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Celebrate some of the most iconic Asian actors from film and television, from [link=/name/nm1231899/]Priyanka Chopra Jonas[/link] to [link=/name/nm0702841]Ke Huy Quan[/link], plus many more.

Asian Icons of Film and Television

Celebrate some of the most iconic Asian actors from film and television, from <a class="ipc-md-link" href="/name/nm1231899/?ref_=tturv_eds_right-7_lk">Priyanka Chopra Jonas</a> to <a class="ipc-md-link" href="/name/nm0702841?ref_=tturv_eds_right-7_lk">Ke Huy Quan</a>, plus many more.

When the telephone comes to Walnut Grove, Mrs. Olesen is hired as the switchboard operator. The telephone company is unaware that Mrs. Olesen loves to gossip, and her new job will simply be another means to spread rumors about Walnut Grove's residents. One of the subscribers to the new Walnut Grove exchange is the Garveys. Alice places a call to her mother, in which she learns that her first husband (a hard-drinking, gambling outlaw named Harold) has just been released from prison for robbery. Alice - who has kept this fact from Jonathan - thinks this is a private conversation, but is unaware that Mrs. Olesen is listening in. Word quickly gets back to Jonathan Garvey, who demands an apology from Mrs. Olesen (she refuses, but an embarrassed Nels does before he reprimands his wife). Jonathan then goes home and gets an explanation from Alice; she didn't tell him about her first marriage because it was a mistake and thought it didn't matter, but Jonathan is angered even more because of this revelation. In the aftermath, Jonathan and Alice stop speaking to each other and Andrew becomes very upset. Jonathan decides to go on a delivery run with Charles to sort things out. After teaching Nellie a separate lesson about eavesdropping, Laura and Albert decide to teach Mrs. Olesen a real lesson about her behavior by working with town banker Bill Anderson to set up a phony stock tip. Mrs. Olesen acts on the tip and loses her share of the family's savings as a result; Nels refuses to sympathize with his wife, effectively telling her she has learned her lesson. Meanwhile, Charles and Jonathan stay with Alice's mother in Minneapolis and learn the whole story about Harold. They later meet up with Harold, who is working in a tavern and very disheveled after his (18) years in prison. Jonathan (who never tells Harold who he is) learns from Harold that Alice was the best thing he ever had but let her slip through his fingers through his wild, foolish living, and that the man who married Alice should consider himself very lucky. Jonathan realizes he needs to go home and make up with Alice ... and get rid of that darned ol' telephone.

"It's one thing to be poor. It's another thing to admit it."

Good ep on its own but not in context with the rest of the series

Johathan should not apologize to Alice. Apologies for what?

