A Newfield Halloween

A Newfield

The History of Halloween

by Weronika Karpio

As you walk the streets filled with ghouls made of spools of unruled material and hear the laughter and chatting of monsters with buckets of chocolates, think back as to why you’re even dressed in a costume, walking house to house collecting candy. Do you know how, why, and when Halloween started and how it evolved to what it is today?

Let's get some background on when Halloween began and how it was celebrated. For that, we have to go back 2,000 years to the Celts, an ancient group of people native to western European nations such as Ireland. Halloween was originally celebrated to ward off evil spirits by dressing in costume and dancing around bonfires. It was celebrated as a new year at the end of the harvest season and welcomed the dark part of the year, winter. So how did a festival celebrating the New Year turn into getting candy from strangers? Well, the Romans conquered the lands where the Celtics lived and for over 400 years their festival and 2 Roman festivals mixed, those being Feralia, the passing of the dead, when Romans also believed that ghosts would roam with them, and the celebration of the goddess Pomona, who is the goddess of fruits and trees. This is where apple bobbing came from because Pomona is represented by an apple. The blending of cultures doesn't stop there because eventually, Christianity came to Europe, if you are familiar with All Souls Day and All Saints Day, they were set to be celebrated November 1st and 2nd. All Souls Day was celebrated similarly to the Celtics with big bonfires, parades and dressing up in costumes as saints, angels, and devils. The All Saints’ Day celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints’ Day) and the night before it, the traditional night of Samhain in the Celtic religion, began to be called All-Hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween.

When this holiday came to America it was primarily celebrated in Maryland with parties where people would share stories of the dead, tell each other’s fortunes, dance, and sing, however, this did not spread everywhere in America and was not very popular. The way Halloween is celebrated and known happened because of the Irish potato famine. Large floods of Irish immigrants came to America and with them their spirits and traditions. Halloween became popular in America in the second half of the 19th century.

So how did candy and trick or treating come to this? Well, Americans, copying the Europeans, started going to others' houses and asking for money and or food while in costume. There were some new traditions that developed, for example, young women thought they could foresee their future husbands' faces by doing tricks with yarn, apple parings, or mirrors. There was a shift in focus since the people wanted to avoid talks of witchcraft and ghosts; they instead wanted the holiday to be more about the community so in the 1800s children and their parents started to throw Halloween parties focused on games, foods of the season, and festive costumes. By the 1920s and 1930s, Halloween became a secular but community-centered holiday the people celebrated with parades and large Halloween parties included. Between 1920 and 1950, trick-or-treating was also brought back as part of the Halloween festivities. Trick-or-treating was a relatively inexpensive way for communities to share Halloween joy and entertain children so there would be no more issues of vandalism (That was a problem in the 1930s). In theory, families could also prevent tricks from being played on them by providing the neighborhood children with small treats to quell their anger the same way the Celtics dressed up and danced around a bonfire to chase away the angry and dark spirits. 6

Trick or Treat Street is Back!

Article by Saitta Roy, Photos by Zayda Hernandez

I'm sure we all remember the disappointment we felt last year when it was announced that Trick or Treat Street was canceled. Well, it’s back! With an admission fee of $8 for adults and $6 for children (both of which could be lowered by $2 if the participant brought in a canned good for the food drive), Newfield’s National Honor Society raised over $2,500 for senior scholarships!

This year's Trick or Treat Street was full of excitement. The Haunted Hospital was put on by the National Honor Society in the library. With the help of cosmetology students, four students were able to creep out little kids by dressing up as zombie surgeons. Nearby in the cafeteria were fun Halloween-themed games put on by Tri-M and the Thespian Society. The main attraction was the musical chairs in the center of the cafeteria. They had plenty of candy for all of the little game participants. Next to the cafeteria, in the teacher's lounge was the National Art Honor Society and cosmetology students painting the faces of little kids. The Varsity Leaders Club had a fun time in the gym with plenty of games for the kids to play, like scooter tunnels and spider web obstacles. Our G.O. Officers wore matching Toy Story costumes, their room had an art and crafts station where kids could make ghost lollipops and other crafts.

More TOTS Photography

BY ZAYDA HERNANDEZ