Trek to the Stars:

Last Updated: April 12, 1998.

Albert and Charles head to the university where Albert plans to attend and become a doctor. Albert really enjoys the campaus and really wants to be accepted. Charles not sure how he'll pay for it, is glad to hear that Albert may be elgible for a scholarship. Albert had been getting a lot of nose bleeds and eventually collapses. Charles takes him to a hospital where they learn Albert is really sick and that out he has a blood disorder that there is no cure for, luekemia.  It was said that it was only a matter of time before he was gone, and he decided he wants to spend the remainder of his days back home, in Walnut Grove. Railway unions and the Co-op are fighting again, and Charles, as head of the Minnesota division, uses Walnut Grove as his headquarters as he convinces neighbouring towns to form their own union. The talks fail, especially in Walnut Grove, until Albert, sick and heavy with pain, gets up and speaks. The townspeople realize the strength of sticking together and decide to go ahead with a deal that Charles had set up with a freighting company.  Albert finds out that the school still does their annual trip to the time capsule set at the top of a mountain, and together with Laura, climb the mountain where the children add some seeds to the capsule to commerate the Co-op success. The episode closes with the children, Laura, and Albert holding hands praying for their town.

• There has been many arguements over whether Albert dies or not at the end of this episode, but the fact is that the people behind this episode INTENDED for it to be concluded that he dies soon after. Considering the fact that Pa says in one scene that Albert cannot come back to the town meeting when he's a man 10 years later because he won't live that long, there is no other conclusion that they intend to be made from this. If however, they make a sequel to this series and have Albert still alive and explain that he survived, then we can conclude differently. Still though, if we consider the times that they lived in, there would be no cure to his ailment. The only thing they could say that helped him recover would be God. Remember that in the 2nd part of "He Was Only Twelve", God healed James.
  Contributed by HYPER, July 1, 1997.

• The fate of Albert is one of the series' most talked about subjects. Having seen this episode many times, it is very plain and clear (at least to this writer) that Albert never died in "Look Back To Yesterday". In fact, he is still living in the very last scene where he makes it to the top of the mountain. There are still people who say Albert died. If he did, then maybe the producers should have shot an epilogue deplicting his death. But since that never happened, one must assume that Albert was miracuously cured by either God or Mr. Montague, gone on to medical school to seek his Masters' degree, and returned to the town as Laura said in "Home Again", either before or after Walnut Grove was destroyed in "The Last Farewell", though in my Timeline I have Albert returning home before the town's destruction. Whatever his fate might have been, one thing is for sure..."Look Back To Yesterday" is the final time we see Albert in the series.
  Contributed by Hiphats, July 7, 1997.

• In this episode, we once again see Melinda (remember the girl who was locked in the freezer in "The Reincarnation Of Nellie"?)...only now her name is Michelle (it is the same actress). Looks like either her parents died and someone else adopted her or she changed her name in secret!
  Contributed by Hiphats, July 10, 1997.
  Correction: Sorry to nitpick, but I believe her name was "Belinda", not Melinda.
  Contributed by D. Wright, October 14, 1997.

• In a scene from "Look Back To Yesterday", Laura is telling Almonzo about an incident of old. She says Albert, me, and a boy named Andy Garvey.... Why did she say this? Almonzo knew who Andy Garvey was! They knew each other.
  Contributed by James M, October 13, 1997.

• I never could understand why the other children weren't more INSISTENT when getting blamed for something Nancy did. I've never known a child to not want to insust on getting it right if blamed for something he or she didn't do! She got away with it way too long!
  Contributed by Cyndi, November 9, 1997.

• I saw no reference to whether Albert died or remained living, and I didn't hear Laura say that he returned and became a doctor.
  Contributed by Catherine, December 25, 1997.
• ADDITIONAL: Laura explains in the epilog of "Home Again" that Albert did recover from his addiction to morphine, and that he returned to Walnut Grove and became the best doctor they ever had. This is the problem: Did Albert die in this episode, or did he survive, and if he did survive, when does he come back to be the doctor? Walnut Grove is destroyed in "The Final Farewell."
  Contributed by Alex Trenta, February 21, 1998.

• When Albert goes to the school, he is glad to hear that the school does their annual field trip of climbing to the top of the mountain and add to the time capsule waiting there. Later, Laura decides to join the class with Albert as they make their trip. She comments to Albert that this is a lot more work than the last time she climbed it, when they were both kids. Didn't she ever take the class on this field trip when she was the teacher?
  Contributed by Alex Trenta, April 12, 1998.

Add your nitpick to this episode!

When a women loses her baby she kidnaps Rose and pretends Rose is hers.   Almonzo, Laura and Mr.Edwards set out on a long search that ends with a happy ending:  The Wilders get Rose back, and they leave another orphan they discovered along the way with a women.

• Michael Landon says in the beginning "It was the winter of '96"... If that was so, Rose (Laura and Almanzo's daughter)would be 10 years old.
  Contributed by Janet S, September 8, 1997.

Add your nitpick to this episode!

