Albert Ingalls
The Beginning;
August 31, 1868, Pierre Orphanage, Dakota Territory. Miriam Jackson heard a babies cry, she walked out the door that evening and saw a newborn baby, wrapped in a blanket. The umbilical cord had been cut and thread used to close it and a diaper was made with a towel. Pinned loosely, the poor baby was soaked in urine.
"Some folks haven't the sense God gave a goat! Well come on sweetheart. I'll get you inside and get you into a dry diaper and feed you."
Miriam was angry that another poor babe had been abandoned by a parent who didn't want the responsibility of raising a child. She took the baby into the nursery and unpinned the diaper. It was a boy. She put some warm water into a wash pan and gave the baby a bath. Then she fed the starving infant, who had not been fed at all. Then after he fell asleep, Miriam went to the director and told him about their new arrival. After looking at the sleeping infant, who had a head full of dark black hair, he told her.
"Put down a name, Albert James, Date of birth, August 31, 1868, he looks about two hours old so put the time as seven PM and weight six pounds, three ounces, tiny little mite isn't he? Cute too. Father, unknown, Mother unknown."
He was put into a crib and fed and rocked and burped and changed and bathed, he was held, but since he was one in twenty babies, he was not loved much.
Unbeknown, Albert's parents were named Jeremy and Frances Quinn, he was wanted but after the baby was born, without a doctor, an old woman named Hanna delivered him, Frances died, after taking one look at her new son.
"Isn't he beautiful Jeremy?"
That was all she said as she took her last breath. Jeremy was heartbroken and then became angry, he put a towel on the baby's bottom, pinned it and wrapped the baby in a blanket, He drove the newborn to the Pierre Orphanage and just left him on the steps. He had it in his head that the baby killed his mother and he didn't want him.
When Albert was five, a couple came to the orphanage and looked at him. They asked him to smile and then the director told them he didn't know who Albert's parents were.
"They could be dead, or deranged even."
"We don't want a crazy person in our family, we'll change our minds about this boy!"
The couple cruelly told them. Later on, Albert was put into a school, next to the orphanage and was teased mercilessly by the other boys, the school master whipped him and told him to stand up straight, to stop stuttering, to stop daydreaming. Albert was a handsome looking little boy, he had dark brown eyes and his hair was black. If he had known her, he would know that he looked like his mother. Albert was also a very smart little boy, always making straight A's in school.
But when he turned seven, he could take the teasing and the name calling no more. He ran away in the middle of the night. He hopped aboard a wagon that had stopped to water the horses and he rode to a town one hundred miles away called Winoka. He ate food from the back of the wagon, drank water from a barrel and went to the outhouse when the wagon stopped. Six days later, the wagon was in the town.
When he arrived, he began stealing food to eat and sleeping under the funeral home. He stole a shoe shining kit and went around the town shining shoes. He earned a nickel and dime and got enough money to buy food and some books, Albert loved to read. He was on his own for three years when one afternoon, he had just earned a dime from a rich man and he happily was putting it into his pocket, when two drunken men started a fight outside the saloon. They knocked the dime from his hand and it fell into a hole in the sidewalk.
"Dad burn it! Stupid darn dime!"
"Hi! I can help you get it back"
He looked up to see a girl in braids standing next to him. She had Albert take off his shoe lace and she took a piece of gum and after a while, the dime was pulled out of the hole. She handed the dime back and introduced herself to the boy.
"I'm Laura Ingalls, that's my sister Carrie in the wagon."
"Laura! I got to go really bad! Please hurry so I can get out and go to the outhouse!"
Little Carrie Ingalls, eight years old pleaded with her older sister, she had been in dire need to go for almost a half hour.
"My name's Albert."
"Albert what?"
"Albert"
A man with curly brown hair and brown eyes came out of The Dakota Hotel and told Laura to take Carrie inside to the water closet. She was taking her when Carries bladder just couldn't hold it anymore and she made a puddle on the sidewalk and Laura ran with her inside. Albert watched the family come in and out of the hotel, the man and a woman, that was obviously his wife, brown hair and blue eyes, and she took inside the hotel a baby girl about six months old with blond hair and blue eyes. He heard them call her Grace. They moved in their belongings.
After the family moved in, Albert would sneak over and watch the family do their work, Mr. Ingalls washed the windows, and did the maintenance and helped Mrs. Ingalls, who cooked and washed dishes for the guests. Laura would care for her younger sisters and he also found out there was another sister, an older one named Mary, she was blind and was at the blind school, she was becoming a teacher there. Albert really wanted to go to school, but there was only one school in Winoka and the families had to pay twenty dollars a months tuition.
One afternoon, Albert had earned enough money to buy another book, but since he could only read in the daytime, he decided to steal a lantern from the general store by telling the clerk.
"There's a fire at the saloon!"
Albert grabbed a lantern and took off right out the door, Charles Ingalls saw this and took off after him. He caught up with Albert at his hideout under the funeral home.
"Okay son! Come on out,"
"No sir! I'm not going to come out."
Charles crawled inside the hole and saw a blanket, a pillow and the lantern.
"This is my place, my name is Albert, they kept calling me a bastard at the home so I ran away"
"Young man! I don't like that name."
"I don't either."
"Say Albert, lets make ourselves a deal okay, you come on out, and I'll pay for the lantern, but you have to come to the Dakota Hotel and work for me for a while, you can earn enough money to buy food and books and clothes and some things. Meanwhile, come on over to the hotel around six o clock. My oldest daughter's birthday is today and we're giving her a party, some cake and a glass of milk, doesn't that sound fine?"
