Sgt. Saunders
06-15-2023, 07:23 AM
Whenever I see an episode of LHOTP, it amazes me to see Charles “Pa” Ingalls, walking around Walnut Grove with his perfectly coiffed head of hair as he toils, seemingly endlessly, at Mr. Hanson’s lumber mill or out plowing the fields on the Ingalls’ family farm.
The guy always looks like he just came out of Hollywood’s most exclusive hair salon. In fact, Allison Arngrim, who portrayed the “slightly” devious Nellie Olesen on LHOTP, once joked that the beloved shows cast members thought that good, old “Pa” Ingalls looked like he somehow got a $300.00 haircut in Walnut Grove.
Okay, I understand that the late Michael Landon had a great head of hair. While Mr. Landon’s three fellow actors on “Bonanza” were each fighting an ultimately losing battle with male pattern baldness, Michael Landon (as the irrepressible, youngest Cartwright brother, “Little” Joe) had that thick head of
dark hair we all saw on Sunday nights for many years.
However, I’ve always thought that Charles Ingalls’s mop of hair was just TOO much. Most of the other men in Walnut Grove wore their hair in a relatively short style. And, the kindly Nels Olesen and the
saintly Reverend Robert Alden, two men who were also sadly afflicted with the “male curse,” must
have resented a forty-something local farmer, who looked like singer Adam Durnitz of the Counting
Crows with hair that was even longer and more lustrous than Ma Caroline Ingalls and the Ingalls
daughters.
Heck, even the all-too-annoying Albert Ingalls would occasionally get a hair cut and look neat and presentable. You would think that when “Pa” Ingalls started to go grey, he would have adopted a more
conservative hair style as a grandpa, but, NO, Charles Ingalls still looked like he was a pathetic, old
Woodstock hippie, trying to desperately cling on to his faded youth from the halcyon days of 1969!
Jesus, even in Michael Landon’s last, short-lived television show, “Highway to Heaven,” he was still sporting that silly, “Pa” Ingalls coiffure as Angel Jonathan Smith. I guess Mr. Landon liked the long-
haired look ever since he portrayed troubled teen Tony Rivers in the 1957 horror film, “I Was a Teen
Age Werewolf”?
PS William Shatner, Howard Cosell, John Wayne and Steve Martin would have all killed for Michael Landon’s magnificent head of hair!
The guy always looks like he just came out of Hollywood’s most exclusive hair salon. In fact, Allison Arngrim, who portrayed the “slightly” devious Nellie Olesen on LHOTP, once joked that the beloved shows cast members thought that good, old “Pa” Ingalls looked like he somehow got a $300.00 haircut in Walnut Grove.
Okay, I understand that the late Michael Landon had a great head of hair. While Mr. Landon’s three fellow actors on “Bonanza” were each fighting an ultimately losing battle with male pattern baldness, Michael Landon (as the irrepressible, youngest Cartwright brother, “Little” Joe) had that thick head of
dark hair we all saw on Sunday nights for many years.
However, I’ve always thought that Charles Ingalls’s mop of hair was just TOO much. Most of the other men in Walnut Grove wore their hair in a relatively short style. And, the kindly Nels Olesen and the
saintly Reverend Robert Alden, two men who were also sadly afflicted with the “male curse,” must
have resented a forty-something local farmer, who looked like singer Adam Durnitz of the Counting
Crows with hair that was even longer and more lustrous than Ma Caroline Ingalls and the Ingalls
daughters.
Heck, even the all-too-annoying Albert Ingalls would occasionally get a hair cut and look neat and presentable. You would think that when “Pa” Ingalls started to go grey, he would have adopted a more
conservative hair style as a grandpa, but, NO, Charles Ingalls still looked like he was a pathetic, old
Woodstock hippie, trying to desperately cling on to his faded youth from the halcyon days of 1969!
Jesus, even in Michael Landon’s last, short-lived television show, “Highway to Heaven,” he was still sporting that silly, “Pa” Ingalls coiffure as Angel Jonathan Smith. I guess Mr. Landon liked the long-
haired look ever since he portrayed troubled teen Tony Rivers in the 1957 horror film, “I Was a Teen
Age Werewolf”?
PS William Shatner, Howard Cosell, John Wayne and Steve Martin would have all killed for Michael Landon’s magnificent head of hair!