Pets are important parts of our lives and families, and they were just as important to our ancestors. Just look at the Little House on the Prairie book series by Laura Ingalls Wilder; in her early books, which cover her young childhood years, she talks a lot about the family dog Jack, the brindle bulldog. This was in the early 1870’s that the stories with Jack took place, and she talks about how Jack would walk for hundreds of miles across the prairie under their covered wagon as he accompanied the family on their various moves as pioneers. Even in old age, when she wrote the books, Wilder still thought fondly of her childhood dog. Pets are essentially furry, four-legged family members, and they should be remembered in our family histories for the important parts they played in our lives, just as Wilder remembered Jack (and now countless generations of people know about Jack, too). Here’s how to do it.