Many of us grew up with Little House on the Prairie, and we knew the actors on that show as well as we knew our own family. One of those who appeared on the show regularly, Melissa Sue Anderson, was a fixture in our homes.
When Anderson played the part of Mary Ingalls, she was only 11 years old. She had been in a few commercials and on the Brady Bunch before, but never to the extent that she was on air in Little House on the Prairie.
Born in 1962 in Berkeley, California, she played on that iconic television show from the 1970s until the 1980s. Of course, she doesn’t quite look like the little girl who was in the show at the time.
Interestingly, she is estimated as of 2018 to be worth about $1.5 million. Much of that came from her time on the television show but she also played in a number of other television shows and films, but they weren’t as well known.
She was the younger of two daughters and the family moved to Los Angeles from San Francisco when she was young. Her parents divorced when she was 13 and she was raised by her mother.
After appearing in a number of commercials, she got an agent, thanks to her parents, so that she could maybe land another role. After being on The Brady Bunch and Bewitched, she eventually was picked up for Little House in the Prairie.
Melissa Sue was on that show until the seventh season when she decided to leave. She played in a number of movies and appeared on television shows from time to time after leaving.
In the 1990s, she worked as an assistant producer for a television show, which was the last one that starred Michael Landon. The next year, she got the lead role in Partners, but the television series didn’t do well.
There were questions as to why she decided to eventually stop performing but it is thought that she wanted to give most of her attention to her family.
She still continues to work in the entertainment industry from time to time but she is mainly out of the spotlight. It was nice thinking about her after all these years.