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Stuart L. Schneider

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Halloween in America: A Collector's Guide With Prices (A Schiffer Book for Collectors) Paperback – January 1, 1995

by Stuart Schneider (Author)

4.8 66 ratings

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Next to Christmas, more money is spent on Halloween decorations and novelties than on any other holiday. This wonderful book has been credited with inspiring the Halloween collecting craze, giving its devotees a chance to celebrate the holiday all year round! In addition to color photography and a brand new price guide, there are also many fascinating insights into Halloween. Most people are familiar with the symbols―ghosts, Jack-O'-Lanterns, witches, bats, skeletons, and black cats―but few know about Halloween's past. Why does it exist? What is the origin of trick-or-treating? Why does it fall on October 31st? Through these pages you will experience Halloween celebrations of the past and take a look at Halloween today. For collectors, this is one of the largest collections of Halloween memorabilia.

About the Author

Stuart Schneider is an attorney who has written sixteen prior books on collectibles and antiques. He resides and works in Northern New Jersey.

Print length

208 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Schiffer Publishing, Ltd.
Publication date

January 1, 1995
Dimensions

8.5 x 0.5 x 11 inches
ISBN-10

0887407072
ISBN-13

978-0887407079
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Schiffer Publishing, Ltd.; With Revised Y2K Prices edition (January 1, 1995)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 208 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0887407072
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0887407079
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.15 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.5 x 0.5 x 11 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,344,930 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #288 in Americana Antiques & Collectibles
- #1,820 in Antiques & Collectibles Encyclopedias
- #69,562 in Social Sciences (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.8 66 ratings

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About the author

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Stuart L. Schneider

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Stuart Schneider lives just outside New York City. He is an accomplished photographer who currently scouts cemeteries in the day and sees and senses what is there. He returns at night to capture his images. One out of a hundred have something unusual, most do not. The color photos are evocative and draw you in as if you are actually standing there and seeing what the photographer saw and felt. These are not the typical orb or streak-type ghosts that ghost hunters often get, but full formed, vaporous apparitions. He has visited haunted cemeteries throughout the world. His latest books, “Ghosts In The Cemetery” and “Ghosts In The Cemetery II, Farther Afield” are best-selling works, melding storytelling, photography, and beautiful imagery together.

My other books cover the field of antiques and collectibles and fluorescent minerals. The photography is professional-grade. If you want to see what he is describing, the photographs easily show you. The different fields that I cover are a bit offbeat. My publisher asks me if anyone will buy (ie. Halloween In America) and I say yes (what else would I say?). Now, many of the books are in their 2nd and third editions, so people are buying them and saying nice things about them. If you want to delve further into my experiences, visit my website at wordcraft.net. I write what I am interested in and try to share my information with all my readers. Stuart

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Melanie O. Massengale

Excellent item! I am very pleased with it.

Reviewed in the United States on December 7, 2023

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Gift for a collector.

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The Wingchair Critic

In the Sumptuous Time of Autumn

Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2002

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Stuart L. Schneider's dynamic 'Halloween In America: A Collector's Guide With Prices' (1995) spectacularly captures the spirit of the classic years of the American Halloween tradition: the period from the turn of the century through the end of the nineteen-fifties. Though the book includes more recent material, Schneider wisely focuses on what he recognizes to be the holiday's glory days in this country, when its spirit hadn't moved too far from its agricultural roots and American culture was predominantly positive, forward-looking, and uncynical--and its Halloween decorations charming and vividly imaginative.

The book opens with three short, loosely-composed essays, "A Brief History Of Halloween," "The Colors And Images Of Halloween," and "Halloween In America." Schneider, who provides no source material, is often broadly correct but specifically wrong.

He suggests, for instance, that the Druids may have built Stonehenge when it has been long established that they did not, and that 'Dryad' is another word for 'Druid.'

The author also writes a paragraph about witches and "witch conventions" during the Celtic reign of the British Isles as if this were an established historical fact, embellishing his account with images of witches stirring cauldrons, speaking in tongues, dancing around bon fires, and sacrificing animals; if Schneider knows this to be historically factual, then he has access to information the rest of the world doesn't.

He also discusses 'Samhain' as a god of the Celtic people who "controlled the dead or non-growing season," when whether or not 'Samhain' was a Celtic deity or even an entity, rather than a season or holiday, is something currently hotly debated among historians, scholars, and Wiccans.

Schneider is to be commended for his honesty in addressing some of the more unpleasant aspects of the holiday and its associations head-on, as well as for the wonderful historical scope he provides in placing Halloween origins in a wide, multi-cultural context.

