Frontier House was an educational reality TV series that originally aired on PBS in April of 2002. The show, which was filmed over the course of five months, followed the lives of three family groups that agreed to live as homesteaders did on the American frontier in 1883. Each family was given a 160 acre plot of land and an allotment of food, supplies, and livestock. They were expected to establish a homestead and complete the tasks necessary to prepare for the harsh Montana winter. At the end of season, before winter struck, each family was judged by a panel of frontier experts and historians, and the likelihood of survival for each group was assessed.