Halloween 2010

We made it. Another Halloween is finally upon us! AND just when we thought we were going to have spend it in our shorts and flip-flops, Mother Nature rears her head and the Earth begins to freeze once more.

As we celebrate this special time of year, take some time to reflect on the true history and meaning of Halloween.

Take a look at this article from History Channel’s Halloween history:

Halloween, celebrated each year on October 31, is a mix of ancient Celtic practices, Catholic and Roman religious rituals and European folk traditions that blended together over time to create the holiday we know today. Straddling the line between fall and winter, plenty and paucity and life and death, Halloween is a time of celebration and superstition. Halloween has long been thought of as a day when the dead can return to the earth, and ancient Celts would light bonfires and wear costumes to ward off these roaming ghosts. The Celtic holiday of Samhain, the Catholic Hallowmas period of All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day and the Roman festival of Feralia all influenced the modern holiday of Halloween. In the 19th century, Halloween began to lose its religious connotation, becoming a more secular community-based children's holiday. Although the superstitions and beliefs surrounding Halloween may have evolved over the years, as the days grow shorter and the nights get colder, people can still look forward to parades, costumes and sweet treats to usher in the winter season.

You can read more here: http://www.history.com/topics/halloween or here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween

So, whether this Halloween season was about trick-or-treating, haunted housing, dressing in costume, carving pumpkins, or parties, we hope that it was everything that you hoped for and more!

Thank you for joining us this and every season! We hope you enjoyed reading our articles and content as much as we enjoyed providing them.

From all of us at Haunted House Chicago to all of you and yours, we wish you a very safe, haunted, and Happy Halloween!

AND stay tuned for the announcement of the 2010 Critics Top 13, Jim Warfield Acting Award recipient, and the 2010 People’s Choice Award!