Sarah Uthoff helped third-grade students learn what it would be like in the pioneer times with a Zoom session Tuesday, May 6, at Lisbon Library’s Heritage Hall.

Uthoff spoke about the life and times of Laura Ingalls Wilder on the prairie in her meeting with students at Lisbon Public Library.

Uthoff, in character as Laura, recounted the time Ma Ingalls patted the rump of a bear she confused as a cow, due to not being able to determine what the animal was due to the type of lantern used.

“Ma told me to slowly start walking to the house,” Uthoff said. “She then started running, picked me up and we were both dashing back to the house.”

Uthoff recounted one of the Christmas on the prairie, where one of the gifts Laura received was her own tin cup, a penny and a stick of candy and that was a wonderful Christmas.

The plights of farming, especially dealing with grasshopper infestations and the family having to relocate to farms that did not have those issues to have food as well as money to pay for their lost crops was another portion of the presentation.

She recounted Laura’s time living in a dug-out hut on the prairie – a home dug into the side of a hill. Dugouts weren’t good at keeping dirt, bugs and snakes out of homes, as they were essentially carving directly into a hill where many of those creatures called home.

Eventually, the Wilders would stay and work at a hotel for a year or so, where the responsibilities included feeding all the guests who came to the hotel.

Uthoff will be back to present an in-person presentation on the items in kitchens during settlement times during Lisbon’s Sauerkraut Days and 150th celebrations in August.