Graveyard shift

Interesting facts from the Auburn Parks and Recreation newsletter: Halloween is the second most commercially successful holiday in the US (Christmas is first). People spend over $2.5 billion during Halloween on candies, costumes, decorations and parties. Candy sales account for $2 billion of that figure.

Pumpkins and various other paraphernalia are starting to appear in force on people's front porches and lawns all over Auburn. The great pumpkin carve at the University attracts over 3 thousand people each year, so we thought we'd better go... I'll take the camera, it should be quite something. Boris is wondering what to wear for trick and treating - Rod and I are trying to persuade him to be a zombie (easy to assemble the costume given our current resources) but he has much more elaborate ideas, of course.

Our apartment is situated in front of the historic graveyard near the centre of town. It is 6 acres and pretty crammed with graves. Each year they have a night tour of the graveyard near Halloween - the Pine Hill Lantern Tour - so we thought we'd better go although we had no idea what it might entail (I was prepared for quite a 'dry' event.) We arrived and were greeted by the Tallasee String Band and a group of people dressed in period clothes. All the paths of the graveyard were lit with tea lights in paper bags and small groups of visitors were led into the darkness as they arrived.

Our group set out with three young women as our guides, each holding an oil lamp. We plunged into the darkness. Not far along the path, a figure emerged from the gloom - it was the first of some 16

occupants of the graveyard that we met on the tour. Each person took on the character of a person of note buried in the graveyard - a light was placed on their grave and the person then recounted their history and anecdotes from their life.

The characters ranged from the important (eg Rev. W. L. Lloyd, founder of Auburn to an eccentric school teacher - Millie Hollifield Jones, noted for making numerous citizens arrests, usually for minor parking offences - unnamed Confederate Soldiers, and black slaves who made good) It was great fun and highly entertaining (and educational) - some of the actors really went to town and put on very spirited (pardon the pun) performances, getting right into character. I tried to take some photos but it was pretty hard as it was so dark (I chopped off the top of the General James Henry Lane's head as you can see - but it gives you some idea).

This is Virginia Howe - married at 13, dead at 15 and then her husband married her sister, much to her disgust. She was great playing the wronged woman...