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Trick-or-Treat

Kate Burt

Issue date: 10/31/08 Section: Features
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The grass is littered with the reds, oranges and yellows of fall leaves. The air is crisp and bitter, and the smell of corn stalks and foliage fills the air. Halloween is here.

In the first century A.D., the Celts, who lived in what is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France, started the tradition of Halloween, according to www.history.com.

On Nov. 1, All Saints' Day, the Celts celebrated their new year and marked the beginning of a cold, harsh winter.

The Celts associated winter with human death. On the night before the first of November, Halloween, the Celts believed the worlds of the living and the dead collided. On this night, they believed the ghosts of the dead returned to Earth to damage crops and cause trouble. When Christianity started to spread into the Celtic region around the 800s, Pope Boniface IV named Nov. 1 as All Saints' Day to replace the Celts' holiday of the dead with a more religious holiday.

St. Bonaventure students are ready to celebrate Halloween 20 centuries later.

Many people have a favorite Halloween candy, and senior journalism and mass communication major George Roland loves the traditional orange, white and yellow candies of fall.

"I do like candy corn, and I know that's really a love or hate thing, but I really like candy corn!" he said. "(My favorite Halloween candy is) probably snickers, too."

Junior journalism and mass communication major Breanna Farner doesn't feel the same way about candy corn.

"I hate candy corn," she said. "But I like candy apples!"

Two thousand years ago, the Celts would dress up in ghoulish costumes to scare away the spirits of the dead from returning to cause havoc. Today, the most fun part about Halloween is dressing up - and don't do it to scare away any ghosts. Farner is making a video game into a reality with her costume.

"I am being Peach from Super Mario Brothers, and my boyfriend is being Mario," she said.

Farner also recalled some of her previous costumes from high school.
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