Creepy Vintage Halloween Costumes

By | October 11, 2021

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Spooky ghost near haunted house at Halloween in vintage style. (ArtMarie/Getty Images)

In the early days of Halloween festivities, the holiday retained much of its original focus on the macabre. Instead of princesses and firefighters or even friendly ghosts and human serial killers, kids donned costumes that made them look like something straight out of hell.

Homemade Costumes

A century ago, there were no Spirit Halloween pop-up stores to help folks find the perfect costumes. Instead, mothers dutifully stitched together masks, hoods, and cloaks from cast-offs. As a result, each child wore a truly unique costume that was a frightening mix of childlike innocence and fiendish horror.

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Supernatural, Extraterrestrial

The traditional purpose of Halloween costumes is to trick the departed souls and otherworldly nasties that are said to return to earth into thinking the wearer is one of them so they don't get attacked, so the children's costumes of yore leaned toward the supernatural, from ghosts and corpses to devils and demons.