Nellie Oleson

Nellie Oleson is a fictional character in the Little House series of autobiographical children's novels written by Laura Ingalls Wilder. She was portrayed by Alison Arngrim in the NBC television show Little House on the Prairie (1974 to 1983), where her role is much expanded. Three different girls from Laura Ingalls Wilder's childhood — Nellie Owens, Genevieve Masters and Stella Gilbert — were the basis for the fictional Nellie Oleson. Character sources Nellie Owens Owens was born on August 2, 1869, two years after Laura Ingalls. Nellie's parents, William (1836–1920) and Margaret (1836–1908) Owens did, as Ingalls describes, run the local mercantile in Walnut Grove, Minnesota.