Halloween Tricks and Kerosene

When Halloween came to our place, we didn't have any tricks or treats. The only thing we ever did that I can remember was to get a piece of carbite chalk and drawing a big pumpkin on the screen door on the front of the house, a jack-o-lantern with eyes.

We heard about the neighbor kids getting together and taking the wheels off a buggy and putting it on top of a barn and reassembling it up there, and the old farmer coming out and seeing his buggy up on top of his barn. I can tell you there were probably some cuss words said.

They also would move an out house away from the hole so when you walked out of it you'd fall in the hole.

That'd have to be done by kids with lots of time on their hands. I never got involved in that. I was too nice a boy (well, a nice boy at least, the 'too' is kind of questionable).

Having kerosene lamps maximized and minimized the days and the nights. The lamp would be sat on the table for eating. We didn't sit up late reading, it would have been wasteful of the light. We were early to bed and early to rise. But it was because kerosene cost 25 cents a gallon and would last about a month. The main use for kerosene was for the lantern kept out in the barn, hung on a nail, which would help you see while you did the night time milking. You still couldn't see much, and you'd need to feel around a bit, but so long as you knew where the cow teats were, where the manure was, and which end it came out of so you could steer clear from it, you would be ok! Kerosene was kept corked with a potato.