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During this time of year, hearth fires in family homes were left to burn out while the harvest was gathered. After the harvest work was complete, celebrants joined with Druid priests to light massive bonfires and pray. Celts believed that the barrier between the physical and spirit worlds was breachable during Samhain. -
In the 7th century, the Catholic Church established November 1 as All Saints' Day, a day commemorating all the saints of the church. By the 9th century, the influence of Christianity had spread into Celtic lands, where it gradually blended with and supplanted older Celtic rites. In 1000 A.D., the church made November 2 All Souls’ Day, a day to honor the dead.
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In England and Ireland during All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day celebrations, poor people would visit the houses of wealthier families and receive pastries called soul cakes in exchange for a promise to pray for the souls of the homeowners’ dead relatives. Known as "souling," the practice was later taken up by children, who would go from door to door asking for gifts such as food, money and ale—an early form of trick-or-treating.
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The practice of carving faces into vegetables became associated with Halloween in Ireland and Scotland around the 1800s. Jack-o-lanterns originated from an Irish myth about “Stingy Jack,” who tricked the Devil and was forced to roam the earth with only a burning coal in a turnip to light his way. People began to make their own versions of Jack’s lanterns by carving scary faces into turnips and placing them into windows or near doors to frighten away Stingy Jack and other evil spirits. -
Halloween celebrations were extremely limited in early America, which was largely Protestant. It wasn't until the mid-19th century that new immigrants—especially the millions of Irish fleeing the Irish Potato Famine—helped popularize the celebration nationally. These immigrants celebrated as they did back in their homelands—especially by pulling pranks.
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Haunted or spooky public attractions already had some precedent in Europe. Starting in the 1800s, Marie Tussaud’s wax museum in London featured a “Chamber of Horrors” with decapitated figures from the French Revolution. In 1915, a British amusement ride manufacturer created an early haunted house, complete with dim lights, shaking floors and demonic screams. In the U.S., the Great Depression kickstarted the trend. By then, violence around Halloween had reached new highs. -
Costumes and disguises have figured into Halloween celebrations since the holiday's earliest days. Around the same time neighborhoods began organizing activities such as haunted houses to keep kids safe and occupied, costumes became more important (and less abstract and scary). They began to take the form of things children would have seen and enjoyed, like characters from popular radio shows, comics and movies. -
The fears about poisoned Halloween candy have been overblown, crimes involving poison have occurred. The most infamous case took place on 1974. That’s when a man named Ronald O’Bryan gave cyanide-laced pixie sticks to childrens, including his son. The other children never ate the candy, but hisson, Timothy, did and died soon after.
The paranoia reached new heights in the early 1980s after a rash of Tylenol poisonings in which cyanide-laced acetaminophen was placed on store shelves and sold.