Halloween: a few thoughts...

[walkin jack]

If you ask any kid between the ages of 3 and 15 what his favorite holiday is the answer will be immediate and usually Christmas. Don't get me wrong now, I love Christmas. It always meant getting together with family and friends and sometimes visiting country relatives (which I loved to do). The food is soooo good and of course let us not forget all the loot.

But just as much, if not more so, from the time I was about 7 until I was about 13 or so I loved Halloween. We weren't poor but my folks always made a big deal out of this time every year and we made our own costumes. One I did often was the hobo.

My mother would burn a piece of old cork and rub it on my face to simulate a beard. I had an old felt hat that I found at the dump one time when I was out shootin' bottles and cans. My dad gave me and old work shirt and pants and I "altered" a pair of old shoes. Nothin' fancy for sure but it was fun.

I had the good fortune to grow up and a neighborhood with lots of kids my own age. We would pack up and work the entire neighborhood one street at a time. Laughing and swiping each others candy and horsing around as we went along.

When it would rain on Halloween I'd get the blues big time. There was always some doin's at the school and/or church but we all thought that was for squares. There was just no substitute for running the 'hood with your buds and getting all the goodies.

Back then you could hit every house without any worries. But that all changed one year when some creep in my home town of Deer Park Texas poisoned some pixie stix and put them in whith his kids Halloween candy. He killed his own children for insurance money. I'm sure you have heard of that time as it made the national news.

Lots of places did like Deer Park and banned trick-or-treating for several years after that. What a disgusting situation. I can't imagined someone killing their own kids for money. But ironically the killer was executed and the irony is that he was executed on October 31st just a few years later.

Now things have more or less gotten back to normal but we have lost our innocence. Now parents feel compelled to go around with the kids while they trick or treat and go through all the candy before they let the kids eat it. No more pop corn ball or other home made goodies. What a shame.

We let our kids go out but instruct them to just go to houses where they know the people that live there. So it is safe to say that Halloween and trick-or-treating will never be the same again.

Now a days we decorate the house and yard and have plenty of candy on hand for all the goblins that call but sadly we don't always have much of a turn out. Sometimes we even dress up in costumes to pass out the candy.

I may be a grumpy old coot now a days but I still love Halloween. I hate the element of sadness that I feel every year now.

[arjay]

It really is a shame with Halloween.What self respecting kid wants to go to a community center with hovering moms.maiden aunts and church ladies? :-) We used Vaseline and coffee grounds for the beard.

[timn8er]

Walkin' Jack, The murderer that you mentioned who got his final punishment when he did...I believe that's called poetic justice!

[duppie]

While I respect your memories and melancholy over Halloween I on the other hand believe it to be the most insidious and idiotic of so called "holidays" the folks at Hallmark ever perpetrated on the American public.
Taking a harvest celebration and blending it with some obscure pagan date just to sell more insipid candy,foolish and expensive costumes made in China no less,too sweet pumpkin themed pastries and nasty alcoholic concoctions and weak beer to a largely clueless adult population and their offspring does not strike me as a fun time.
Perhaps in it's infancy it was about the kids and may have been even quaint but all I see today are people making absolute fools of them selves.

[arjay]

Damn Duppie that's funny! I always saw it as a kids holiday too.

[CAJUNLAWYER]

here's a couple of thoughts.

Snickers bars

Butterfingers

I'm done here

[CAJUNLAWYER]

Originally Posted by arjay

It really is a shame with Halloween.What self respecting kid wants to go to a community center with hovering moms.maiden aunts and church ladies? :-) We used Vaseline and coffee grounds for the beard.

Coffee grounds and vaseline in the same sentence kinda curdles my milk

[arjay]

You're trying to get me dinged :-D

[finesse_r]

Originally Posted by CAJUNLAWYER

here's a couple of thoughts.

Snickers bars

Butterfingers

I'm done here

I would add Baby Ruth to get my big three.

[sophie]

When I was growing up Halloween meant trick or treating and seeing who could get the most goodies. We delighted in tearing each others sacks sometimes just for meanness. Of course they were all paper sacks. There wasn't any such thing as a plastic bag. One older man in our neighborhood delighted in draping a white sheet over his head and coming around the side of the house and trying to scare us. We got wise to him. Everything was done in fun and no one preached the devilistic evil side of Halloween to us. We just knew it was the time of the year to have fun and trick or treat.

Things aren't like that anymore and haven't been for many years.

Wife and I were at her eye doctor the other day and they had all of the office area and waiting areas really decorated with the fall season, pumpkins, wheat straw, all the different stuff associated with late October and Halloween and man they went to a lot of trouble and it looks real nice. One of the doctors helpers took us in for checking of her eye and we commented on how festive and Halloweenee everything looked and she said "I don't take part in Halloween and never have and don't believe in it" and my wife and I just looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders because it is her perrogative for sure, but she just don't know what she missed.