Today was the day that made history. The telephone comes to Walnut Grove! The switchboard is set up at Nellie&#39;s hotel where Harriet has become the self-appointed operator. So after causing a lineman to fall off the pole, the telephone system was all set up and fully operational...though the same can&#39;t be said for the operator. Now, the first local business to get a telephone system was the bank, courtesy of the town&#39;s new banker, Bill Anderson (he replaced Sprague who left in Season 3.) Doc Baker wants one too. Yep, this strange newfangled telephone contraption is spreading like wildfire... wildfire or cancer? You be the judge. Even the Garveys got one! Jonathan surprised Alice with a telephone all their own. He had some extra cash due to Smith Pharmeceutical stock and he decided to put it back into another prominent investment, on which Alice can call her mother in Minneapolis. The conversation started out pleasantly, until her mother mentioned someone named Harold...rattling Alice&#39;s nerves. So while Anderson and the Garveys used their new phones, Harriet delighted in listening in on their conversations. A gossip such as herself could really use this telephone invention to her advantage. And brother, as soon as the fat bitch heard about Harold, she blabbed to Nellie who blabbed to Andrew who told his Pa, who thought it a filthy lie...until he confronted Alice. Harold was her ex. Jonathan never knew. So while the Garveys&#39; marriage hangs in the balance, Albert comes up with a brilliant scheme to get back at Harriet for eavesdropping. He and Laura have Anderson call his bookie in Mankato and gives him a faux stock tip regarding Smith Pharmecuticals. It was destined to reach sky high. Harriet fell for it like a ton of bricks. She emptied the cash from her stash box and rode like the wind to Mankato; meanwhile in Northville, after Charles and Jonathan delivered an order, the Garvey patriarch wanted to have a talk with Alice&#39;s mother and Minneapolis wasn&#39;t too far off so they head over and have a sit down with the old lady. She described Harold as a gambling drunk, yet she still thought the world of him, apparently. Way to rub salt in Jonathan&#39;s open wounds, Ma; Following supper, Jonathan ventured out to where Harold was said to be working: The Good Times Saloon. Sure enough, Harold tended bar. He accepted an invite from Jonathan to drink with him, and they got to talking. Seems Harold was a decent guy who had gambling problems, fell in with a bad crowd and did 18 years for bank robbery. He lost Alice through his dishonesty. Through it all, Jonathan learned just how lucky he was to have Alice and thus gave him a whole new perspective. So back in Walnut Grove, as Harriet pouts over all the money she foolishly lost, Jonathan went home and admitted he was wrong, and Alice...well, she forgave him, and they both promised never to talk on a telephone again. Oh, the dangers of gossip. It was very gratifying in the end to see Nels get the last laugh on Harriet. But sadly, this was not the last Harriet would abuse her telephone operator privileges. She would continue to listen in on calls, as would Nellie, and later on, so would Nancy. Just goes to show what can happen if the telephone is in the wrong hands. Well, terrific episode. Merlin Olsen, Hersha Parady, Richard Bull and Katherine MacGregor were all superb, and the latter really adds to my reason for loving to hate Harriet. And Royal Dano did his cameo justice. He would come back in Season 7 as Sylvia&#39;s abusive father in &quot;Sylvia&quot;. Pretty dramatic episode there, but that&#39;s another story. Though &quot;Crossed Connections&quot; has some funny moments, it&#39;s actually pretty heartfelt and dramatic. But see it anyway.

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Crossed Connections

On the eve of going to see Alison Arngrim in the cabaret version of her autobiography, I&#39;m revisiting my favorite episodes of &quot;Little Mercantile on the Prairie&quot;, and this is one of the most memorable episodes that is both comedic and serious, a life lesson on the evils of gossip. Even Nellie, whom you can see starting to mellow, is aghast over the fact that Harriet is listening in on other people&#39;s conversations, but when she learns that Alice Garvey had a quickie first marriage, she uses the information as ammunition, and the word gets around. Of course Nels is aghast over the use of the phone as a tool of gossip, even if it is too, and the town joins forces to teach gossipy Harriet a lesson while the Garveys try to repair their marriage. &quot;There&#39;s only one way to hurt Mrs. Olsen, and that&#39;s in the pocket book&quot; the wise Albert suggests as a way of teaching the town&#39;s biggest gossip a lesson, and the irritated townspeople are willing to utilize it as a way of sweet revenge. This doesn&#39;t help the Garveys though as they try put their problems past them so you get two great stories. Town villains Harriet and Nellie once again are the buffoons and the humor is overwhelming as Harriet risks losing everything. Merlin Olsen is touching as he does all he can to understand the truth. Of course, Katharine MacGregor, Alison Arngrim and Richard Bull pull the humor of the episode off brilliantly, and the opening scene of Harriet&#39;s screeching which causes a telephone technician is one of the most memorable episodes of the series.

On the eve of going to see Alison Arngrim in &quot;Confessions of a Prairie Bitch&quot;, I&#39;m revisiting my favorite episodes of &quot;Little Mercantile on the Prairie&quot;, and this is one of the most memorable episodes that is both comedic and serious, a life lesson on the evils of gossip. Even Nellie, whom you can see starting to mellow, is aghast over the fact that Harriet is listening in on other people&#39;s conversations, but when she learns that Alice Garvey had a quickie first marriage, she uses the information as ammunition, and the word gets around. Of course Nels is aghast over the use of the phone as a tool of gossip, even if it is too, and the town joins forces to teach gossipy Harriet a lesson while the Garveys try to repair their marriage. &quot;There&#39;s only one way to hurt Mrs. Olsen, and that&#39;s in the pocket book&quot; the wise Albert suggests as a way of teaching the town&#39;s biggest gossip a lesson, and the irritated townspeople are willing to utilize it as a way of sweet revenge. This doesn&#39;t help the Garveys though as they try put their problems past them so you get two great stories. Town villains Harriet and Nellie once again are the buffoons and the humor is overwhelming as Harriet risks losing everything. Of course, Katharine MacGregor, Alison Arngrim and Richard Bull pull the humor of the episode off brilliantly, and the opening scene of Harriet&#39;s screeching which causes a telephone technician is one of the most memorable episodes of the series.

