October 1969

These days Halloween is a big business, with entire retail spaces devoted to costumes and decorations, but it was not always like that. Although there were several rows of boxes with thin nylon costumes and plastic masks with cheap elastic bands that always broke almost before you could wear them lined up on shelves in the discount department store near our house, when I was a kid the holiday was a little less involved, but just as exciting and fun. 

In fact, one of the clearest memories of my childhood is Halloween 1969. [Insert wavy screen and harp music here.]

The orchestra was just striking the first notes of the theme music to Bewitched on TV, and I looked anxiously at my mom. "When is Daddy going to get home?" It was the Thursday night before Halloween the next day, and our perfect pumpkin was waiting to become our perfect jack o'lantern. 

Bedtime was usually 8:30, but tonight the plan was to watch America's favorite witch at 9:00 while carving the pumpkin. Just then, the front door opened and my dad came in, smelling of smoke and cool evening air. We rushed to greet him as we always did, hugging his legs. 

It was Dad's job to use our biggest knife to cut a circle around the stem and pull the top of the pumpkin off. After that, my mom scooped out the insides with a large kitchen spoon and plopped them into a bowl. My brother and sister and I plucked the slippery seeds from the stringy, orange guts, placing them into a separate dish where we would toss them with salt and oil and roast them in the oven for a crunchy, once-a-year snack.

Next, since there was only one pumpkin and three kids, we each picked a folded slip of paper from Phillies baseball cap to see who got to create the eyes, the nose, or the mouth. We drew our shapes on the back of the paper, and my mom transferred our designs in pencil to the pumpkin. Then my dad went to work again, carefully cutting along each line.

When he was finished, he carried our creation out to the front porch, my mom behind him with a candle and the three-legged milking stool we kept as an extra seat in the living room. Outside, we set the pumpkin on the stool by the door and placed the candle inside. Then we all stepped back while my dad lit the candle and my mom turned off the porch light, revealing the glowing face of our jack o'lantern.

Before bed that night, my mom had us try on the costumes that she had made for us. We were going to be the Rice Krispies elves, Snap, Crackle, and Pop. She had a lightweight cardboard replica of the cereal box for each of us to wear over our heads. Underneath, we were in tights and different colored t-shirts. Then I, as the oldest, had Snap's floppy white chef's hat, my brother had Krackle's red-and-white striped stocking cap, and my three-year-old sister wore a yellow toque.

She pinned our hats to finalize the fit so that our costumes would be ready for the parade and class party at school the next day. Then she sent us off to bed where we dreamed of the perfect Halloween we would have tomorrow.