204. THE LAST FAREWELL February 2, 1984

The town discover that the town of Walnut Grove, and the surrounding farms were not built on homestead land, but built on land that the government owned, and later sold to a developer. The developer, seeing that Walnut Grove was a prosperous town, told the townspeople they could remain on the land but be working for him or leave.  The town, angry that the town they built with their own sweat and love, was no longer theirs, decided the developer could have the land (which he owned) but not the town (which they owned). They decided to take what was theirs, and destroy the rest.  The townspeople blew up the town and houses with dynamite.  When the developer returned to claim the town, along with several mayors from other towns that he now owned, he was shocked as his plans of owning a prosperous town and businesses were now destroyed and there was nothing he could do (it was perfectly legal to destroy their own buildings). Compounded to this, the mayors of the other towns stated that if the developer tried to take over their towns, the same thing would happen there. The people of the late Walnut Grove cheered as the realized that Walnut Grove did not die in vain.

• In the episode, HOME AGAIN, a 2 hour special in which Albert was a morphine addict, Laura's voiceover said something about him one day becoming the best doctor in Walnut Grove (assuming he went to med school and returned as the town dr.). However, in this film they blew up the town and all moved away. This is besides the 2 hour special in which Albert had contracted a terminal illness!!
  Contributed by Nathan, May 30, 1997.

• One more thing about Albert's absence...since his death was never deplicted or mentioned in the series or post-series movies, it could be one of two things...either Albert came back as a doctor before the events in "The Last Farewell", or after, in which case he went on to medical school to seek his Masters degree, then returned to a ruined Walnut Grove years later (after "The Last Farewell") as a doctor and possibly helped rebuild the town.
  Contributed by Hiphats, June 29, 1997. Corrected June 30, 1997.

• Face it, producers of movies make errors. They meant Albert to die--that's pretty obvious. They aren't God, and not everything they do has to be totally consistent--hence the existence of the nitpick pages in the first place.
  Contributed by Rachel G, August 17, 1997.

• Either I was seeing things or I was going nuts. When I first saw The Last Farewell on its original release date, I could have sworn I saw Charles Ingalls and the most recent owner of the little House blow it up together. Then when I wacthed the replay of it the house was the only surviving house in Walnut Grove. I'm confused, what really happend here. Please let me know before I go bonkers.
  Contributed by Mark H, October 9, 1997.
• ANSWER:  The following buildings were not blown up in The Last Farewell (according to someone who worked on the show):  The Ingalls/Carter Home; The Ingalls/Carter Barn; The Church/Schoolhouse. A cast member owns the Ingalls house, and the other buildings are still standing on the land.
  Contributed by Jennifer Slegg, December 24, 1997.

• I'm a little confused about something that was said in The Last Farewell. Charles tells the guy sitting in the wagon with them that Carolyn hasn't been to Walnut Grove in 3 years. But when they get to Lauras house, and we see Rose, she definitly isn't over 3 years old. She looks more like 2 to me. But she was born when Almonzo had his stroke, and Carolyn and Charles were still living in Walnut grove. So they moved after she was born. So how old was Rose when they came back to blow up the town?
  Contributed by Donna, December 13, 1997.

• Why didn't they blow up the Ingalls's previous house? That I thought would be the last house blown up, but it never was.
  Asked by Catherine, December 25, 1997.

• In this episode Laura and Almonzo blow up their home. It is the same home Almanzo and Eliza Jane lived in when she was the school teacher of Walnut Grove. However, that original house was blown away in a storm. There was an episode right after the storm, where Charles and Almanzo build Laura their own "Little House" to replace the one blown away in the storm. How could the house still be standing in the last episode?
  Asked by Wanda L, December 25, 1997.
• ANSWER: Actually, Laura and Almonzo lived in three different houses after they were married. Their first home, the house the Eliza Jane gave them, did blow down in "Days of Sunshine, Days of Shadow." At the end of that episode, Charles and Almonzo build a "Little House" and Laura was happy to just have a new home. In "Times are Changing" Almonzo expands the house and adds a couple of new rooms for Jenny and Rose. In the episode "May I have this Dance" Laura and Almozno inherit the larger home which they turn into a boarding house. Its this house that we see them blow up at the end of "The Last Farwell."
  Answered by Alex Trenta, February 21, 1998.

• Okay, I hope I'm in the right episode here... Anyway, why is Walnut Grove all of a sudden on the Mesabi Iron range? They are one compleatly different sides of the state! Unless that range is a lot longer than I thought, I think they made a mistake.
  Contributed by The Watland's, December 27, 1997.

• Did anyone else notice Laura's nose job in the last season? It bothers me so much that I can hardly watch the latest episodes. I can't believe they let her do that. By the way, has anyone out there been to Mansfield? Is it worth the trip?
  Contributed by Kelvin, December 27, 1997.

• Real story about Walnut Grove: Town's location was moved but not because it was blown up....the river flooded. The new site of the town is about two miles from the original site.
  Contributed by Shorty 18, February 14, 1998.

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Trek to Stars  Little House Nitpickers Guild

Last Updated: April 12, 1998.

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