Halloween Has Certainly Come a Long Way Since 1974

Halloween today is light years different than it was when I was a child back in the 1970s, especially when it comes to costumes. My son has had two amazing costumes - last year he was a lion, this year Sesame Street’s “The Count” - both hard to find, and cost a pretty penny. But that’s the market when it comes to dressing up for Halloween these days right?

Let’s step back in time. I bring you back to 1974 - when the joy of finding a Halloween costume brought you to stores like Woolworth’s where you could find rows and rows and rows of boxes filled with costumes - all different, yet all the same. A plastic mask and a costume that tied on like an apron.

In the pictures here I’m dressed as none other than the Queen of Hearts.

My memories of these costumes not only included standing in front of the shelves of boxes deciding if I was going to be Holly Hobbie, Alice in Wonderland, Tinkerbell and the like, but also included memories of my mother cutting the eye holes in the mask just a little larger so I could see better, and the nostrils in the nose, as well, so I could breath a little better. She would also, of course, trim the costume itself so I wouldn’t trip over it.

Just typing all this brings back memories of friends and neighbors out en masse trick or treating in dozens of similar costumes each and every Halloween.