Blanche Hanalis (11 December 1915 – 27 July 1992) was an American screenwriter and television writer best known for developing the '' Little House on the Prairie series'' as well as several made-for-TV movies based on

Little House on the Prairie The ''Little House on the Prairie'' books is a series of American children's novels written by Laura Ingalls Wilder (b. Laura Elizabeth Ingalls). The stories are based on her childhood and adolescence in the Midwestern United States, American M ...

''.'' Hanalis was born as Blanche Weiss in

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, but grew up in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

and graduated from Theodore Roosevelt High School in 1932. She was of Greek and Jewish descent. She has been quoted as saying her family was poor and she grew up "in the slums of Chicago." The family relocated to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

after her father's candy business failed, and she started working to help support them rather than attend college. Hanalis married Irving Wodin and together they had three children. In 1957, once the children were in school, she wrote her first television script and submitted it to

The Philco-Goodyear Television Playhouse ''The Philco Television Playhouse'' is an American television anthology series that was broadcast live on NBC from 1948 to 1955. Produced by Fred Coe, the series was sponsored by Philco. It was one of the most respected dramatic shows of the Golde ...

. It was quickly accepted, and Hanalis continued writing for over thirty years. She wrote episodes for numerous television programs, including:

My Favorite Martian ''My Favorite Martian'' is an American sitcom that aired on CBS from September 29, 1963, to May 1, 1966, for 107 episodes. The show stars Ray Walston as "Uncle Martin" (the Martian) and Bill Bixby as Tim O'Hara. The first two seasons, totaling ...

The Barbara Stanwyck Show ''The Barbara Stanwyck Show'' is an American anthology drama television series which ran on NBC from September 1960 to September 1961. Barbara Stanwyck served as hostess, and starred in all but four of the half-hour productions. The four in which ...

Family Affair ''Family Affair'' is an American sitcom starring Brian Keith and Sebastian Cabot that aired on CBS from September 12, 1966, to March 4, 1971. The series explored the trials of well-to-do engineer and bachelor Bill Davis (Keith) as he attempte ...

, and The Young Pioneers. She wrote the screenplays for From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E Frankweiler, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, and Portrait of a Rebel: The Remarkable Mrs. Sanger. Her work, A Love Affair: The Eleanor and Lou Gehrig Story, was nominated for an Emmy award in 1978 for Outstanding Writing in a Special Program—Drama or Comedy—Adaptation. Hanalis won a Writers Guild of America Award in Television—Children's Script for her 1987 adaptation of

The Secret Garden ''The Secret Garden'' is a novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett first published in book form in 1911, after serialisation in ''The American Magazine'' (November 1910 – August 1911). Set in England, it is one of Burnett's most popular novels and ...

. Hanalis also contributed to the story of a major motion picture

Weddings and Babies ''Weddings and Babies'' is a 1960 film directed, produced, and written by independent filmmaker Morris Engel. It stars Viveca Lindfors, John Myhers, Chiarina Barile, and Leonard Elliott. The last of Engel's feature films, it was shot in 1957 and ...

, which won the Critic's Award at the

1958 Venice Film Festival The 19th annual Venice International Film Festival was held from 24 August to 7 September 1958. Jury * Jean Grémillon (France) (head of jury) * Carlos Fernández Cuenca (Spain) * Piero Gadda Conti (Italy) * Alberto Lattuada (Italy) * Hidemi ...

. Hanalis died in 1992.

References

1915 births 1992 deaths 20th-century American screenwriters {{US-screenwriter-stub