Written By Alice Gibb
In 1933, octogenarian Jane Farley, of a pioneering West Nissouri family, happily recalled Halloween pranks of the 1850s.
“Halloween was looked forward to more as a night for fun in the community than was Christmas night,” she told a Free Press reporter.
The tradition in the Farley home was to serve up a roast goose on Halloween night, inviting other families to drop by for the Halloween festivities. Pumpkins were scooped out by the children and on coming up the Farley driveway; guests were sometimes met by strange and weird faces.
Inside the house, tubs of water with apples bobbing on top stood in the kitchen. Pantry shelves would be lined with homemade pumpkin pies. At one Halloween celebration, one of the pumpkin pies was so enormous that it had to be baked in a large bread pan.
After the Halloween meal had ended, older folk joined in singing favorite songs and hymns, or sat and visited. Their “snacks” were walnuts, hickory nuts and beech nuts gathered in the West Nissouri woods. The children often made taffy from the large cakes of maple sugar which were commonplace in settlers’ homes.
Out along the concession roads of the township, older boys and young men took part in much more mischievous activities. It was a common practice to dismantle farmers’ fences or to build barriers across the roads.
Travelers, surprised when their horses stopped dead in their tracks, often discovered that they had to detour several miles out of their way in order to get back home. Also, sometimes families arriving home after midnight would find their gates wired so tightly shut that they could not get into their laneways.
Miss Farley noted that although Halloween was the night for ghosts, witches, goblins, and lots of pranks, rarely were there any reports of serious property damage.
Speaking of ghosts, the first cemetery in the township was located on Miss Farley’s grandfather’s farm where nine settlers were laid to rest. A clearing was later found on the nearby Robbins’ farm and this property seemed like a more suitable burial place. It was named Brown’s Hill and the bodies were transferred from the Farley farm to the new cemetery.
When settlers learned of the death of John Farley, they chopped down a tree, and were in the act of hewing out a coffin from the trunk. Before they had completed the task, Mr. Belton, from the Crumlin district, arrived with his oxen and sled, hauling two large boards that were used to create a proper coffin.
Miss Jane Farley was born on Con. 2, West Nissouri, in 1849, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Turner Farley. She was 88 years old when interviewed about the Halloween customs of her younger days.
One of this writer’s most prized possessions is a rough-hewn kitchen
chair believed to have belonged to the Farley family.