Jonathan Garvey finds out that his wife had been previously married and responds by saying some cruel things to her (&quot;How many other men have you been with?&quot;), then leaves with Charles on a business trip, without telling his wife and son whether he&#39;s coming back or not. When Jonathan is talking to Harold in the tavern, Harold tells him that he had been married years earlier to a woman who was the best thing that ever happened to him. He tells Jonathan - who doesn&#39;t let him know that he&#39;s been married to Harold&#39;s former wife for years - &quot;I heard that she married again. I wonder if that man who&#39;s married to her now knows just how lucky he is.&quot; Jonathan and Charles return to Walnut Grove after their long trip, and Jonathan, realizing how lucky he really is, apologizes to his frightened wife (she was afraid he that he was going to leave her).

Harriet Oleson has made it possible for Walnut Grove to get modernized. They are now connected to the world! Telephones have finally arrived in Walnut Grove. Of course the fact that Mrs. Oleson can now listen in on every telephone conversation is the main theme to this episode. We discover the Garvey secret: Alice Garvey had been married before - a long time ago. When Mrs. Oleson overhears her private conversation with her mother, Harriet is excited about spreading the news. This causes a huge fight, and Jonathan leaves to go meet the man she used to be married to. I&#39;ll call the sub-plot &quot;Getting even with Mrs. Oleson.&quot; Albert comes up with a plan to hit the woman where it counts. The ending to this episode is priceless with an over-dramatic scene of a crying Mrs. Oleson being told by her husband that he now owns everything...

The ep established that Alice Garvey was a previously married woman. Believable. At the episode end her husband returned to her. This would have been way better character development for the Garvey family if Alice had just not died a couple of eps later in a fire. On another point. Some other poster went to too much trouble to point how realistic or unrealistic this ep was about telephones. It is TV.

Good storylines in this episodes keeps one entertained. I felt the part about Jonathan going to talk to Harold was really underhanded and was a really bad example. And what&#39;s with Alice&#39;s mom divulging so many detail of Harold &amp; Alice&#39;s relationship? Again, showing women as the bumbling gossipy female. I realize the moral of the story was to be respectful of others privacy (regarding all the gossip that came from Mrs. Olsen listening in to phone convos) but Jonathan could&#39;ve confronted Alice about his interaction with her ex in the end. He did the same thing as Mrs. Olsen; just in person! Instead, the viewer is left to assume they discussed his goings on in Mankato with Alice. But given the nature of their current relationship, I doubt Jonathan would be upfront about it. So instead of explaining to her in a civilized way, he walks over to the telephone pole and pushes it over like a hulk. I suppose that&#39;s how they could&#39;ve dealt with things back then. It left a bad taste in my mouth.

It&#39;s a good chapter, but it has its flaws. I leave aside the question of time and distance of the trip, I suppose that on TV it is worth arranging things a little.-
But let&#39;s see. Regardless of how he found out, Johathan should not apologize to Alice. Apologies for what? Or wasn&#39;t it logical that he would be angry when he found out that his wife had another husband before and kept a secret about it? On the contrary, Jonahtah should have accepted Alice&#39;s apology instead of asking for it! And Jonathan&#39;s dialogue in the cantina with Harold seemed unreal to me.- In a few more chapters, whoever plays Harold here will play the father of Albert&#39;s girlfriend, Silvia.

