Halloween with Morris and Boris (1975)

While we're on the topic of Halloween-themed books, here's another one that predates me but which I only learned about through library books my wife checked out for our sons—Halloween with Morris and Boris, written and illustrated by Bernard Wiseman.

Like the Nate the Great books, this series features recurring characters. In this case, the two main characters are Morris the Moose and Boris the Bear, and the rapid-fire humor and running gags in these books are very much in the vein of old vaudeville and comic teams such as Abbott and Costello. In other words, you may find them occasionally tedious—as Morris constantly misunderstands Boris (the comedic foil of the duo) and Boris responds with mounting frustration.

Halloween with Morris and Boris is no different, though in my opinion, it's the most interesting book in the series. Here Boris must explain to his simple friend how trick-or-treating works, to convince Morris to participate. The characters literally stumble into their costumes, but have to swap when people are too scared of Boris to give him any candy. The pair end up being invited to a children's Halloween party, where they bob for apples, play Pin the Tail on the Donkey, and listen to ghost stories—before Morris gets frightened of his own reflection and runs away.

Wiseman's illustrations are great, and his limited color palette of orange, blue, and black works surprisingly well. It's fun to think of this odd couple of clowns roaming my neighborhood tonight, trying their best to fit in.

Happy Halloween to you and your loved ones!

Nate the Great and the Halloween Hunt (1989)

I don't remember reading or even hearing of the Nate the Great books when I was a child, even though the first in the series by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat was published in 1972, almost a decade before I entered kindergarten.

But I discovered and came to enjoy the character through my eldest son, who has enjoyed checking out these stories from the library and even adding some to his own book collection.

Nate the Great and the Halloween Hunt is, naturally, one we enjoy reading together this time of year.

For those not familiar with the books, Nate is a nine-year-old detective whose friends enlist him to solve various problems—typically a lost item or pet. Nate interviews people and, with his dog Sludge, follows their leads from location to location, gathering clues along the way that eventually reveal where the missing object is.

In Halloween Hunt, a cat belonging to Nate's eccentric friend Rosamond goes missing, and instead of trick-or-treating, Nate spends his evening following the trail of clues—even sneaking into the neighborhood's "old haunted house," where the cat ventures every Halloween.

My favorite part of this short book is Marc Simont's artwork, which is wonderfully atmospheric.

Halloween 1989

Halloween, 1989. The holiday was on a Tuesday that year, as it is this year. It was surely one of my most awkward Halloweens.

I was in eighth grade. Tim Burton's first Batman movie was the biggest blockbuster that summer, and was still my favorite movie when autumn rolled around. By October, I had decided to be the Joker for Halloween. Around the middle of the month, I dressed as the character for a youth group costume party at church.

Although I don't remember where I bought the face makeup, it was probably at the local Sav-on Drugs. It was pretty cheap stuff as I recall, because the white paint dried out quickly and was thoroughly cracked by the end of the night. Of course, I painted my mouth into a wide red grin a la Jack Nicholson, and sprayed my head with green hairspray. (Using hairspray was nothing out of the ordinary for me back then!) For the costume, I wore black jeans along with a button-up shirt that had a small checked or plaid pattern colored with purple and/or green—the closest thing in my closet to a Jokeresque outfit.

That night, my younger sister went out trick-or-treating with her friends. My older brother was at home, hoping to watch Night of the Living Dead on television—probably on the popular show Night Flight—but Mom didn't approve of the subject matter. After a long workday, Dad was probably resting on the couch between trips to the front door to hand out treat bags.

We had put up several cardboard decorations inside and out, from the "HAPPY HALLOWEEN" sign on a closet door to the smiling paper pumpkin hung outside the front door. We had a carved pumpkin lit up on the front porch outside, but also a pumpkin inside the foyer on which my brother drew the face of Mad Magazine mascot Alfred E. Neuman.

Just outside our side door into the garage, I set up a large ghost figure I'd constructed a couple weeks earlier. The head was a basketball covered in black electrical tape and fitted with a long blond wig. The body was a simple wooden contraption covered with a white sheet. I vaguely recall it having at least one moveable arm. I somehow thought that this figure would be visible to trick-or-treaters on the sidewalk near our house. But since only the head was visible from outside the fence, I doubt anyone saw it but me.

Mom drove me around the neighborhood in our Dodge Caravan so that I could trick-or-treat. Wanting to document the trip, I took along our large camcorder and made a few shots out the passenger window. Street lamps and objects in the car's headlights occasionally light up the shadowy video, though it remains pretty dark throughout. However, I captured a fairly good shot of the front of one neighborhood home, with its warm jack-o-lantern faces, yellow porch light, and softly glowing windows.

