Halloween, or Hallow E’en as it is occasionally shortened to, is a month-long celebration or thereabouts, usually celebrated around October, with the pinnacle being sometime on the 31st October. All Hallow’s Day is on November 1st, which is usually used to recover from a month long party, or for other things.

Halloween was the brainchild of Herbert McHallow, and his then ‘friend’ Amy. They first came up with idea specifically (although there is some speculation that the date may be incorrect) on August 3rd 1974.

Before then, it had been a one day event steeped in history and mystery since the dawning of time, and Herbert and Amy thought it would be a good idea to make a ‘thing’ of it.

Herbert was an artist, and set to work creating items for use solely at Halloweentime, including cards which had the slogan ‘Be my Halloween Fright!’, also trying to cash in on the popularity of St Valentine’s Day (which had been ‘invented’ the previous year by Herbert’s arch-nemesis Viktor Von Luff.)

McHallow’s Everyday Shoppe, the emporium owned and operated by Herbert’s Great-Grandfather Stanley (also, according to sources, since the dawn of time) became the first place anywhere in the world to sell Halloween merchandise. As well as the cards, sweets, costumes and sinister music DVDs were also sold (although back then nobody knew what DVDs actually were and most used them either as coasters or created decorative wall hangings out of them – many thought they were to cast an eerie reflected light around the darker October days.)

Brian Jones, historian and archaeologist currently ‘on a dig’ somewhere in Peru disputes the above facts, as he believes that it was descendants of his family that came up with the Halloween idea, long before 1973.

Brian Jones was also in the same class as Herbert at school, coincidentally, and have never spoken since, although Herbert disputes Brian Jones’ claim.

Brian Jones counter-disputes with the revelation that Halloween couldn’t have been created by Herbert and Amy, as Amy never actually existed, and was a figment of Herbert’s far-fetched imagination.

And Herbert counter-disputes this by producing a sketch he did of Amy, back in 1972, just before they got to work on THEIR idea. Which may or may not prove her existence, but backs up the claim that he was an artist. Sadly, Herbert concedes, he and Amy haven’t spoken now for many years. He can’t say why, when or how they lost contact.

Regardless of Amy’s existence, Halloween still exists to this day, and is celebrated by some for a whole month. Some for a whole year, and others just for the day. The night actually, on October 31st.

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Sideview’s Weekend Theme this week is Ambiguous, and according to Wikipedia, Ambiguity of information, in words, pictures, or other media is the ability to express more than one interpretation. With this post, just to clarify, ambiguity of events comes under scrutiny, not the existence of Halloween. I just felt I needed to make that clear in case you thought I thought Halloween was made up. Which I don’t.

As usual, pop along to Sideview’s space to find other takes on this weekend’s theme!