A Spooky Holiday For All
Halloween Is Special Fun For Everyone!
Pretty scary things come to your door this night.
We had a rock one Halloween!
Hallowe'en,
or Halloween, is a holiday celebrated on the night of October 31.
Traditional activities include trick-or-treating, costume parties,
viewing horror films, visiting "haunted houses", and participating in
traditional autumn activities such as hayrides (which may have "haunted"
themes).
Halloween originated under the name of Samhain as a Pagan festival among
the Celts of Ireland and Great Britain. Irish and Scottish immigrants
carried versions of the tradition to North America in the nineteenth
century. Other western countries have embraced the holiday as a part of
American pop culture in the late twentieth century.
Halloween is now celebrated in parts of the western world, most commonly
in Ireland, the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, the United Kingdom
and sometimes in Australia and New Zealand. In recent years, the holiday
has also been celebrated in parts of Western Europe.
Halloween Movie and Radio Shows
We selected a few slides of days gone by and put them into a movie for you to watch and remember. We make these movies using ProShow which is a fantastic product. See our movies page.
Make sure you listen to "The War Of The Worlds" from The Mercury Theaters October 30, 1938 radio show! The first half of the 60 minute broadcast was presented as a series of news bulletins, and suggested to many listeners that an actual Martian invasion was in progress. There was public outcry against the episode, but it launched Welles to great fame. There is controversy about whether people panicked in the streets, and a series of urban legends have grown up around the production which suggest that major disturbances took place.
A Quick History Lesson Behind What We Call Halloween
About 2000 years ago, people called Celts lived in Scotland, Ireland,
and Wales. Their new year didn't begin on January 1, it began on November
1. So October 31 was New Year's Eve.
The Celts believed that ghosts and goblins and witches walked the earth on October 31. These spirits terrified the Celts, so the people dressed up in costumes so the spirits wouldn't recognize them. When the Romans conquered the Celts, the traditions of the two different people were brought together, and some of them were combined.
For the Romans, November 1 was an important holy day called All Hallows. Eventually October 31, the day before All Hallows, became known as All Hallows E'en (evening). And that is the day we celebrate as Halloween
Our Tradition Lived On For Many Years
For
many years our entire family got together to carve pumpkins and enjoy a
meal together. You will see pictures from 2000 through 2005 on
this site but unfortunately the tradition has been lost in 2006 as the
families drifted apart and kids lost interest (you know, the teenage
years).
Sad but true
but that is life. The tradition lives on but it is just
Jeanette, Connor, Paul &
Sue and a few friends who are up in years and enjoy getting
together. On some occasions one of the kids will join us and that is
a good thing! We do enjoy going back as seeing the old pictures like
Colleen as The Great Punkin' circa 1992.
We plan to continue the mini-tradition in 2007 and have just a few people over... those still interested in making scary punkin's and having some good food and companionship!
Fond Memories
We have many fond memories of this day which we hope to share with you.
Some from our own childhood and some more recent so sit back and
enjoy!
Scary houses were always fun to visit on HAloween
Fun Is Never Too Far Away
Leave it to her to scare people to death!