The Halloween Chronicles: Night 6 of 11

So far we’ve talked about Halloween parties, costumes, and all the downright dumb things women did to find themselves a husband. While some people we’re inside peeling apples and burning nuts, there were others outside, causing all kinds of trouble.

By the early 1900s, Halloween had become a pretty popular night for pulling pranks. Some of the stuff had been going on for years, but by the 1920s and 1930s, things were getting a little out of hand.

Here I thought I was a little shit growing up…

One of the more popular Halloween pranks was stealing someone’s gate right off its hinges. Sometimes they hid it and other times they would put it somewhere like on top of a building. I guess this happens so often in some places that Halloween was even called Gate Night 🤣🤦‍♀️

I found an account of the following story in the University of Detroit Mercy’s folklore archives. In 1972 someone shared a family story about their uncles pulling Halloween pranks back in the 1920s. The story says they pushed over an outhouse sitting on a little hill. They heard somebody yelling as the thing rolled downhill. I guess there was an old man inside. 🤣🙃💩 Good thing he wasn’t hurt, but he did recognize one of the boys voices. I have a feeling somebody got a whooping. 😬😆

I have so many questions but the one I want answered the most has nothing to do with this. I wanna know how did they clean those fuckers back then? Did they just dig a new hole, pick up the outhouse and place it over the new? Then go cover up the old hole? 🤔
That will be research for another day! 😆

Some of the other popular pranks were soaking windows, ringing doorbells and running away (which is still popular today in my neighborhood) 👊🏻, moving things around in people’s yards, and just generally annoying the hell out of the neighborhood.
This all sounds pretty tame and maybe even familiar to some of us that grew up in the 70s and 80s… Just add in the toilet papered trees 🧻 🌳
Some of these little hooligans took it a lot further back then. There are reports of people tying ropes across sidewalks to trip pedestrians, letting air out of tires, breaking windows, and even setting fires.

In 1894, a group of about 200 boys in Washington reportedly threw flour at nicely, dressed people riding in streetcars. (Isn’t that redundant…kinda like hot water heater?) 🤔😆
Anyway. Stay on track, Louie. 🫡
How did these kids get so many of them together back then without technology? I mean 200 is a lot of people and it’s not like they can just blend into the crowd.

By the time the Great Depression rolled around in the 1930s, Halloween vandalism had become a serious problem in some communities. It wasn’t kids just having fun anymore. People are dealing with damaged property and dangerous behavior.

People eventually got pretty fed up with all those crap and so community started coming up with ways to keep the kids entertained and hopefully out of trouble. Parties, parades, costume contest, anything to keep the kids out of trouble.

And that my friends, brings us to trick-or-treating!
When did Halloween become all about going Georgia door-to-door collecting candy? It certainly didn’t start out that way.

That will be for Night 7.

Here’s my question tonight: What kind of Halloween mischief did you get into growing up? Were you one of the little hellraisers (like my brother) or were you the good kid who just happened to be hanging around the hellraisers… 😬 (like me 😇)

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The Halloween Chronicles: Night 6 of 11

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