Many
things are in the planning
stages right now for Halloween
2008. From Spook Houses to
whats your costume going to
be this year. But little does
the whole world know thwt
it is also the time of year
that Ghosts and all the paranormal
things that go bump in the
night are stirring.
Paranormal
people like my self attend
many work shops over the year.
this is to us our special
times to learn new tecqniques
from Paranomal investigators
Greats like Mark Nesbitt,
Greg Myers, Gina Lanier, Troy
Taylor, Patti Starr, And Charles
Emmons, Jeff Zaffis, Chris
Flemming, TAPS, Rosemary Ellen
Guily and who ever else is
on the convention Circuit.
Halloween,
Hallowe'en, or Holloween is
a holiday celebrated on the
night of October 31. Halloween
activities include trick-or-treating,
ghost tours, bonfires, costume
parties, visiting "haunted
houses", and carving
jack-o-lanterns. Irish immigrants
carried versions of the tradition
to North America in the nineteenth
century. Other western countries
embraced the holiday in the
late twentieth century. Halloween
is celebrated in several countries
of the Western world, most
commonly in Ireland, the United
States, Canada, Puerto Rico,
the United Kingdom, New Zealand,
and occasionally in parts
of Australia.
Trick-or-treating,
ghost tours, bobbing for apples,
costume parties, carving jack-o'-lanterns,
bonfires, and fireworks (in
Ireland).
The
modern holiday of Halloween
has its origins in the ancient
Celtic festival known as Samhain.
The festival of Samhain is
a celebration of the end of
the harvest season in Gaelic
culture, and is sometimes
regarded as the "Celtic
New Year". Traditionally,
the festival was a time used
by the ancient pagans to take
stock of supplies and slaughter
livestock for winter stores.
The ancient Gaels believed
that on October 31, the boundary
between the alive and the
deceased dissolved, and the
dead become dangerous for
the living by causing problems
such as sickness or damaged
crops. The festivals would
frequently involve bonfires,
where the bones of slaughtered
livestock were thrown. Costumes
and masks were also worn at
the festivals in an attempt
to mimic the evil spirits
or placate them.
The
term Halloween (and its alternative
rendering Hallowe'en) is shortened
from All-hallow-even, as it
is the eve of "All Hallows'
Day", which is now also
known as All Saints' Day.
It was a day of religious
festivities in various northern
European Pagan traditions,
until Popes Gregory III and
Gregory IV moved the old Christian
feast of All Saints' Day from
May 13 (which had itself been
the date of a pagan holiday,
the Feast of the Lemures)
to November 1. In the ninth
century, the Church measured
the day as starting at sunset,
in accordance with the Florentine
calendar. Although All Saints'
Day is now considered to occur
one day after Halloween, the
two holidays were, at that
time, celebrated on the same
day. Liturgically, the Church
traditionally celebrated that
day as the Vigil of All Saints,
and, until 1970, a day of
fasting as well. Like other
vigils, it was celebrated
on the previous day if it
fell on a Sunday, although
secular celebrations of the
holiday remained on the 31st.
The Vigil was suppressed in
1955, but was later restored
in the post-Vatican II calendar.
There
are several games traditionally
associated with Halloween
parties. The most common is
dooking or bobbing for apples,
in which apples float in a
tub or a large basin of water;
the participants must use
their teeth to remove an apple
from the basin. A variant
of dooking involves kneeling
on a chair, holding a fork
between the teeth and trying
to drop the fork into an apple.
Another common game involves
hanging up treacle or syrup-coated
scones by strings; these must
be eaten without using hands
while they remain attached
to the string, an activity
which inevitably leads to
a very sticky face.
Some games
traditionally played at Halloween
are forms of divination. In
Puicíní (pronounced
"poocheeny"), a
game played in Ireland, a
blindfolded person is seated
in front of a table on which
several saucers are placed.
The saucers are shuffled and
the seated person then chooses
one by touch. The contents
of the saucer determine the
person's life during the following
year. A saucer containing
earth means someone known
to the player will die during
the next year, a saucer containing
water foretells emigration,
a ring foretells marriage,
a set of Rosary beads indicates
that the person will take
Holy Orders (becoming a nun
or a priest). A coin means
new wealth, a bean means poverty,
and so on. In 19th century
Ireland, young women placed
slugs in saucers sprinkled
with flour. A traditional
Irish and Scottish form of
divining one's future spouse
is to carve an apple in one
long strip, then toss the
peel over one's shoulder.
The peel is believed to land
in the shape of the first
letter of the future spouse's
name. This custom has survived
among Irish and Scottish immigrants
in the rural United States.
