Remembering Halloween in an Earlier Day

Jack-O-Lantern design by Ruth Apps. Photo by Jerry Apps

When I was a kid, Halloween meant tricks only. No “trick or treats.” The favorite trick was tipping over somebody’s outhouse. No one had indoor plumbing in those days. The country school outhouses were favorite targets.

The toilet tippers tried to avoid the possibility that someone might be in the structure when it was tipped. If that were the case, the consequences would be dire. Some farmers were known to sit up most of Halloween night, shotgun in hand, protecting their outhouses.

Another trick I heard about was a group of tricksters that managed to take the neighbor’s horse harnesses and put them on his cows. There was no dressing up in strange costumes and walking from house to house—just too much effort as the farm homes were at least half a mile apart.

We always had a Halloween party at our country school, with the mother’s invited. (The men were usually still involved with the fall harvest.) We bobbed for apples that floated in a galvanized washtub. The only way to retrieve an apple was to hold your breath and chase your apple of choice to the bottom of the tub, resulting in a very wet head. Additionally, the teacher would blindfold us and led us past a bowl of grapes, which we would feel and be informed they were a ghost’s eyeballs. We would smell some vinegar—a witch’s brew, and feel some cooked spaghetti—I don’t remember what the spaghetti represented. Mothers brought cookies and cake for treats.

At home, we carved pumpkins and put a lighted candle in them. But no trick or treating. Older boys usually were the ones involved with neighborhood tricks.

THE OLD TIMER SAYS: Fond memories of Halloweens past.

UPCOMING EVENTS:

November 9, (Saturday) 9:00 a.m. 2nd Sat. Plymouth Art Center, Plymouth, WI. Sheboygan County Historical Research Center. “Farm Winter With Jerry Apps.”

November 14, (Thursday) 6:00 p.m. Patterson Memorial Library, Wild Rose. The Land Still Lives launch.

November 18, 1:00 p.m. Kiel Public Library, Kiel, WI. “Wisconsin. CCC”

For those interested in purchasing my books (Christmas is coming). Get them from the Friends of the Patterson Memorial Library in Wild Rose—a fundraiser for them. Phone: 920-622-3835 for prices and ordering.

Patterson Memorial Library
500 Division Street
Wild Rose, WI 54984
barnard@wildroselibrary.
www.wildroselibrary.org

If you travel in the western part of the state, stop at Ruth’s home town, Westby and visit Dregne’s. They have a great selection of my books for sale or order a book by calling them at 1-877-634-4414.
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