1. What is "Little House On The Prairie"?

"Little House" is a series based on Laura Ingalls Wilder's best-selling novels about a young pioneer family struggling to make ends meet in post-Civil War Walnut Grove, Minnesota.
 

2. How long was "Little House" on the air and how many episodes were there?

"Little House" was originally a 2-hour (with commercials) television film which eventually became a series of 164 episodes (139 regular one-hour episodes, 17 two-part episodes, 5 90-minute episodes, 2 two-hour episodes, and 1 three-hour special) that ran on NBC from the fall of 1974 to the summer of 1982. A re-tooled version of the series built around its co-star, Melissa Gilbert, called "Little House: A New Beginning", ran only one season, consisting of 19 episodes (16 regular one-hour episodes, 2 two-part episodes, and 1 two-hour episode) from the fall of 1982 to the summer of 1983. This was then followed by three two-hour telefilms. They were, in order, "Little House: Look Back To Yesterday" (1983), "Little House: The Last Farewell" (1984), & "Little House: Bless All The Dear Children" (1984).
 

3. After the final telefilm ("The Last Farewell"), they aired another "Little House" story months later. I thought the series had ended. Why is this?

NBC shot 3 telefilms to wrap up the "Little House" story. "The Last Farewell" (which aired in the spring of 1984) was the last "Little House" story filmed. But, "Bless All The Dear Children" (which aired Christmas of that same year as "The Last Farewell") was shot BEFORE "The Last Farewell", and therefore "...Dear Children" had sat on the NBC shelf and went
unaired until it was finally shown at Christmas of 1984.

4.  Where can I find "Little House" in my area?

LHOTP is currently in its second syndication run. Though it might not be seen on very many stations in the U.S., the best place to find it is on TBS Superstation, where it is currently airing twice in the morning. TBS is available on cable and many Digital Satellite systems.
 

5. Why does TBS skip over some "Little House" episodes in sequencing? For instance, I saw an episode with Laura living in her big house, and then the next show I see her living in a shack!

This is the case with many stations currently running LHOTP. One thing to remember...many episodes ran 90 minutes long. Because some stations sometimes cannot fit 90-minute shows in their regular schedule, they skip over them. A prime example is the two-part episode "Days Of Sunshine, Days Of Shadow". Part one runs 90-minutes long (including commercials, of course), while part two (this is the part where Laura's "big house" is destroyed by a tornado) runs the regular 60-minute length. This may explain the "plot hole" mentioned in the question. In any event, the 90-minute episodes that are skipped over may be saved for a "special time slot" on the weekends. In the case of TBS, they may skip over other episodes, such as those that originally ran as a two-hour special episode (such as "May We Make Them Proud" and "The Lord Is My Shepard") and save them for a special time slot also. In any event, since "Little House" is still being shown in syndication on select TV stations nationwide, the sequencing of LHOTP shows is at the discretion of your local station.

6.  Where was Mrs. Oleson in the last three LHOTP telefilms? Yes, I know she was either busy or in the hospital, but why didn't we see her?

Katherine MacGregor was not interested in appearing in any of the final three LHOTP telefilms, so therefore the scriptwriters had to find some way of explaining her absence by writing her out of the script. In "Look Back To Yesterday" and "Bless All The Dear Children", Harriet Oleson was out of town shopping for things for Oleson's Mercantile, and in "The Last Farewell" she was seriously ill and in the hospital in the big city. At last check, Katherine MacGregor was still alive.