MovieChat Forums > Meet Me in St. Louis Discussion > was the halloween scene an accurate depi...

was the halloween scene an accurate depiction of the time?

posted 11 years ago by erinthelass
17 replies | jump to latest

I'm curious whether such practices as lighting bonfires and throwing flour in neighbors' faces was how Halloween was actually conducted by children in 1903. The business of throwing flour in faces and telling people you "hate them" while you're doing it goes well beyond the "trick-or-treat" model employed by kids today (and kids from the last 50 years as far as I know). I found the whole scene at best odd, and at worst upsetting. But maybe that's how Halloween was "done" in 1903. Any history buffs out there who could shed some light on this?

[–] bonidea 11 years ago

My guess is yes. My father was born in 1927 and has told me stories about Halloweens back then that are similar to what the movie depicts. (Except they would throw stuffed dummies in front of the cars driven by drunks coming out of the local bar.) Don't forget this movie is based on a book written by the author from memories of her childhood.

[–] erinthelass 11 years ago

Thanks for that input. Would like to hear from others whose relatives can recall that era.

[–] volstork 10 years ago

My grandmother and her younger sister were born in 1906 and 1910 and used to tell me similar stories about playing pranks on neighbors. They said their brothers put a neighbor's buggy on top of his garage.

(They also described a Halloween carnival at school that is similar to the one Harper Lee features at the end of "To Kill A Mockingbird.")

[–] muchmeow 8 years ago

"Except they would throw stuffed dummies in front of the cars..." Don't forget, they did that too in this movie. Agnes and Tootie find an old dress and stuff it, then they put in on the trolly tracks as a prank.

[–] crlnrgbrght5 10 years ago

So, back then they didn't go door to door begging for treats? Or, was it just about dressing in costume and playing pranks?

[–] RichN36 10 years ago

I was thinking about that as well. The Halloween sequence was beyond odd. But I guess it would be close to what was going on. Even after Tootie did her prank, she didn't see the guy laugh as he wiped the Flower off his face. I would guess the folks would put out broken chairs and Junk for the kids to steal and burn in the town square.

Col. G. Stonehill: Most people around here have heard of Rooster Cogburn.

[–] johnsokw 8 years ago

beyond odd? If many people did it, and I guess the screenwriters used the stories from the book and the author wasn't making it up and it was a common prank then it's not odd at all. e.g. On birthdays, it is not odd to stick candles in a cake and lighting them only to blow them out. It doesn't solve any problem. It's not profitable, nor healthy, but it's not odd-- in America at least.

[–] greenbudgie 10 years ago

I think that bonfires have been part of the Halloween tradition for centuries. In the UK an effigy is burnt on fires on November 5th. It is called the Guy. Fireworks night and Halloween are so close together that I think that they are part of the same celebration. November 5th commemorates the Gunpowder Plot lead by Guy Fawkes.

I notice that the children cross-dressed in their ceremony. I think that wearing clothes of the opposite sex goes way back too. January has been a time for this at the start of the old ploughing season. I don't know what the reason is. A lot of meaning behind those customs have been lost.

I didn't particularly like the girl taking revenge on the grumpy old man. He didn't refuse to contribute anything like in the trick and treat rituals now. So it was just a case of dare. It is interesting that flour was used back even then. I didn't like the way that the adults encouraged the wetting of flour to make it stick to it's victims. Children's betters teaching them how to misbehave seems a bit odd.

[–] KatrinaW 10 years ago

The thing that gets me is all the young children playing in front of the huge bonfire! "Okay kids, go out and have fun by the big fire, with your costumes made of layers of clothing"!

[–] dollvalley 10 years ago

Hilarious observation :)

[–] ida96 8 years ago

I was wondering too why there was no adult supervision of all the risky stuff and potential misbehavior and reckless chat about killing people. Definitely not like anything I saw of Halloween growing up in the 1950s/60s.

[–] liscarkat (19418) a year ago

Then you didn't grow up in the 1950s/60s that I grew up in. We had a lot of not-necessarily-safe fun on Halloween night, kids of every age out everywhere long after dark, with zero adult supervision. Glad I lived where I lived instead of where you lived.

[–] marktayloruk (2590) a year ago

Less paranoid then.

[–] AmyJolamb 9 years ago

Yes. My grandma told me stories of soaping windows to hide the trouble the kids would do. It was a night for kids to go wild and some caused some serious trouble some even using fire. She spoke of kids setting fire to fence and almost burning a field! These were kids.

She like me was a history buff. She said some kids in New York set fire to buildings and people died one Halloween. She said it was not long after that Halloween parties started to keep kids and others safe.

[–] cmashieldscapting 9 years ago

Such pranks and destruction were the reason parades, parties, and trick-or-treat began to come into fashion around 1914.

[–] moosefeather 8 years ago

Midchief Night is what it was called. And it was actually the night before Halloween.

[–] CoriSCapnSkip (2756) 3 years ago

Before 1914 and a woman named Elizabeth Krebs in Hiawatha, Kansas, pretty much anything went. https://www.daimonologia.org/2015/11/elizabeth-krebs-founder-of-our-modern.html The term "trick-or-treat" first appeared in print in 1927 and became nationwide later on. Even in the 1930s vandalism was so bad with fires and such there was talk of banning Halloween.