Readers will find a rich phantasmagoria of topics discussed in the essays, including the custom of sin eating, All Saints' and All Souls' Days, the belief in the 'veil between worlds' and the return of the dead to their families one the night of the harvest feast, the story of 'Jack of the Lantern,' Snap-Apple and Crack-Nut Nights, apple bobbing, fortune-telling, the Scottish influence on American Halloween traditions, Cabbage and Mischief Nights, the various theories surrounding the origin of trick-or-treating, the meaning of the literal 'scapegoat' and its influence of the appearance of the Christian Devil, the Mexican Day of the Dead, and even mention of the elves, gnomes, boogies, and goblins with which agrarian societies peopled the forests and fields.

The gorgeous main portion of the book is dedicated to collectible items and includes sections on Postcards, Decorations, Lanterns, Costumes, Hats and Masks, Noisemakers, Invitations, Games and Toys, Trick Or Treat Bags, and Vegetable People, Figurines and Candy Containers.

Halloween In America is by far the best of the books on Halloween collectibles available, and also the best of the Schiffer books on the subject.

Many readers will remember these items from their childhood homes, classroom bulletin boards, Five & Dime store shelves and windows, and neighborhood parties. Readers will also be astonished at how the painters, artisans, and creators of these crepe paper, cardboard, composition, glass, and celluloid items were able to envision and capture what we remember and still think of as the very essence of holiday, and in a wide variety of forms: lonely, barren, orange-skied landscapes with setting suns ablaze or yellow rising moons, black cats and owls lurking in pumpkin patches with an anthropomorphic moon overhead, witches flying on broomsticks in formation over dark, isolated houses, skeletons parading in graveyards, etc.

Folklorists, sociologists, academics, and artists may have special appreciation for the visionary and sometimes surreal paintings, illustrations, and three-dimensional designs revealed here.

One 1908 German postcard portrays a witch, a black cat and a vegetable spirit riding in a car made of a partially hollowed-out watermelon with squash-slice tires; another portrays a red-caped witch riding a immense cob of husked corn like a phallus-conquering Amazon through the stratosphere, with an astonished moon and planet Jupiter looking on; and a third, from 1911, shows children happily bobbing for apples in their warm, cozy home, while a tall, red-skirted, stone-faced witch, accompanied by an owl and a black cat, looks in at the window like the ultimate outsider and a disenfranchised, but still proud and powerful, loner.

An entire page is devoted to 1910 postcards of anthropomorphic vegetables riding cars, dancing with or chasing fairies, and joyfully imitating human family practices.

Others display Rockwell-like scenes of boys and girls carving pumpkins or trick-or-treating, or elderly women in dimly-lit Victorian mansions being frightened by children's pranks and high jinks.

Throughout the book, visionary landscapes and distant horizons beckon; curly-toed elves spring from hollow trees and slide gleefully down rooftops; lone witches warm their hands at their cauldrons under brilliant, star-filled skies; beautiful young ladies sleep fitfully on ruffled pillows while fairies circle their heads; peaked-hat shadows stretch in threateningly at midnight doorways; black cats screech to their own banjo, accordion, violin, and horn playing; and scarecrows extend their arms heavenwards to frighten off their circling opponents.

Readers will run for their magnifying and/or reading glasses so that none of the often minute detail will escape their gaze and inspection. 'Halloween In America' is a huge treat, will make collectors and seekers out of most, and hopefully inspire generations to come to celebrate and pass on the traditions recorded here. Highly recommended to holiday lovers, educators, folklorists, Scout leaders, and all lovers of Americana.

36 people found this helpful

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Sassy

Arrived fast!

Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2022

Nice reference book!

good graphics and informative

Reviewed in the United States on February 6, 2014

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I always look at my books for information on what kind of price to pay when buying old halloween. It's a great tool to use when looking at ebay and wondering if the price is right.

Reviewed in the United States on July 1, 2011

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This book is perfect if you are collecting vintage Halloween items and want to know approximately the year the items were made and the maker of the items. The photos are very sharp. This is a great coffee table book to have out in the fall. Several people have looked through my copy and remarked it is a wonderful book and remembers some of the items from when they were younger. When I read the previous reviews I had mixed emotions on whether I should get the book. I'm certainly happy that I followed through and purchased it.

2 people found this helpful

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summerdog

Colorful! I love it.

Reviewed in the United States on December 2, 2017

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Such a rich, pretty book. Lots and lots of large pictures of many colorful things that will jog your memory of Halloweens you had in your past. Items go way back to the early 1900's in America. It will make a great Baby Boomer gift for a Halloween lover.

2 people found this helpful

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scientist infinity

beautiful quality color images of halloween

Reviewed in the United States on October 19, 2018

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beautiful quality photographs of exceptional and rare halloween images. Im not a collector but i bought it for the sheer pleasure of looking at the beautiful images.

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