Man we had some good times during Halloween and got a lot of goodies and nothing ever got out of hand in my growing up years.

I guess it really is different now and people have to be careful with the kids because things aren't the same. What a shame.

[duppie]

......did I mention the infernal and omnipresent stink of pumpkin spice everywhere? did I?

[RonJ]

I always had a ton of fun on halloween when I was a kid. It wasn't the candy. The costumes and running around in the dry leaves was the fun part. Curmudgeonly personalities should turn off their lights and lock the doors.

[duppie]

Originally Posted by RonJ

I always had a ton of fun on halloween when I was a kid. It wasn't the candy. The costumes and running around in the dry leaves was the fun part. Curmudgeonly personalities should turn off their lights and lock the doors.

Did one better...moved to a gated adult community where the residents don't trick or treat,stay off my damn lawn,and hit the sack at 8pm.
Although old Mrs Stein did look rather fetching in that "Naughty Nurse" costume at Canasta on Sunday....we're still wondering where one would purchase one in size 18 though.

[Arik]

Originally Posted by duppie

While I respect your memories and melancholy over Halloween I on the other hand believe it to be the most insidious and idiotic of so called "holidays" the folks at Hallmark ever perpetrated on the American public.
Taking a harvest celebration and blending it with some obscure pagan date just to sell more insipid candy,foolish and expensive costumes made in China no less,too sweet pumpkin themed pastries and nasty alcoholic concoctions and weak beer to a largely clueless adult population and their offspring does not strike me as a fun time.
Perhaps in it's infancy it was about the kids and may have been even quaint but all I see today are people making absolute fools of them selves.

Why dont you stop holding back and tell us how you really feel!?!?!?

I kinda agree but it was fun getting candy as a kid although I rarely went out on Halloween cause my dad didnt trust people and he never wanted to go with me.

But the same goes for Valentines day....completely made up to sell junk.

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[duppie]

Originally Posted by Arik

Why dont you stop holding back and tell us how you really feel!?!?!?

I kinda agree but it was fun getting candy as a kid although I rarely went out on Halloween cause my dad didnt trust people and he never wanted to go with me.

But the same goes for Valentines day....completely made up to sell junk.

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Yep....another totally stupid Hallmark holiday. Bad chocolates,Rushed,tasteless and expensive dinners followed by cheap sparkling wine,Flowers costing a mortgage payment only to die a day later,longing glances at tacky jewelry by single women,Oddly colored and most likely carcinogenic stuffed animals.
I cook for my wife,share a glass of wine and offer a tasteful if sometimes not expensive gift and then obey her wishes to "leave her alone".Been happily married 18 years.

[Iggy]

I grew up in the country.. Each Halloween all of the Dads and kids would gather at the school house which was 30 miles from the nearest town. The Dad's would form a caravan of roughly 20 cars and head for the nearest ranch. We would all decsend on the place and get home made candy treats. Carmel Apples were a favorite, Popcorn Balls, and fudge, rated high too.
Everyone would load back up and the Mom of the family just visited joined the caravan. This would continue until all of the ranches in the NE corner of the county had been visited.
It was not uncommon to cover over a 100 miles during the evening.
Gradually families would drop back off as the tour wound down.

Each kid would return home with a huge grocery sack full of treats that usually kept us supplied with goodies for at least a month.
Older folks and bachelors usually provided candy bars instead of home cooked stuff. There weren't any bite sized candy bars back then. A nickle bought a full sized one, and there was always tray full with a variety so you could pick your favorite.

One had to consume the more delicate treats first.. Yeah, them was the good old days, and they continue out in ranch country to this day.

[finesse_r]

Certainly Halloween has been commercialized, but so has Christmas and Thanksgiving. The worst in my opinion is Valentines Day, which is nothing more than a creation to sell greeting cards, candy, flowers, and jewelry. I also understand that some have religious differences with the Holiday, and I can certainly see their point.

However, for the children Halloween is just a time to have fun and get a lot of treats they might normally not have gotten. My parents were pretty conservative when it came to store bought candy. Most of our sweets were cooked by my mother, so Halloween was a rare time to pig out on store bought candy and a sugar rush that was a pure delight.

Today I would not let children go out and about like we did in the 50” and 60’s. Our neighborhood was a new subdivision with a very homogeneous population where we knew most of the people that lived in the houses around us and most were families with children. We either had adult or older siblings walking around with us, and we never felt any fear back then. It is all different today.

[arjay]

Originally Posted by duppie

Yep....another totally stupid Hallmark holiday. Bad chocolates,Rushed,tasteless and expensive dinners followed by cheap sparkling wine,Flowers costing a mortgage payment only to die a day later,longing glances at tacky jewelry by single women,Oddly colored and most likely carcinogenic stuffed animals.
I cook for my wife,share a glass of wine and offer a tasteful if sometimes not expensive gift and then obey her wishes to "leave her alone".Been happily married 18 years.

