My dad didn’t much care for Halloween. He knew it had pagan roots, that it had originated in Ireland during ancient times, and was thought to be a day when the barrier between physical and spiritual worlds was removed. The dead could rise from their graves and walk the earth, and evil spirits had free reign.
He was a Free Will Baptist Preacher, and Christianity was the compass of his life. He thought Halloween was against Christianity, and I think he might have believed somewhat in the idea of evil spirits being let loose on that day, what with all the not-so-harmless pranks being played on that night.
The first time I wanted to go trick-or-treating, I was about 8 years old. It was the first Halloween after a new friend, who had been trick-or-treating before, moved in down the block from me in Vera Oklahoma. Dad grumbled, discussed it with Mom, and finally said I could go. I loved it. Such treats and frights we got.
The lady that lived next door to me was my favorite. She gave out homemade candied popcorn balls, great in themselves, but the best part was that she always dressed herself and her house for the occasion, and left her door open. Standing at her screen door you could see into her living room hung with spider webs and such. We knocked and she came flying at us from another room, arms flapping, in her bat costume, not a sexy one like it would be today, and making eerie bat noises. It was a fantastic scary surprise.
Sometimes we’d hit her house twice. She might not give us a second popcorn ball, but she’d give us a second scare. My second favorite was the lady who made caramel apples, for the apples, she didn’t add the scare.
While I was trick or treating, my older brother (by 6 years) was doing the tricking part of that. He and his friends played the evil spirits part well, egging cars and houses, soaping windows, opening gates to let livestock out, and the best one – turning over outhouses. Yes, they still had them in Vera Oklahoma. They’d do anything they thought would be funny, and it was considered then to be just mischievousness, to be expected on Halloween. Today, it would be vandalism. My Dad never caught on to the fact that his son was part of the group. He was pretty blind where my older brother was concerned.
When I grew up I tried to follow the Halloween tradition of my Vera next-door neighbor. I tried her surprise scare tactics for the trick-or-treaters who came to my door. I did the candied popcorn balls, caramel apples, or something homemade, but that all ended with the news and widespread fear of poisoned Halloween candy in the early 1980s. By that time, I was in a bigger city and the word was out not to accept anything homemade, and to look for injection holes in everything else. So, regrettably, no more homemade goodies, but the scare tactics continued, at least for some years.
They stopped here in Austin. I think it was the first Halloween that we were here I dressed up as Morticia and looked pretty ghoulish. The first kids that came to the door left crying and screaming. So, that ended that. Kids now just don’t have the same sense of humor. Wish I had the ghoulish picture but didn’t take one.
Halloween in America History note:
Halloween traditions were brought over in the 1800s, by the Irish escaping the potato famine. They came to America and brought their Halloween traditions with them. They celebrated as they did back in their homelands—not with costumed children going door-to-door for sweets but by pulling pranks. And that became what Halloween was about and got worse as time went on. In the 1930s. the malicious violence, looting, and destruction became so bad that many cities were considering banning the holiday. That’s when some people had a better idea.
During that decade, civic and religious authorities, community organizations, and neighborhood families began to program parties, carnivals and costume parades on Halloween to keep kids out of trouble.
By the 1950s that had led to the practice of trick-or-treating, and the other Halloween celebrations that we have today. It worked and the pranks lessened over time.
Here’s a few pictures of a past Halloween.
Dan and I at a Party in Branson. Don’t know what we were, Biker people I guess but we were that already so, we kind of faked it. And then me at another party as Spider-woman. Notice I wore the same necklace. I love that necklace.
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