604 465 4322General Store Site 12294 Harris Road Pitt Meadows, B.C.
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History of Halloween in Pitt Meadows
Halloween as we know it, is a relatively new tradition. It is however rooted in very old traditions like that of Samhain. Today our Halloween celebrations consist of children wearing costumes and going door-to-door screaming “Trick or Treat” in the hopes of getting a treat, watching horror movies with friends, going to Haunted Houses, or dressing up and going to fun parties.
Halloween had descended from Celtic traditions, which were brought to Canada in the mid-to-late 1800’s by Irish and Scottish immigrants. Their traditions of wearing costumes to ward off malevolent spirits and offering food to appease them has become part of the tradition we all know and love. In North America, our first recorded instance of dressing up was in Vancouver in 1898! Halloween originally was all about mischief and pranks, which we in Pitt Meadows have seen our fair share of! Arguably the best Halloween “prank” was the mounting of WW1 machine guns to our municipal hall in 1929/30, which you can read about here.
Celebrating in Pitt Meadows
Trick or Treating wouldn’t have been much of a thing when we were a tiny newly incorporated district. Since there were very few children (and our population was tiny!) it wasn’t practical for kids to drag themselves from farm to farm. If we were celebrating Halloween in 1914, it would have been small parties at home. We also were going through World War One, and then the depression, and then another World War which meant rationing and a lack of the sweet goodies that kids crave.
By the 1950s with the rise of commercialized candy, it became a lucrative business opportunity. People were heavily encouraged to buy candy in stores to give out to kids (rather than the homemade stuff they were used to). By the 1970s, it was standard to give out storebought items as they were deemed “safer” than a homemade item. During the 1950’s we also see a growth in suburbs, where kids would have been able to quickly walk door to door (and get all their loot!). One could argue that the growth of the suburbs helped with the growth and popularity of Halloween.
Today, we’re lucky to live in a City that has ample Trick or Treating Spots, with perhaps the best being the famous (at least in Pitt Meadows) “Spooky Lane”. So let’s let kids enjoy the fun of racing through their neighbourhoods on a sugar high as they collect more candy than they can carry, and hopefully parents you can take your “tax” as soon as they go to bed!
Trick or Treat! Happy Halloween!