By the time we returned home, an episode of Matlock ("The Star," which pays tribute to horror films of old) was playing on TV. My sister had come home as well, and we sat by the fireplace in the living room, examining our bags of sweet Halloween loot.

As an eighth grader, it was one of the last times I trick-or-treated for myself. I enjoyed the holiday in my own introverted way, though it was a far cry from the excitement of earlier times, such as Halloween 1982 when I dressed as the Incredible Hulk. But now I experience the excitement of Halloween in a different way—as a father. As the leaves pile up and the nights grow chilly, I anticipate walking my sons along the streets of our neighborhood and up to those warmly-lit front porches. 

(Updated Sept. 24, 2024)

Leftover Candy

Halloween 2023 swiftly approaches. Yet at our house, evidence of last year's candy collection remains.

As my eldest son grows older and his trick-or-treating stamina increases, he inevitably brings home a fuller bucket of candy every year. While he enjoys sweets, it doesn't take much candy to satisfy his craving for it. Like his dear old dad did as a child, he prefers "making it last" instead of gobbling it all up in the weeks before Thanksgiving. For him, making it last means occasionally taking out a piece or two at dessert time, unless there's something better in the house—like ice cream or Mom's delicious cookies.

The result is that his bucket never goes empty. Whatever candy he gets on Christmas and Easter gets piled on top of the Halloween loot. So there in the corner of the pantry, the Halloween bucket sits for most of the year with the leftover candy zipped into baggies to discourage ants.

This means that for the next two weeks I can have all of it I want, since it will otherwise be thrown out before Halloween night. I doubt my son will protest against me eating one of his year-old Fun Size Snickers.

Treat Bags

When I was young, filling treat bags was an important part of Halloween preparations. Our house sat at the closed end of a suburban cul-de-sac, and typically several dozen trick-or-treaters stopped there each year. To make candy distribution easier, Mom got in the habit of buying treat bags and filling them on the dining room table a day or two before Halloween, making sure to distribute the various candies equally. When she ran out of the fancy treat bags, she used plain brown paper ones and put stickers on them.

In my younger years I was mostly focused on assembling my costume and satiating my lust for sugar, and paid little attention to the treat bags except for not wanting Mom to give away all the good candy. Now I can very much appreciate the care she took in preparing treats for the children who would come to our door. And I think back fondly to how the small foyer in our house looked on Halloween night, with a basket of bags positioned next to the front door, additional bags set under a nearby table lamp, and a few festive knickknacks on display.

Because my most recent memories of trick-or-treating were as an adolescent who was old enough to do so without his parents, I don't have many clear memories of Mom and Dad accompanying my siblings and me around the neighborhood. But I suspect that for at least some of those years, Mom took us trick-or-treating while Dad stayed home and handed out the candy.

There is an impalpable comfort in knowing that Dad is back at home, probably on the couch watching a holiday program (or, more likely, the evening news), waiting for knocks at the door to beckon him to the treat basket. 

Frame grabs, top to bottom: 

• Ozzie and Harriet, "Halloween Party" 
• Happy Days, "Haunted" 
• Bewitched, "Trick or Treat" and "Safe and Sane Halloween" 
• Everybody Loves Raymond, "Halloween Candy"

Halloween 1982

Halloween 1982 was a big event for me.  I was 6 years old at the time and obsessed with The Incredible Hulk.  The previous summer was mostly spent running around the yard with cut-off shorts and no shirt, roaring menacingly at my sister.  But I was small, white, and blond.  Although I sometimes forgot this fact when I was truly in character, it was very embarassing when my dad had his video camera zoomed in on me, knowing that I didn't look anything like Lou Ferrigno.  In fact, one particular video shows me running in front of the camera and, in my best Hulk voice, pausing to offer this explanation to the audience: "I'm not painted green because I didn't have time!"

 



But that Halloween, I didn't want to make excuses anymore.  I wanted to BE The Hulk.  So, my mom found a black wig at the drug store and some green grease makeup.  I put on my cut-offs and a plaid shirt with rolled-up sleeves (with a green t-shirt underneath and wadded socks to make my biceps bulge).  And I had the best time that night, carrying my plastic pumpkin bucket, and flexing proudly for the video camera, allowing my dad to zoom in all he wanted.

Looking back at the video, I was still a pretty underwhelming Hulk; the makeup was uneven around my mouth, which just made me look dirty, and though my mom did her best to fix it, the shapeless wig looked like a ski cap.  But it was a special Halloween for me, one of my favorites, and I had a good night trick-or-treating with my older brother (the demon baseball player) and my younger sister (Tweety Bird).  Judging by the size of his treat bag, my brother was expecting a lot more candy than I was.

