Before Halloween became a multi-billion dollar industry with expensive decorations and pre-made costumes, it was a fun and exciting time for all kids. In the 1970s, kids engaged in creative activities combined with the free spirit of trick or treating. The magic of Halloween today where kids make their own costumes and use their imaginations is hard to convey to today’s kids. Let’s take a closer look at the magic of Halloween from the decade where disco ruled and bell bottoms were the hottest fashion.
Table of Contents
- 1 1. Ben Cooper Costumes
- 2 2. Trick-or-Treating After Dark
- 3 3. Homemade Popcorn Balls
- 4 4. UNICEF Collection Boxes
- 5 5. Paper Decorations
- 6 6. Halloween School Parades
- 7 7. Monster Cereals
- 8 8. Halloween TV Specials
- 9 9. Apple Bobbing
- 10 10. Candy Cigarettes
- 11 11. Wax Lips and Bottles
- 12 12. Decorated Paper Bags
- 13 13. Halloween Record Albums
- 14 14. Candy Apples
1. Ben Cooper Costumes
The stretchy bands to hold your mask broke at the worst possible times, and the plastic costumes designed to choke you were definitely a Halloween tradition. They were affordable enough for every kid to get their favorite character costume from Spider-Man to The Fonz.
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2. Trick-or-Treating After Dark
Guided only by street lights and their plastic jack-o-lantern buckets, kids would roam their neighborhoods until 9 or 10 p.m. Parents would sit on the porch and watch as the kids went wild and stayed out past bedtime.
3. Homemade Popcorn Balls
Every neighborhood had that one house that gave out the fresh popcorn balls wrapped in cellophane. The sticky sweets were actually eaten and not thrown away due to some nonsense safety concern in today’s world.
4. UNICEF Collection Boxes
The little orange boxes that kids got from school were used to hold pennies they collected for UNICEF. It was a tradition to neglect the box and return it full of collected candy giving it a crushed appearance.
5. Paper Decorations
Classrooms and homes were decorated for Halloween with giant spiders, black cats, crepe paper streamers, and cardboard skeletons. Each year, kids re-used this Halloween themed decor. Many homes and classrooms had spirit (and witch) cutouts, which didn’t have to be made every year. They didn’t make decorations like those anymore.
6. Halloween School Parades
Parades at every elementary school were organized to have children march in them in their costumes. Parents would take videos of the children from the sidelines of the playground while they parades took place. Everyone was able to show off their holiday spirit before the Halloween party in the classroom.
7. Monster Cereals
Halloween themed cereals like Franken-Berry, Boo-Berry and Count Chocula were breakfast options during the Halloween season, and only during this time. The prizes in the box were Halloween themed toys while the box also had a mask to cut out on the front.
8. Halloween TV Specials
Seasonal specials like It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown were a needed tradition for families to watch these shows together every year around Halloween. The shows would never be on TV at any other time during the year, so the families knew they had to watch them together then.
9. Apple Bobbing
Halloween parties in schools always had a basin full of water (and bobbing) with apples floating in it. Kids would end up getting wet but they were happy to get the prizes. Parents, teachers, and kids were never worried about spread of germs. The suff of apple bobbing was fun.
10. Candy Cigarettes
Kids would go trick or treating expecting to get chalky white sticks with a red tip as one of their treats. The sticks were smoked and sugar was blown from the end of the sticks. They were considered to be impolite today, but in the past, they were wanted Halloween treats.
11. Wax Lips and Bottles
More like a toy than candy, kids would don the lips or fangs, sip the colored sugar water from the bottles, and chew the wax (which parents claimed wasn’t actually meant to be eaten).
12. Decorated Paper Bags
Kids used to make their own trick-or-treating bags out of paper grocery bags decorated with drawings of witches, bats, and pumpkins. They were strong enough to hold a whole day’s worth of candy!
13. Halloween Record Albums
Sound effect albums played on portable record players added creaking doors and howling wolves to the Halloween party atmosphere.
14. Candy Apples
Red and caramel-coated candy apples were another Halloween specialty. Some families were candy apple legends, and getting a candy-coated apple was better than a bag of store-bought candy.
