Saturday, October 17, 2009

He Gave Pumpkins A New Look!

Pumpkins, pumpkins, pumpkins; they're climbing the fence, the walls and usurping the entire yard of our home, attracting Valley wide attention as it did every year when Dad, aka "The Pumpkin Man", would transform the lowly vegetable into resplendent and ingenious works of art.

Dad's creations departed from the traditional Jack-o-Lantern, with its candle flickering through triangular eyes, nose and grinning mouth. In designing his pumpkin faces, he used autumn vegetables instead.

The eyes were usually gourds or turnips; parsnips for the mouth because they were easily bendable, and squash in assorted sizes for the ears and nose.

After everything was fastened in place with nails, a properly wielded paintbrush added more distinction and expression to the pumpkin face features.

Dad truly gave Halloween a new look! He would concoct anywhere from 100-175 pumpkin heads as part of a huge display on our front lawn that included a variety of scare crows, witches and a smoking cauldron.

His out-of-this-world treatment of the pumpkins not only thrilled the 4 of us kids and the children for blocks around, but children from all parts of the Valley who were brought by parents to witness the annual display.

On Halloween night, first-comers who rapped on our door, were favored with a gift of one of the elaborately decorated pumpkins as long as the supply lasted!

Every year, Dad would also turn his work to good purpose, or a purpose above that of delighting the hundreds of youngsters who visited our home.

He would deliver them to local hospitals, schools and churches. The Optimist Club would use them for money-raising projects to help the YMCA, Little League and Home for Boys, just to name a few.


The 'Before & After'
 
Dad At His Work Bench
 
All of the Neighborhood Kids


Mom being 'scared' by Dad. lol
Oh My Gosh, My Parents were Lucy and Ricky?!!


Hospital Visits.
Cool Looking Nurses, huh? And those were NOT costumes!!


 
No Explanation Needed Here!




 
Ah, yes. The funny pumpkin on the right is your's truly
 
Mom 'n Dad....
The Best Pumpkin's in the World!
Thanks for the most wonderful Trick-or-Treat memories a kid could ever have.




And that's how I celebrated Halloween, circa 1950's








9 comments:

  1. This is fantastic, J! Love the walk down memory lane. Love, A

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  2. Muwahahahahahaha!

    Wow, what an awesome thing for your dad to do and what a cool memory to have! Thanks for sharing this with us and thank you for a hauntingly good party!

    I'm visiting from Beyond to celebrate the spookiest Halloween blog party ever! I hope you are having a fang-tastic time today! You are cordially invited to share in the celebration at my party HERE. I do hope you'll stop by!

    Have a spook-tacular day!

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  3. I love this tribute to your Dad. That is so incredible that he did all that. God Bless him! Do stop by and party with Alice and Dead Bob, if you dare! **kisskiss** Deborah

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  4. Wonderful Halloween memories. Thank you for inviting us to relive them with you. Have a magical weekend! Twyla

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  5. What a nice family memory and a nice thing to do for others help..looked fun.thanks for sharing..

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  6. Wonderful! Thanks for inviting me over.

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  7. Wow, what a magical story. Your dad had a great personality. Looks like he was very kind with sharing his fun with others. Love the photo of your mother and him in the window. Too cute. Ricky and Lucy, yes.
    Xo,
    Tammy

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  8. Wow, fabulous! What wonderful pumpkins! Thanks for sharing!

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  9. I convoed you in your etsy shop to let you know you won one of my BOO banners. Please email me with your address at tlsprinkle@yahoo.com
    Congratulations!!
    Tammy

    ReplyDelete

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