The History of the Jack-o-lantern

I love to play dress up and I love to dress up on Halloween. Can you tell? We had a great, quiet night at home eating chili, trick or treating the neighborhood, visiting with family, friends and neighbors. Gwyn was so fun when she caught on that people wer giving candy away!

I also love Jack-o-lanterns. We have a pumpkin party every year to carve with friends and today Aggie counted 72 jack-o-lantern decorations as we cleaned them up! For a homeschool project this year Aggie learned the history of the Jack-o-lantern and lo and behold it is Irish-yea McIntyre! Here is her report:

The Irish used to carry turnips carved out with faces on them on All Hallows Eve as lanterns. They went out on this night to beg for money and food because the next day was All Saints Day. People would give money because they were remembering their family who died. The Irish people came to America because of the potato famine and we changed turnips to pumpkins because America had alot of pumpkins at Harvest. The Irish told a story about a mean, mean man named Jack who did not share. He didn't love Jesus so he couldn't go to Heaven. The Devil felt sorry for him and gave him a hot coal that he put it in his pumpkin lantern to light up his way. Now we call then Jack-o-lanterns because of the story of Jack and the Irish!