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966)

Originally aired October 27, 1966. The Peanuts gang celebrates by trick-or-treating and attending the big Halloween party, while Linus and Sally spend the evening in the pumpkin patch waiting for the Great Pumpkin to arrive. It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown is, without a doubt, the most cherished Halloween special of all time. My family and I now watch this every year on DVD as we carve our jack-o-lantern. But when I was a child, it was a special occasion to catch the annual TV broadcast. While commercials tend to annoy me, I actually looked forward to those that often accompanied this Halloween special. I remember when airings from the mid-80s often included candy ads for Mounds and Almond Joy, Caramello, Peppermint Patties, and others.

Here is a recording from October 24, 1980, shared on YouTube by the Museum of Classic Chicago Television, that includes the spinning "CBS SPECIAL" logo, as well as the opening of the program up to the first station break, and commercials that followed:

And here is the full video of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (1966):

Punky Brewster: Love Thy Neighbor (1985)

Originally aired November 17, 1985. On Halloween night, a woman named Isabelle Peavy behaves rudely to the children in Punky's building and refuses to give them candy. Punky and Cherie enter her apartment to play a joke on her, but their plans go awry when Brandon accidentally gets left behind. The next day, Henry goes over to retrieve the dog, and he ends up learning some interesting information about Isabelle. (Synopsis from TV.com) Watch episode on NBC.com.

The Cosby Show: Cliff's Mistake (1987)

Originally aired October 15, 1987. Cliff's neighbor Jeffrey gets angry when Cliff can't find the drill that he borrowed. The Huxtable kids prepare for Halloween by building a haunted house in the basement. (Synopsis from TV.com)

Happy Days: Fonsillectomy (1977)

Originally aired October 25, 1977. Fonzie is ill, and the doctor says he must go into hospital the next day to have his tonsils removed, meaning that he will miss the Cunningham's Halloween party. The Fonz does not take the news well. Worse still, the only spare place in the hospital is on the children's ward. (Synopsis from Wikipedia)

National Safety Council PSA (1989)

Public service announcement about Halloween safety, featuring Garfield and Odie. Some of the animation from "Garfield's Halloween Adventure" was used for this commercial.

Roseanne: Halloween the Final Chapter (1995)

Originally aired October 31, 1995. Roseanne is "Queen of the Gypsies, consort of wizards and seer of souls" on Halloween. An Ouija board sends a message and foretells an unexpected event...a new baby. (Synopsis from Hubpages.com)

Major Dad: There's No Place Like Farlow (1992)

Originally aired October 30, 1992. While Casey (Chelsea Hertford) is home sick on Halloween, she dreams that everyone is a frightening monster. With Gerald McRaney and Shanna Reed. (Synopsis from IMDB.com)

Bewitched: Trick or Treat (1965)

Originally aired October 28, 1965. When Darrin defies Endora again by insisting Samantha remain at home during Halloween, Endora places a curse on Darrin that slowly begins transforming him into a werewolf. (Synopsis from hulu.com)

The Mask: All Hallows Eve (1995)

Animated series based on the 1994 film with Jim Carrey. This episode originally aired October 28, 1995.

Blossom: All Hallows Eve (1992)

Originally aired October 26, 1992. Blossom and Six fear a crazed killer on Halloween. (Synopsis from Fancast.com)

Pooh's Heffalump Halloween Movie (2005)

It's Halloween in the Hundred Acre Wood. Roo's best new pal, Lumpy, is excited to trick-or-treat for the first time. However, Tigger warns them about the dreaded Gobloon who'll turn them into Jaggedy Lanterns if he catches them. But if they catch the Gobloon before it catches them, they will be able to make a wish. With Roo by his side, Lumpy knows he can face anything. So when Pooh eats all the Halloween candy, Lumpy and Roo decide to be 'brave together, brave forever' and catch the Gobloon so they can wish for more. When Roo thinks Lumpy is turned into a pumpkin, Roo decides to wish for something more important. (Synopsis from ?)

Donald's Halloween Scare (2000)

Donald scares his nephews to steal their candy, and they plot their revenge. This cartoon feels similar to the 1954 Donald Duck classic "Trick or Treat."

The Halloween Tree (1993)

Four children learn the origins of Halloween customs while trying to save the life of their friend. This Emmy-winning animated film is narrated by Ray Bradbury, who based the screenplay on his 1972 novel.

The Haunted History of Halloween (1997)

In this History of the Holidays segment, the History Channel examines Halloween. Discover the history of Halloween and how the Celts played a part in this popular holiday.