"Okay sir, I'll come."
That evening, after Charles paid for the lantern, Albert went inside the hotel and met the family face to face, along with some neighbors that had followed them from their little town of Walnut Grove Minnesota. There was the Garvey family. Jonathan, the father, Alice the mother, and Andrew their son, he was ten also. Then the Oleson family, the father Nels, the mother Harriet, a daughter Nellie, and a son named Willie who was also ten.
After Mary read a letter that Laura had specially written in the Braille printer, the entire roomful of people were in tears, it was a lovely letter. Caroline handed Charles his fiddle and he played a song and the entire roomful of people clapped to the rhythm of the music. Then Charles introduced Albert to the families. They ate cake and drank milk. Then Charles told Albert to just walk on upstairs and he would let him share a room with them.
As time went on, Alice Garvey began teaching the poorer children in a barn. Albert was excited and attended every day. He also stayed with the Ingalls family while sweeping and mopping and waiting tables at the hotel. He loved Mrs. Ingalls and talked to her as she cooked sometimes, or helped mind Grace on the weekends. After the families lived there about a month, they decided that this town was not a decent place to rear a child. One afternoon proved this. They were finishing dinner, as they called their midday meal.
They were having homemade apple pie, Carrie had an extra large piece on her fork, it fell onto the table before it got into her mouth.
"Oh DAMNIT!"
Charles angrily scolded her, the eight year old child's eyes filled with tears of remorse and she sobbed
"I'm sorry Pa!"
"She just repeats what she hears Pa, we hear that all day and all night from the saloon."
Laura told him. Charles apologized to Carrie, telling her if she ever heard a word that she didn't know, to just not say it. That evening, Charles and Caroline were once again, trying to settle down the baby for the night and sleep themselves as the drunken patrons of the saloon next door were yelling and shooting off guns and cursing as the piano loudly played dancing music. It was after eleven PM and Caroline had to rise at four AM to begin her day of cooking and the children also had to go to school.
Caroline! I cannot stand this any longer. I don't know about the Garvey' s or Oleson' s, but tomorrow, I'm telling Mr. Standish we're leaving ."
"Oh Charles! I'm so happy."
Caroline happily told him. The next day, Charles talked to Nels and Jonathan, they both agreed they could make it back in Walnut Grove, so they all packed their bags. Meanwhile, Albert was completely heartbroken. He went back to his hole in the funeral homes underground and began crying. Then someone crawled inside, It was Charles Ingalls.
"Albert, I thought you wanted to come along, wouldn't you like to go with us to Walnut Grove? I know Laura and Carrie and Grace and Caroline would enjoy your company and I always wanted a son like you. The girls love you and little Grace smiles and coos every time you hold her, Carrie is even telling everyone that you're her big brother. Come on son. I love you too and you're coming with us okay?"
Albert wiped his eyes with his sleeve and Charles gave him a handkerchief and he blew his nose, he packed his clothes in a pillow case and happily got into the wagon, right beside Laura and Carrie, with Grace in her cradle near them. Three days later the children were awaken by Caroline happily saying.
"Children! We're HOME!"
They jumped down and helped Pa and Ma carry the furniture inside. Charles told Laura that Carrie was moving upstairs into the loft and they were going to put a curtain between Albert's side and the girls side. After re opening the town, The families started church services again, their regular pastor Reverend Alden got the message and he returned to Walnut Grove. Charles and Jonathan re started the mill again and Alice Garvey opened the school and began teaching, since Eva Simms, the beloved teacher that had been there for over ten years left with her husband Adam, her newly adopted son Luke and their infant son Matthew.
Charles registered Albert there as Albert James Ingalls. About a year later. Albert began having nightmares about his early childhood, the children had gotten a new teacher, Miss Eliza Jane Wilder, her brother Almanzo was also a new member of the town. She had given an assignment to the children to draw a family tree. By that time Mary had married Adam Kendall, a young man that was also a teacher for blind children, he was also blind, but a a result of an accident he had at the age of twelve.
Nellie Oleson, who was then sixteen teased Albert, Laura became angry at Nellie and told her to leave Albert alone. That evening, after Albert witnessed a friend being beaten by his father after he didn't come home right away after school and went fishing with Albert. He told the Ingalls family that this frightened him and told them about the beating he received from the school master. Charles and Caroline took Albert to Sleepy Eye the next day and talked to a lawyer. They were in the procedure of adopting him.
About a week later, a letter came from the town informing them that Albert's biological father was trying to get him back. He needed a helping hand at his farm and thought that his son was old enough to earn a living. Heartbroken, Charles and Caroline were going to take him back to be reunited with the man. That night, Albert tearfully told Laura and Carrie
"No matter what anyone says, no matter what Nellie Oleson says. I'm always going to be your brother, and you're my sisters and Ma and Pa and Grace and Mary are my family."
The next morning, Pa drove to Sleepy Eye with Albert, they went inside the courthouse and the lawyer told Albert to go upstairs that his father was up there. As Albert walked up the stairs, he went inside the courtroom, tears filling his eyes, then he saw a burly looking man. The man turned, his eyes looked mean, Albert pretended he was blind. Jeremy Quinn told the boy he could stay with the Ingalls family and walked out. Charles signed the adoption papers and the two of them happily went back to Walnut Grove and forever he was known as Albert James Ingalls.