You should have been a poet :-)

[DeathGrip]

I loved Halloween as a kid. Times changed rapidly.

You want to see adults acting crazy? Google Key West Fantasy Fest.

There's another in New Orleans but the name slips my mind. Never been there for that one. Key West..... Oh Yeah, Been there a few times but not in a long time.

[duppie]

Originally Posted by DeathGrip

I loved Halloween as a kid. Times changed rapidly.

You want to see adults acting crazy? Google Key West Fantasy Fest.

There's another in New Orleans but the name slips my mind. Never been there for that one. Key West..... Oh Yeah, Been there a few times but not in a long time.

Ironically it's the same themes,costumes,revelers and debauchery as their Valentines Day Parade.

[Taurus627]

The only thing I will add is that in my world, if I don't get the day off from work, it isn't an "official" holiday.
Those kind of days on my list include Halloween, Valentines day and St. Patrick's day.

I am not demeaning these days at all, I just think calling them "holidays" is a bit of a stretch.

[Comrad]

We used to burn a cork and use it to make beards. We would fill pillow cases with candy and made a couple trips to empty it. That's when you could get a full size candy bar. Some of the candy today is less than bite size.
My dog hates Halloween.

[rimfired]

I usta Halloween in the snow, uphill,
both ways, 2 miles. PA in the 50-60's.

Well, I really did do it in snow. ;-}

[arjay]

Halloween has always caused it to snow here :-) Ask any kid,best costume in the world..under a parka..

[Comrad]

Originally Posted by rimfired

I usta Halloween in the snow, uphill,
both ways, 2 miles. PA in the 50-60's.

Well, I really did do it in snow. ;-}

Luxury!

We were barefoot.

[shouldazagged]

Originally Posted by duppie

While I respect your memories and melancholy over Halloween I on the other hand believe it to be the most insidious and idiotic of so called "holidays" the folks at Hallmark ever perpetrated on the American public.
Taking a harvest celebration and blending it with some obscure pagan date just to sell more insipid candy,foolish and expensive costumes made in China no less,too sweet pumpkin themed pastries and nasty alcoholic concoctions and weak beer to a largely clueless adult population and their offspring does not strike me as a fun time.
Perhaps in it's infancy it was about the kids and may have been even quaint but all I see today are people making absolute fools of them selves.

Gee, Duppie, don't hold back, tell us what you think!

I pre-date Hallmark and the mass commercialization of Halloween (on which people now spend almost as much as they do for Christmas, according to reported sales figures), though rudimentary masks and things were sold in dime stores even then. Same for the tremendous marketing extravaganza that is Christmas now.

But the combining of the seasonal rituals with ancient pagan observances isn't confined to Halloween and hasn't been for centuries. The celebration of Christmas in winter is a grafting of one tradition onto a much older one set in the dark days of the year. Same with Easter.

The difference is what the retailers have done to all three.

[SgtLumpy]

Are there any holidays that have NOT been over commercialized?

People getting injured and killed on Black Friday because rival shoppers want first crack at the Nintendo or Nike or Barbie latest.

How about buying sheets on Washington's birthday? What's up with that? I'm sure that would make ol George happy.

I don't celebrate xmas but every single person I know absolutely dreads it "Oh my inlaws" "Oh the cooking" "Oh I have to clean" "Oh little Johnny won't be happy because grandma gives him sox and aunt Peggy always wants to kiss him" "I can't wait till it's over"

Geez folks. Relax and make it what you want.

Halloween at our place means my girlfriend and I dress up in authentic RCMP uniform (me) and Nell (Dudley Do Right's girlfriend). We ride our horses around the neighborhood. Kids pet the horses. Parents take pictures. Women swoon at the handsome mountie. Men flirt with the chick in spurs. We ride past one local block party and the hosts give us prints of the pics they took of us last year. One local family gives out beer. Another gives margaritas (all to adults). Some of the local parents tow hay wagons with horses and/or ATVs. They take about 20-30 kids to a new block, park, let the kids go retrieve candy, then take them to the next block. All very safe and supervised. And most of all hundreds of people having FUN.

Poo on you guys that go out of your way to find the negative in Halloween or any other festival. Make it what you want. If you don't want it, don't make it anything.

Me, I've got to lose an inch by Thursday to fit into my Sam Brown.

At the "Buffalo Chip" a bar in Cave Creek Arizona. They still have horse pens and hitching posts out front. You can ride up, tie up your horse and go in for a beer -




I was out front of the bar, street-side. A deputy drove up and asked me if I'd help stop traffic at this intersection because they were trying to get an ambulance through -




This lady, and her husband, were hosting a foreign exchange student from Germany. The visiting girl got to dress up in period costume and celebrate the old west with a bunch of goofy Americans -

Mom -


German Student -



Yes soccer moms, I'll pose for a picture with you -




My girlfriend "Nell" -


Studly Dudley -



Now who wouldn't have fun doing all that..