In North
America, unmarried women were
frequently told that if they
sat in a darkened room and
gazed into a mirror on Halloween
night, the face of their future
husband would appear in the
mirror. However, if they were
destined to die before marriage,
a skull would appear. The
custom was widespread enough
to be commemorated on greeting
cards from the late nineteenth
and early twentieth centuries.
The telling
of ghost stories and viewing
of horror films are common
fixtures of Halloween parties.
Episodes of TV series and
specials with Halloween themes
(with the specials usually
aimed at children) are commonly
aired on or before the holiday
while new horror films, like
the popular Saw films, are
often released theatrically
before the holiday to take
advantage of the atmosphere.
Visiting
a haunted attraction like
a haunted house or hayride
(especially in the northeastern
or midwest of the USA) are
other Halloween practices.
Notwithstanding the name,
such events are not necessarily
held in houses, nor are the
edifices themselves necessarily
regarded to have actual ghosts.
A variant of the haunted house
is the "haunted trail",
where the public encounters
supernatural-themed characters
or presentations of scenes
from horror films while following
a trail through a field or
forest. One of the largest
Halloween attractions in the
United States is Knott's Scary
Farm in California, which
features re-themed amusement
park rides and a dozen different
walk through mazes, plus hundreds
of costumed roving performers.
Among other theme parks, Walt
Disney World's Magic Kingdom
stages a special separate
admission event after regular
park hours called Mickey's
Not-So-Scary Halloween Party
featuring a parade, stage
show featuring Disney villains
and a Happy HalloWishes fireworks
show with a Halloween theme,
while their sibling park in
California, Disneyland Resort,
holds Mickey's Halloween Treat
at their California Adventure
park. The Universal Studios
theme parks in Hollywood and
Orlando also feature annual
Halloween events, dubbed Halloween
Horror Nights. The Six Flags
amusement parks also have
Halloween events called Fright
Fest in which visitors enjoy
redecorated rides, costumed
goals, special shows and more.
Busch Gardens Howl-O-Scream
Tampa Bay and Busch Gardens
Howl-O-Scream Williamsburg
also host a few weeks of Halloween-themed
fun. There are many haunted
houses each with a different
theme, "scare zones"
where costumed performers
scare random passerby, live
shows, special themed food
and much more.
Paranormal
Treats
HAUNTED
EVENTS CALENDAR 2008
Paranormal
Community Calendar of Shows
and Events
GHOSTS
OF GETTYSBURG. . . AND BEYOND
Sunday,
August 31, 2008
Lily Dale Assembly Hall
Lily Dale, NY
America's
Civil War battlefields are
laboratories for paranormal
investigations. Mark Nesbitt
has collected over a thousand
stories that appear to show
evidence of spirit entities
lingering on battlefields,
as seen on The Ghosts of Gettysburg
series on the History Channel.
Dr. Emmons has collected similar
accounts of hauntings in China
as well as in the town of
Gettysburg and on the Gettysburg
College campus. Using this
data, as well as photographs,
videos and audio recordings,
Nesbitt and Emmons will present
evidence of ghosts and theories
to explain them.
Charles
Emmons
Author
of Chinese Ghosts and ESP,
and Guided by Spirit: a Journey
into the Mind of the Medium.
He has appeared on numerous
TV and radio shows in the
U.S. and Hong Kong, As a sociologist
at Gettysburg College he investigates
the way science studies or
ignores paranormal phenomena
such as spirit mediumship,
and UFOs.
Mark Nesbitt
The
Well Known Paranormal Investigator
and author of the popular
Ghosts of Gettysburgbook series
, A Ghost Hunter's Field Guide:
Gettysburg & Beyond,and
several books on the Civil
War. He also appeared in the
TravelChannel's “Mysterious
Journeys.” He runs the
Ghosts of Gettysburg
Candlelight Walking Tours
in Gettysburg and the Ghosts
of Fredericksburg Tours in
Virginia.
Sunday, August
31, 2008
Lily Dale Assembly Hall
Lily Dale, NY
1:30 - 4:30 P.M.
Fee: $40.00
Also
PARANORMAL
INVESTIGATIONS ON BATTLEFIELDS
How does one research a battlefield
for historic information germane
to the investigation site?
How does one even find a Civil
War site (they're not all
national parks like Gettysburg)
and how does one get permission
to investigate there? What
is the proper use of the two
types of equipment, “detecting”
equipment and “recording”
equipment? What does each
piece of equipment do? And
finally, what is the proper
way to document all the data
gathered?
With
Mark Nesbitt
Sunday, August
31, 2008
Lily Dale Assembly Hall
Lily Dale, NY
7:00 - 10:00 P.M.
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