I have something truly incredible to share today!
Since I truly got into Halloween collecting in my adult life, one thing I have always wanted is one of those old paper maché pumpkins.
I first came across them while trying to find information on a die cut pumpkin decoration that’s been a grail item of mine since I was about twelve years old. I don’t think I realized what a market there was for vintage Halloween items until I, almost inadvertently, started looking. Somewhere in my search, though I never did find what I was initially looking for, I started to see all of these incredibly unique little pumpkins, that brought to mind a completely different era in time. Most of them had their mouths in a permanent “O” shape, as if either surprised or frightened. And, due to their age, they each had particular “defects” that only seemed to add to their character. You couldn’t help but look at them and wonder what they’d seen; what they’d been through. What was Halloween like when these little pumpkins were the central focus of a table display, or flickering in a window as trick-or-treaters passed? Some even seemed to have handles. Were they ever used to carry candy on Halloween night?
I made a promise to myself then and there that one day I would own at least one.
Due to their usually higher price tags and my other collecting endeavors taking up a lot of my time and money for many years in between, I kind of put the idea on the back burner for awhile. Over the past year, though, as I’ve started to discover my true Halloween collecting and aesthetic goals, I suddenly started to remember just how badly I wanted one of those specific types of vintage pumpkins. I searched high and low at the antique shops in Delaware, but the closest thing I found was my mysterious little Scratch Kitty. 2019’s shopping season yielded a few vintage style pumpkins, all very aesthetically pleasing, but I still desperately yearned for a true vintage pumpkin of my own. I figured I would just know the right one when I saw it. And finally, several days ago on Mercari, he finally appeared.
He’s truly everything I ever hoped to find in one of these pumpkins. That “O” expression that brings me back to many of the pumpkins my aunt carved in my childhood, and to the infamous “McBoo” pumpkin pails from McDonald’s. Just the right amount of imperfections to give him a tremendous amount of character and make you wonder what he’s seen in his time. The price was also much less than I was expecting to pay when I finally found my prospective perfect pumpkin.
There’s also one other thing that makes this pumpkin truly special, and was the deciding factor in choosing him.
He has a mostly burnt candle still stuck inside him!
The seller was worried that this actually ruined the pumpkin as a collector’s item, but I knew on sight that this actually made him perfect. While you can look at any one of these old pumpkins and know that they’ve most likely seen a lot their time, seeing an old candle stuck inside one like this just proves that there is an immense amount of history within this particular pumpkin. There’s no way to tell exactly how long this candle has been in there, but my guess is that it’s been quite awhile. I’d like to think it was put there by his first owners, who proudly displayed him for several Halloweens before he was somehow lost to them and managed to survive all this time. It’s hard to explain but I can so clearly picture him in his prime, glowing as a centerpiece on a table at an old fashioned Halloween party, or in a window on Halloween night. And while I would love any vintage pumpkin, and still may end up with more in the future, I don’t think any other could capture my heart and imagination quite the way this one has.
Stay spooky, my friends.
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