Sgt Lumpy

[labworm]

All our candy was placed in a large glass bowl, like you just won a huge prize.

About 2 weeks later the bowl only contained the famous corn candy, year after year it was the last to get gobbled up.

I always went out as a Hobo and my friend was always Aunt Jemima.

Ma made my costume, just a shirt and jeans with different patches of material sewn to it, and of course the burnt cork.

It was a lot of fun being a kid and enjoying the simple excitement that Oct 31st brought every year.

PS: Mallo Cups, Walecos, Sugar Daddy's and one of my favorites Bonomo Turkish Taffy (Vanilla).

[ditrina]

Originally Posted by duppie

......did I mention the infernal and omnipresent stink of pumpkin spice everywhere? did I?

HMMMMM May the great PUMPKIN.. land directly on your patch..

[carpriver]

Halloween was called All Hallow Eve, it is or was a religious Holy day. Some churches still have a short mass at some point on Oct. 31st.

In the 50s-60s we ran the streets on Halloween night. We played pranks on each other and people who gave us candy. It was a fun time.

[Minnehaha]

Back in the 1950's Halloween was a great night that all of the kids looked forward to. A big bag full of candy! No one ever worried about us going out alone back then - what has changed so much. The picture below is my brother and I cira 1957, getting ready to go out and score a bag full of candy.

[GreyRider]

It's the eve of the catholic All Saints Day. Dia de todos Los Santos. And yes, another "grafted holiday". The pagan Celts called it Samhain. It was considered to be a time when the "veil" between the living and the dead was thinnest and easily crossed. The church converted the pagans by establishing holidays at the same time. Basically said, hey we got the same thing. Just keep doin what you're doin only let's call it ... Ahhh... All Saints Day. Good? Good. Same with Easter. My favorite corruption. From Anglo-Saxon goddess Eostre. As in Estrus. Thus the bunnies and eggs. But man am I digressing. Halloween rocks and running the neighborhood, staying out late, hiding from the "big kids" - it was for all intents and purposes a first taste of freedom. And I hope I didn't jack this thread OR cause a ruckus. I was born catholic and am fascinated by the history.

[CAJUNLAWYER]

Best part of Halloween is that in Louisiana November 1st is a state holiday so all the courts are closed.

[Comrad]

Originally Posted by labworm

All our candy was placed in a large glass bowl, like you just won a huge prize.

About 2 weeks later the bowl only contained the famous corn candy, year after year it was the last to get gobbled up.

I always went out as a Hobo and my friend was always Aunt Jemima.

Ma made my costume, just a shirt and jeans with different patches of material sewn to it, and of course the burnt cork.

It was a lot of fun being a kid and enjoying the simple excitement that Oct 31st brought every year.

PS: Mallo Cups, Walecos, Sugar Daddy's and one of my favorites Bonomo Turkish Taffy (Vanilla).

Nothing could pull a filling out of a tooth like Turkish Taffy. Good times.

[Beemerguy53]

Maybe I'm just getting to be an old grump, but Halloween has gotten totally out of hand, IMHO. What used to be an occasion for kids to dress up like goblins and ghosts, or adults to go to costume parties, has morphed into a celebration of evil and murder and mayhem.

While driving yesterday, I passed a home where a baby doll was hanged in a tree, with a noose around its neck. That's just sick...

[DeadAye]

On any other day of the year - "Give me your stuff - OR ELSE" can ( and should) get you in need of a lawyer.... Go figure.

[walnutred]

I told my kids that Halloween was a Socialist holiday intended to teach kids to go door to door begging for things they didn’t need rather than working for them. The costumes were because at one time American kids had too much self-respect to panhandle door to door but LBJs Great Society in the 1960’s changed all that.

[arjay]

Did they buy it?

[walnutred]

Originally Posted by arjay

Did they buy it?

For the first 10-12 years they bought it then they just wrote it off as another of Dads idiosyncrasies.

[wbraswell]

SgtDudley has it almost right. Is there any one thing in our society that isn't commercialized. Religion, marriage, patriotism, you name it. Don't go cutting down Halloween like it's something different. Look at Christmas and Easter, our most sacred holidays are lowered to buying orgies lured by reindeer and a giant rabbit. Your whole life is commercialized, get over it. Nobody ever bought a costume while held at gun point. I'm with Walkin Jack, I loved Halloween, it has many great memories for me. And for any of you Bible beaters ranting about Satan worship and pagan rituals, you can suck eggs, just like the ones I'm fixing to nail your Cadillac with. (actually, all I ever used was water balloons and shaving cream)