re: #119 A hollow voice says, Covfefe.

Actually, the author agreed to change it as soon as it was pointed out to her, because it was a stupid and wrong thing to have said.

Since she’s been dead for quite a while, I doubt she’ll be too troubled by the decision.

More from the same article. It really doesn’t sound accidental (and Harper’s did take twenty years to make a single-word change to her book):

Elsewhere in the book, Osage tribe members are sometimes depicted as animalistic, notes the critic Philip Heldrich: In one scene, Wilder describes them as wearing a “leather thong” with “the furry skin of a small animal” hanging down in front, making “harsh sounds” and having “bold and fierce” faces with “black eyes.” Although Laura’s father espouses a more tolerant view of Native Americans, his description of a “good Indian” is one who is “no common trash.”

The character who is Laura Ingalls’s mother, Caroline Ingalls, is not subtle in her hatred of the Native Americans, saying repeatedly she doesn’t like them, before she has even encountered them. As the critic Ann Romines wrote, “Indians become a code for everything that seems to threaten the settled, white life she wants for her daughters.”

In addition, in another scene, Wilder depicts white men wearing blackface for the entertainment of others — including her father.