Someone who never saw this episode, reading the above paragraph is likely to say, &quot;What? Phones in Walnut Grove in 1881?&quot; Well, to enjoy this show you have to accept the extremely unlikely notion that just five years after Mr. Bell first demonstrated his new invention, that telephones would spread to this tiny farming community in rural Minnesota. I could accept that small cities COULD have seen some businesses, such as a bank or newspaper having a telephone, but it just doesn&#39;t ring true that a tiny village such as Walnut Grove would have had any phones, or would have had enough phones to merit their own switchboard at that early date. Getting past that, we are led to believe that farmer Jonathan Garvey had enough extra money to afford to have a phone installed, and would be willing to spend it when there is little likelihood that anyone in his family would really have anyone to call. Charges for a long distance call, such as the critical one his wife made to Minneapolis to her mother, would have certainly put a crimp in their modest savings. For that matter, why would her mother have wanted a phone? Certainly, few of her friends would have had them, probably none. I have read that, while the first telephone in the White House was installed in 1879 (President Hayes&#39; phone number was &quot;1&quot;) it was rarely used because there were so few telephones in Washington. Another source reports that as late as 1930 only about one of three U.S. farms had telephones. Anyhow, Harriet Oleson wound up operating the switchboard (it&#39;s amazing how she always seemed busy at the mercantile, yet could drop that for all sorts of extra activities, such as writing her newspaper column, or, in this case, sitting at a switchboard most of the day.) Being the town&#39;s official gossip, she loved to listen in and when she heard Mrs. Garvey talking with her mother about her first husband, Harriet blabbed it so that it quickly got to Andy Garvey, and then to his father, which turned out to be rather shocking news. So shocking, it seemed like the marriage was truly on the rocks. Jonathan wound up declaring he needed to get away, so he went on an overnight trip with Charles to Northville. While there, they agree that Minneapolis is close, so they decided to go there to visit Jonathan&#39;s mother-in-law. The mother-in-law tells them all about Alice&#39;s first husband. The other part of the plot, dealt with Albert and Laura working to teach Mrs. Oleson a lesson about listening in on phone calls. The town banker cooperates, phoning his stockbroker in Mankato telling him about a stock that will pay off 10 times his investment by the end of the month. He orders a huge investment. Eavesdropping Harriet takes all the money she can and tells Nels she is going to Mankato right away. Nels asks why she can&#39;t just telephone and order and wire the money. She says she is worried someone might be listening in on the phone. Nels gets off the best line of the show, saying, &quot;I thought you were one of a kind.&quot; The second part of the plot involved Albert going to the switchboard and distracting Nellie, who operates it when Harriet isn&#39;t there. He needs to make sure she doesn&#39;t hear the banker&#39;s second phone call, cancelling his just-placed order. Now this wasn&#39;t executed perfectly, as Nellie could easily have heard the first 30 seconds of the call before Albert got her away from the switchboard, but as shown, she didn&#39;t hear the critical part of the call. Of course, the stock goes in the tank and Harriet loses all her money. And it seems to happen overnight, as she returns from Mankato all hysterical, crying and weeping, and is furious at the ultimatum Nels gives her, which I won&#39;t reveal here. I think you can easily mix a comedy plot with a dramatic one if the dramatic one isn&#39;t too serious, such as the death of a regular character, or the dissolution of the marriage of series regulars. Jonathan really sounded like he was ready to leave Alice, which made this episode too serious for the comedy bit. I also had a problem with the notion that Harriet would lose her money, and lose it that quickly. As shown, they had no way of knowing that tricking her into buying this one stock would cause her to lose any money. All they knew was that there was no reason to believe it would make her a fortune as she expected. As presented, buying stock is like betting on a roulette wheel—almost immediately, you either make a bundle or lose everything. Another problem is the notion that the 127 mile ride to Northville and back would just be overnight, as stated. Charles is really driving those horses too hard. Now Northville to Minneapolis, the &quot;short&quot; distance they were willing to detour after doing their business, is indeed a short drive in 2014. But it is over 42 miles! Riding in a wagon means it is hardly close enough that these farmer/deliverymen would just &quot;drop in&quot; on Jonathan&#39;s in-law. That&#39;s another half day drive just one way! My belief is that a rather amusing episode concerning Mrs. Oleson eavesdropping on the phone and getting tricked into a few embarrassing situations could have been a rather fun episode, along the lines of the Lake Kezia Monster. But that plot needed to not come in an episode that dealt with such a darkly serious plot. The Garvey plot did nothing to advance any characters in my opinion. So I can not give this episode more than a 4.

User reviews

Crossed Connections

Little House on the Prairie

You Have Been Disconnected.

"It's one thing to be poor. It's another thing to admit it."

"It's one thing to be poor. It's another thing to admit it."

Jonathan learns how lucky he is

Ring her Neck?

Good ep on its own but not in context with the rest of the series

Exs, Lies & Telephone Lines

Johathan should not apologize to Alice. Apologies for what?

Phones in Walnut Grove

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