Masked men to morphine addiction: The original TV Little House on the Prairie was a true American horror story

A Netflix spin on the classic children's books is about to launch. It remains to be seen how it compares to the 1970s adaptation – which is much darker and grimmer than most remember. When it comes to TV credits sequences, few evoke as much nostalgia as that for Little House On The Prairie, the 1970s series about family life on the American frontier in the 19th Century. "This song reminds of the good old days...carefree and unburdened," says one fan, commenting under a video clip of the NBC series intro on YouTube that has currently been viewed 1.6 million times. Someone else notes: "They simply do not make television like this anymore. It is real, it is wholesome." But the show's famous introduction gives a false impression of the show – as in fact it was much much darker than it is commonly remembered to be. Warning: This article contains details that some might find upsetting. Based on the much-loved semi-autobiographical 1930s children's book series of the same name by Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little House on the Prairie ended up becoming a genuine TV phenomenon. Centring on the lives of the Ingalls family – father Charles, mother Caroline and their four daughters Mary, Laura, Car