Halloween in the 70's

...Ahhh...ghastly ghouls and frightful sights....it's time to look back at Halloween with pure evil delight.

Halloween...let's face it...pretty much...was like the Super Bowl of having a ball for little kids growing up in the 70's....Indeed, in fact, it was pure, kid chaos...You pretty much, got your costume, you got your giant bag, that you had every intention of filling to the very top...and you just blazed a torrid path, out the door, and down the block...with a wild, reckless abandon, jumping from house to house, loading up a ton of candy, candy and more candy...Well, you guessed it, we just could not get enough candy....

In our house...we always had a giant pumpkin that my Dad would carve up and my Mom would decorate...She'd go to great lengths to make it a very unique pumpkin which would be dispalyed in our front picture window...all ablaze, with a flashlight in it...every Halloween season...My Mom would put bright white Desitin baby butt creme on the teeth of the pumpkin, to further enhance our pumpkin's smile...And the pumpkin would also have a big cigar hanging out of its mouth and a big, black top hat...giving him an aristocratic aura...There was also all kinds of Halloween decorations throughout the house and my favorite was the skeleton Dracula that was placed on the wall as you walked down the stairs into the basement...There was always excitement in the air around Halloween and we'd always hope for decent weather...at least not frigid cold...when the big day on October 31st rolled around...

Let's go back to the kiddie costumes back then...They were very primitive compared to today's standards. As a matter of fact, they were the most uncomfortable, ill-fitted pieces of crap...Taiwain had to offer. But hey, don't tell us that....it was our true, shining moment of glory...where, most of the time we became the embodiment of our favorite cartoon character...displayed for the world to see...for only just one day...

They say that your first Halloween costume that you remember wearing while growing up reflects the true inner you...Now think way back...and try to recall that first crazy kid costume. For me, I had every intention of buying that kick-ass SPIDERMAN costume....but they had sold that out quickly. Let's face it...Spiderman was as popular back then...as he is today...So...I was forced to venture into a different direction...while grabbing at every kiddie costume they had stacked in the aisles of our Zayre store up on Western Avenue...which was alot like a Wal-mart back then...I had to sift thru all of the Bugs Bunny, Road Runner, Bozo the Clown, Captain America, The Hulk, Fred Flinstone, Superman, Magilla Gorilla, Huckleberry Hound, Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy...and on and on and on...

What did I end up with....Egad...Don't say it...Don't even say it....Uhhh...Casper the Friendly Ghost...???....What was I thinking...???...Casper was this little whimpy ghost who would whine and cry, and I don't even know why he existed except for the fact that his whole schtick was him saying over and over that all ghosts aren't so, so SCARY. Yet Casper possessed his child-like innocence and it resonated a certain pure goodness...that had you somewhat transfixed...at a young, impressionable age...Let's face it, in my neighborhood, if you wore a Casper costume...you were gonna get your ass beat, big time and your candy bag ripped out of your hands...if you didn't watch out...and run like hell...

But there I was nonetheless, poised for my first Halloween adventure...when the big day rolled around, sporting the dorky, smiling white, plastic Casper mask...which was already suffocating me, only after 2 minutes, ...ready to boldly head out on a crisp, cool autumn afternoon...

Our neighborhood itself, was prime territory for maximizing your candy obsessions...It was just row after row, of closely knit houses, that streamed block after block, mile after mile...It was a given you would cover a 4-5 block radius...in a few hours...because you were on such a wild high as you ran from house to house...like a madman...just totally focused on landing those tasty treats...from every door to door...

I'm guessing, by the end of the day, my Halloween candy bag was filled with mini Snickers, 3 Muskateers...Kit-Kats...bubble gum, popcorn balls, sugar pixies, sweet tarts, cracker jack, lollipops, ju-ju fruits, Almond Joy, malted milk balls, candy corn, apples, Hershey bars, Nestle Crunch bars...and even those nasty, nasty, nasty, peanut-butter chews...Well, as you can probably guess...that was only half of what was inside my bag that day...It was just such a huge thrill to finally get back home to my house on 86th Street, with my heart still racing, pouring out all of the endless candy onto the living room carpet and just picking up the loads and loads of candy, and letting it all sift thru your fingers, in a complete frenzy of awesome delight...Sure, my Mom and Dad would laugh at all of the candy I had managed to collect, because they knew I'd probably try to eat it all in one day...They'd just chuckle and smile...That was just a given...of course...

As we got older...our costume got cooler, we thought...Most of the girls had elaborate witch costumes and all of the boys were dressed as bums...Bums, was definitely the premium boys costume, in our young adolescent heydey, because you could basically get your Mom to tear up some old, worn-out clothes and you could just smear dirt on your face...and that's it...you were good-to-go...Even the girls liked to dress like bums in our neighborhood...But our obsession with candy...kind of fell by the wayside...at that age...and our passion for throwing eggs at each other and shooting cans of shaving cream at each other...while running around and chasing after the girls...was our primary focus by then...

It was kind of a sad jump for us...Here we were, completely having a ball, screaming adolescents, all drenched in slimy eggs and loads of shaving cream, laughing at each other...but there was a small, small part of us...that still yearned for the candy part of Halloween...I think that may have been our first big realization that we were truly growing up, really, really fast...and you couldn't go back into that time anymore and be the little candy-crazed kid...

On Halloween nights...the neighborhood took on a more ghastly, foreboding glow...especially up at Carroll Park...as the older kids wreaked havoc...where there was your fair share...of people jumping out at you and scaring the hell out of you...in the dark...wearing frightful, terrifying, scary masks...Just a totally different world and certainly no place for the little Caspers and Clowns and Little Red Riding Hoods...alike...

But for the most part, it was our age of innocence...of wearing silly costumes, of getting excited over candy, of just being out by ourselves, going door-to-door...that remains at the heart of our Halloween memories...for us kids...remembering way, way back then...

I think we all appreciate all the memories that Halloween has given us throughout our years...Our one big chance, to just let go...and pretend to be something else...providing us with an endless amount of visions...so firmly locked in our minds...and a reason to grab a big, ripe pumpkin, to put up all the decorations, to load up on the crazy candy...and just let the kid inside of us...take hold...

HAPPY HALLOWEEN TO ONE AND ALL...