Page:Hallowe'en merrymaking (IA halloweenmerryma1931unit).pdf/3

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 * UNITEDSTATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE
 * RADIO SERVICE
 * OFFICE OF INFORMATION.
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HOUSEMAKERS' CHAT

Subject: "Hallowe'en Merrymaking, " Menus and. recipes from the Bureau of Home Economics, U. S.D.A.

Bulletins available: "Lamb As You like It" and "Aunt Sammy's Recipes Revised."

Of all the holidays of the year, the two that children enjoy most are Hallowe'en and. Christmas. Hallowe'en with all its tradition of mystery, quaint old spooky customs and. celebrations has a special appeal to young imaginations. What youngster doesn't enjoy this night of the year when ghosts and goblins are abroad, when witches are riding on broomsticks and other eerie folk are free to wander.

Hallowe'en is one of the oldest holidays we have much older than Christmas in fact, because it came down to us from the harvest festival of the ancient Druids, when each village lighted a great altar fire as a protection against evil spirits. Each family took a spark from the new altar fire for their own hearth fire as a protection for the coming year,

When the Druids became Christians, they abandoned this festival, but the superstitious country folk still believed down through the ages that on All Hallow Eve, the fairies and elves came out to dance in enchanted moonlight and that bed spirits gathered in deserted castles to plot against mankind. In fact, as late as the 17th century farmers would tramp over their acres on Hallowe'en brandishing lighted torches and chanting weird songs to frighten away the goblins. And until very recent years, I'm told, the custom of lighting Hallowe'en fires has continued in the highlands of Scotland and Wales.