Halloween Countdown - 5

Fun Facts

Halloween traditions of trick-or-treating were brought to America in the 1840s by Irish escaping the Great Potato Famine. The Irish Potato Famine (1845-50) prompted over 700,000 people to immigrate to the Americas. On Halloween, Irish peasants begged the rich for food and played practical jokes on those who refused. To avoid being tricked, the rich handed out cookies, candies, and fruit. A practice that turned into our present day trick-or-treating.

Orange and black became Halloween colors because orange is associated with harvests and black is associated with death.

Did you know - There are no words in the dictionary that rhyme with orange? Hard to believe for such an important color?

The same is true for the colors purple and silver. But, who cares about silver and purple...they are not pumpkin colors!

The biggest pumpkin in the world tipped the scales at a whopping 1,446 pounds. This gigantic gourd was weighed in October 2004 at a pumpkin festival in Port Elgin, Ontario, Canada.

Candy corn, anyone? More than 35 million pounds of candy corn will be produced this year, an estimated $1.93 billion in candy sales. That equates to nearly 9 billion pieces! Enough to circle the moon nearly four times if laid end-to-end.

Tootsie Rolls were the first wrapped penny candy in America.

What's the most popular Halloween candy?

Snickers tops the list for trick-or-treaters.

Halloween is the sweetest holiday of the year, beating out Easter, Valentine's Day, and Christmas. In fact, one quarter of all the candy sold each year is purchased between September 15 and November 10.

Halloween is second only to Christmas in spending. U.S. consumers spend as much as $1.5 billion on costumes each year, and more than $2.5 billion on other Halloween paraphernalia, such as decorations and crafts. More than $100 million is spent online.

Halloween is the 8th largest card-sending occasion.

There are over 28 million Halloween cards sent each year!

And a little Ha-Ha:

You might be a Redneck if
the Halloween pumpkin on your front porch has more teeth than your spouse.