October brings early nightfall, brisk fall nights, pumpkins, cider, crunchy, colorful leaves, Halloween, and Dia de los Muertos.

Halloween is rooted in our agricultural past, marking the end of harvesttime and the beginning of the new year. The origin of Halloween and many of its customs can be traced to Samhain (pronounced SAH-win), an ancient pagan Celtic festival that is Gaelic for “summer’s end,” a day to bid goodbye to warmth and light. It marks the end of the harvest season and the start of winter.

The ancient Celts believed that the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead was at its thinnest during Samhain, making it the ideal time to communicate with the deceased and to divine the future.

Costumes were meant to ‘confuse’ the spirits. To keep ghosts away from their houses, people would place bowls of food outside their homes to appease the ghosts and prevent them from attempting to enter.

After the Roman Empire took over Celt-occupied lands in the 1st century A.D., the Romans combined many of the Celtic traditions, including Samhain, with their own. This day evolved into All Hallows’ Day or Allhallowmas, “hallow” meaning “to sanctify.” Years later, the Roman Catholic Church designated November 1 as All Saints’ Day, in honor of all Catholic saints. It was celebrated with a mass, bonfires, and people costumed as angels and saints parading through the villages. November 2 brings All Souls’ Day, a holy day set aside for honoring the dead and departed.

American colonists are responsible for initially bringing Halloween to the United States. Most of the colonists were English Puritans who celebrated Samhain before traveling to their new country. Although the Celtic religious traditions had long been replaced by Christianity, many of the old practices remained.

Halloween has since transitioned, and become a day of costumes, parties, pumpkin carving, festivals, and trick or treating. Today, Americans spend an estimated $6 billion annually on Halloween, making it the country’s second-largest commercial holiday after Christmas.