loan from the bank. Happily, he realized that it was not the case, for Laura didn¡t even know that her father was trying to get this loan and that Sprague was the bank director...

Vanesa.

One of my fave episodes, though doesn't your heart break for Laura when she's lying in bed crying because all she wanted was just to be Mr Sprague's friend. Pa to the rescue, as always!

This was so good! It was so sad when Mr. Sprague yelled at Laura when he thought Charles sent her to talk with him.

Beckie

I just can say that I hated Mr. Sprague from that very moment! But at the end, I liked him a lot, for he gave all these books to the children. :woohooo:

Vanesa.

Yeah, that was a miracle that he did that! :)

Beckie

It was a little predictable but still so sweet that you couldn´t help but smile as much as Laura did...

Yeah you're right. In tv there is usually a happy ending. If only life were really like that.

Beckie

Yeah if we all just lived in a little house on the prairie around Walnut Grove ::sigh:: Then we would have our happy ending

I Like this Episode

I just got through watching this one the other day, a very good episode indeed. It was good to see that Mr Sprague came around in the end.

this episode was alright, not one of my favorites. In a way Mr. Sprague was like the teacher in "Troublemaker" because he took an immediate disliking to Laura.

Wish i could catch a fish with a dough ball.......Aussie fish want shrimp lol

Vanesa wrote:

I just can say that I hated Mr. Sprague from that very moment! But at the end, I liked him a lot, for he gave all these books to the children. :woohooo:

Vanesa.

Same here, sort of...

I love the episode though.

indi wrote:

Wish i could catch a fish with a dough ball.......Aussie fish want shrimp lol

I use lures/soft plastics.

I like how this episode shows that people aren't always what they appear to be and that just because they seem grouchy doesn't necessarily mean that they are always grouchy and have no heart.


I love it when Harriet is going on and on about the upper class and Ebenezer goes, "Mrs. Oleson, I grew up on a farm and quite school after (insert age)."


Poor Laura when she found out who she was fishing with!

I did't like him..He was so darn mean..You just want to slap him silly..Glad in the end what he did was very nice.

I absolutely love this episode. I was sitting here crying my eyes out.....but not really so much for Laura as for Mr. Sprague. I agree with Pa that he was a man to be pitied. I was especially sobbing in the scene where he is all alone at his home. I think that what Pa explained to Laura was true about Mr. Sprague, i.e. that he did not want to feel any sorrow so he did not have anyone he loved, but he also would not feel any joy. I think he truly believed people would only be nice to him if they wanted something from him and that he had never experienced true friendship until Laura befriended him. Then when he learned who she was, I think he just assumed the worst because apparently he never had any real friends. That is what makes me feel so sad for him. I'm glad in the end he not only ends up with Laura as a friend, but even the whole Ingalls family.

This episode just has all the right LITTLE HOUSE elements for me.

It is sad that these days nobody would ever probably trust that an older guy like this could just be "best friends" with a little girl.

The actor who plays Mr. Sprague is really good. I too enjoy it when he tells off Mrs. Oleson.

And we got a lot of Jack in this one. That dog is so cute. But where was Jack when Mr. Sprague gave Laura a ride in the carriage? I think it was in a scene just after Jack had been there at the pond, but then when Laura got out of the carriage and started heading for home, Jack was nowhere in sight.

What you've said is so true, Amyk. It was touching to see Laura bringing some love and joy to Ebeneezer Sprague apparently cold heart.

And yes, a child could befriend an adult. Sometimes, children knows how to rech someone's heart much better than any adult. They are innocent, that's why children tends to solve problems in a simple way, unlike adults. Adults tends to make things harder than they really are because they reasons overmuch.

Vanesa.

I love how Laura is not put off by Mr. Sprague's gruffness when she first interacts with him and how she just keeps persisting to get him to try her doughballs.

I always feel like going fishing when I watch this episode!

Great episode. Great actor-Ebeneezer. The respnse he gave to Charles when he asks him over for dinner always makes me laugh. One of my favorite TV scenes. He says something like... "Mr. Ingalls, I have been feeding myself for many years now..." I haven't seen this in years, but it's coming on Hallmark Tuesday!

He has lots of good lines and he delivers them very well. I wish he were later in many more episodes. I think he is only in 1-2 more perhaps and then I don't know if we ever see him again. It would have been fun for him to be in more and for him to get to fluster Mrs. Oleson a lot.