Halloween Parade of Costumes

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The custom of trick-or-treating and wearing costumes is thought to have originated with the first few centuries of the Christian era and European custom called Souling.

At the time, it was believed that the souls of the dead were out and around for a time after death. Offerings of food and drink were left out to placate them. It was also believed that prayer, even by strangers, could expedite a soul's passage to heaven.

On November 2, All Souls Day, early Christians would walk from village to village begging for "soul cakes," made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. Dressing like dreadful creatures and roaming from door to door demanding treats gradually became more recent custom of trick-or-treating.

Today Halloween is more and more becoming masquerade, like Mardi Gras costumes. People in every imaginable costume are walking through the streets of big American cities on Halloween. But, even to this day, witches, ghosts, and skeleton of the dead remain the favorite of all Halloween costumes. In so doing, they are recognizing death as a part of life. But, the true value and importance of Halloween is in contact with neighborhood that we rarely see the rest of the year, which help us overcome our fears of strangers, reaffirming our social bond with other people.

Please join us by sharing photos of costumes of Halloween Past..... Whether it was homemade in the 30s or store bought in the 80s.... on a mannequin, in a gallery.. on a hanger, or being modelled by your favorite piece of "vintage"...you!

Thank you Jonathan for the picture above!!

 

No pics of me as a kid dressed up - my mom was just not a picture taker. :( These are the oldest ones I could find. Circa 1980's.

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The Sheik and I - 1981

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1985 - Creatively Costumed Friends...don't you just love the matchbook cover??
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The Colonel and Crazy Old Lady - he/she is wearing vintage!!

Can't wait to see all of your old pics!!
Bonnie

 

Hubba Hubba Bonnie! LOL

I was hoping my dad would scan and email the pics from his childhood halloween that they have at the house. I would say it was circa 1953/1955ish My aunt was a rich lady in a fur coat wearing my great aunt's real fur, my uncle and i think also their cousin was a cowboy and I forget who everyone else was.

 

Oh, hello Mr. Sheik....

 

Okay, mine are boring... sorry, but all the Halloween pics of me as a kid are gone...

So, all I have are these ones, one from a Halloween party in 1990 when I was the Berlin Wall, with a Checkpoint Charlie hat and barbed wire strung all over me and Kenn went as a recycling bin. (We had been invited to a party where we had to come in a home made costume representing some newsworthy item of the past year). That was the year they introduced the recycling program in Toronto, and of course that was the year that the Berlin wall came down. Bizarrely, we were the only two there that picked up on those themes and I won a best costume award for most political statement and Kenn won the best costume award for "trashiest" costume. That doesn't mean much though, since there were about 60 people at that party and I think 55 prizes!

This other pic was from 1993 where we went to a HUGe fundraiser at some bar. I went as "film" with a film reel on my head and scads of film hung all over me, Kenn went as "chess" and our girlfriend went as a character from an Edward Gorey book -- a widow in weeds.


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Oh gosh..now I have to go hunt through all my old photos!

 

Susan...if you have a vintage costume that you sold to, feel free to post it as well.

"""Okay, mine are boring"""

no, those costumes are very creative! I think Kenn's "trashy" costume is the funniest..

""""Oh, hello Mr. Sheik.... """"

Is Mr. Sheik Mr. Bonton*Vintage or a mysterious stranger?

1985? I think that year I went as a Rubik's Cube...but that might have been '84 i don't remember Cut holes in a box and colored all the different squares in. I used the same box a year later and was a table with a working lamp. My mom wouldn't throw the darn thing out so i recycled it.

 

Great costumes Jonathan!! That golden hair is something else!!!!

Mr. Sheik is my high school sweetheart. I run into him from time to time...he's still hunky but stangely into all kinds of psychic stuff and a steady diet of mega vitamins!

 

What a fun thread! Jonathan, I love your recycle costume :D

I can't find all of my pics at the moment - but here's a pic of a friend and I 7 or 8 years ago. Not sure what she was supposed to be, but I was Carrie. Mwahahahaaaa!

Man, was I sticky and gross by the end of the night! (Yeah, I know, the wig sucked!)



-Melanie

 

Good Carrie costume Mel!! Here are a few bloody ones of my macabre dh.

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The Cooking Accident

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Corpse

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Thankfully he had a bloodless halloween last year.

 

I couldn't find any really old pictures of myself. I had a thing for indians and spent many years with blond haired, pale faced me pretending to be an indian. Very funny.

I did find this picture from high school. The blond hair in this pic is a wig. That was one of my cats, Repo. He looks possessed in this photo but he was really a sweety.

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I can see the photo now (couldn't before). what a sweet kitty! he looks like he thinks he is a little human in that photo

 

Repo did think he was a human. He used to wait until our neighbors would pull up with groceries and then just stroll on into their houses while the doors were open. Apparently two of our neighbors thought that was so cute that they would feed him little snacks when he came over. What a ham!

 

Great Pictures! You all look great! I have no pictures at least that I can get to without a lot of digging! Keep them coming though, I really enjoy seeing everyone creativity!

 

Mel, your friend's mask reminds me of one of those ceramic masks that people paint flowers, etc on. But it vaguely vaguely reminds me of some alien from a movie. i am not quite sure.

 

There was a really funny story behind my friend in that pic that night. (Not sure what she was supposed to be - but that thing around her neck was supposed to be a picture of her in that outfit on vacation or something. It was really odd!)

She was a producer that had worked with at the time, and she had married a guy that I had gone to film school with - but I didn't know that. Her husband was wearing the same outfit. I didn't know who they were at first when they showed up at the party. Her husband came up to me and said, "Melanie! Wow, I haven't seen you in years! You have to meet my wife...." She sorta gasped, took off her mask, and that was when I found out that they were married.

Lordy, did that make any sense? Anyway it was a BIZARRE way to find out that they were married, LOL!

-Melanie

 

that is weird, Mel

All this time you never met her husband, but knew him but didn't know it.

I had a kid in my film class that i swear reminded me of someone but i didn't know who and he was actually a friend of my cousin's but i hadn't seen him in eons.

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I couldn't get ahold of any old pictures, but i absolutely cannot resist showing off pics of my little trick or treaters.
There are little people behind those dog costumes (esp Alex, top photo, who believes that he is not a dog). Alex joined our family 4 years ago this halloween

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Oh Oh

Here's a Happy Halloween from Nanc!!!
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you crack me up!

 

The pictures not vintage, but the clothes are. It all came from Ebay.

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