Halloween
Holidays and festivals have been celebrated at the end of October for
thousands of years. In 5th Century BC, the Celts celebrated Samhain
(sow-en) believing that the spirits of all those who had died the preceding
year would come back in search of living bodies to possess. The Celts
thought that by dressing up in ghoulish costumes they could frighten
the spirits away.
During the eight century, the Christian church made November 1st,
"All Saints' Day" and the night before was known as "All Hallows Eve".
Eventually this name became Halloween. The custom of Halloween
was brought to America in the 1800's by European immigrants.
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Trick Or Treat
The custom of trick-or-treating originated with a ninth-century European
custom called souling. On November 2, All Souls Day, people would walk
from village to village begging for "soul cakes," made out of square pieces
of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive,
the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives
of the donors.
The National Confectioners Association estimates that
one billion nine hundred fifty-three million dollars is now spent on Halloween
candy. 80% of children say their favorite Trick or Treat candy is either
chocolate or gum.
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Jack-O-Lantern
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The Jack-o-lantern custom comes from Irish folklore that tells of a man named Jack who carried an ember in a hollowed out turnip to light his way. Originally the Irish used
turnips as their "Jack's lanterns" but found that pumpkins were far more plentiful
than turnips in America - and easier to carve. When the term jack-o'-lantern first appeared in print in 1750, it referred to a night watchman carrying a lantern.
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Born on Halloween
1632 - Jan Vermeer, painter
1705 - Pope Clemens XIV
1795 - John Keats, poet
1887 - Chiang Kai-shek
1896 - Ethel Waters, actress/singer
1912 - Dale Evans, cowgirl/actress
1920 - Dick Francis, jockey/writer
1922 - Barbara Bel Geddes, actress
1927 - Lee Grant, actress
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1931 - Dan Rather, news anchor
1937 - Michael Landon, actor
1937 - Tom Paxton, singer
1942 - David Ogden Stiers, actor
1943 - Stephen Rea, actor
1944 - Deidre Hall, actress
1950 - Jane Pauley, newscaster
1950 - John Candy, comedian
1967 - Vanilla Ice, rap singer/actor
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Legendary magician Harry Houdini died in Detroit of gangrene and peritonitis
resulting from a ruptured appendix on Halloween in 1926.
He and his wife, Bess, had divised a secret code to use to test messages from the spirit world after one of them died. Bess attended seances trying to contact Houdini for serveral years waiting to hear...
"Rosabelle- answer- tell- pray, answer- look- tell- answer, answer- tell".
The Houdinis' secret phrase spelled out the word "BELIEVE"
Seances are still held to contact Houdini. None have been successful.
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